The Founder Discussion

This movie is a very interesting story about how the iconic McDonald's restaurant came to be. We all are aware of the fast service and classic products that this chain brings to the food industry, but the story of its start is one that many people might not know. The McDonald's brothers first started the restaurant with the intent to just keep it small and local. However, Ray found their business and had bigger plans for it, which the brothers were not always keen on. Eventually, Ray iced the brothers out of the McDonald's company entirely, and it has obviously continued to grow into the force that it is today.
First of all, there were multiple elements of entrepreneurship that I found interesting in this movie. All of them relating to topics from class on Tuesday. The first element stems from the discussion that we, as a class, had about entrepreneurs and managers. The McDonald brothers were the initial creators of value in this case. The innovated their business throughout the touch economic climate of the 1930's and took advantage of trends at the time to give people what they wanted in a restaurant. The brothers innovated many times. The moved their entire building to a larger geographical area, they made it a drive through format, and they limited the products that they offered to control quality to the best of their ability. The brothers were good entrepreneurs that did all the right things. However, as we discussed in class, this did not mean that they were good managers. Managers are people that can control costs of the venture and keep profits and revenue high. They are not necessarily concerned with value creation, but revenue creation instead.
Ray was a good manager. He sealed the deal on multiple franchises and figured out alternate ways to cut costs and stay profitable. Due to this role that he plays in the movie and the creation of McDonald's he can be seen as the villain of the story. He ices out the brothers and uses their creation for the benefit of himself. Although this can morally be seen as wrong, it is often a very necessary part of business.
Secondly, based on a discussion in class on Tuesday, perfect competition can not exist effectively. The McDonald brothers spent a lot of time figuring out how they could maximize their resource and time use, but when it came down to their opening, there were no consumers that valued their product so it was all for naught. They first had to spread the word and get their business out to people that would value it, then they could start focusing on efficient production, just without using up every bit of their time, money, and materials.
Society has a huge impact on startup companies because, without consumers that are valuing the product, there is no way that an entrepreneur or a manager, either one, can succeed. As seen in the movie, consumers had to figure out that McDonald's products were valuable, and Ray even mentions that the name became iconic for the company. After all, we still know McDonald's as one of the largest players in the fast food industry.
To the point of managers versus entrepreneurs in busines, society as a whole might not have such a huge impact. Consumers do not care about the costs of the company, they only want their valuable products, which will get to them in one way or another. One way that the entrepreneurial and managerial roles can affect consumers is if the entrepreneur drives their original business to the ground, and its valued products are no longer apart of the market for consumers that value them.