Eating is fun! Join the McRonnie Club!

[zonelistener]

Originally posted by Calluna
I think that when one 'does the ronald' it means that they have sold out and become a corporate tool, crossed over to the dark side for the almighty dollar. It's kind of like that old Mojo Nixon song about how Elvis is in everyone. Scott Baio was the Anti-Elvis because he had no Elvis in him. I'm sure Scott Baio does the ronald every single day.

I'm not sure this will make sense to anyone but myself but that is how I see it.

Very good. I get it. Yes, Scott Baio.

[Flaming Friar Sr]

*licks lips* at thread

[Flaming Friar Sr]

hey gang, here's an article youll all enjoy. its got all the answers. it even encourages us to do the ronald. did you know that your avarage ronald makes 40.000 bucks a year and can have years of about 100.000???? have fun reading.

McDonald's plans Ronald revival
By Shirley Leung and Suzanne Vranica
The Wall Street Journal

McDonald's is planning to make its signature clown more visible. Officials are keeping most of the details under wraps, though.

When it comes to Ronald McDonald, McDonald's doesn't clown around. It won't even admit that there is more than one Ronald.

For four months now, McDonald's Corp. executives have been meeting at headquarters in Oak Brook, Ill., trying to decide just how to script a Ronald revival. The Golden Arches is mostly mum on the matter, saying only that the 40-year-old character will start showing up more -- and in unexpected places. Maybe he'll even perform his new dance, "Do the Ronald."

The careful choreography of this clown's every step shows the McDonald's machine in high gear. No detail is too small. In 1999, McDonald's ad agency Leo Burnett hired a Los Angeles stylist to refashion Ronald's wavy red hair, and it spent months studying whether to increase the width of the red stripes on his socks.

So protective is McDonald's of the character's mystique that men who play Ronald are never to admit that they do. Ronalds in costume aren't to say who they are in civilian life.

McDonald's keeps a roster of about 250 Ronalds world-wide, according to marketing experts familiar with the program, and franchisees, with some support from the company, pay for Ronalds as an advertising expense. Each major market in the United States has at least one Ronald, with large cities employing several.

Ronalds often have schedulers, chauffeurs and bodyguards. Thanks to McDonald's franchisees, a Ronald in Nevada got a motor home so he could travel more easily. Bodyguards? "Kids would throw rocks from the parking lot. Sometimes you would get protesters," explains Jeff McMullen, a former Ronald, of Appleton, Wis.

Typically actors, or ex-Ringling Bros. clowns or teachers, Ronalds make about $40,000 a year on average. A Ronald busy handling 400 shows a year can make close to $100,000, while the highest-paying Ronald, who appears in national commercials, earns more than $300,000, according to former Ronalds. Asked about Ronald's salary, McDonald's ducks the question. "Ronald doesn't go out to work," says Amy Murray, a director in U.S. marketing. "He goes out to have fun."

McDonald's trains and recruits many Ronalds through a Clayton, Calif., company, CW & Co. Productions. One of its methods is to place ads in clown magazines.

Many amateur clowns covet the gig. "To be a Ronald is a lifelong career," says Janet Tucker, past president of the World Clown Association.

To preserve the illusion that there is only one Ronald, the chain forbids two Ronalds from ever appearing together except at a secret biennial convention McDonald's holds -- but won't talk about -- in which Ronalds brush up on their skills.

McDonald's own Web site seems to intimate that there is more than one Ronald. On World Children's Day last November, according to the site, Ronald was everywhere. He posed for pictures in Austria, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Hong Kong, New York and Russia.

Asked about that, Larry Light, McDonald's global chief marketing officer, stands pat. "There is only one," he says.

After repeated grilling on the multi-Ronald question, McDonald's officials released a statement, attributable, they said, to Ronald: "If I told you all my secrets, they wouldn't be secrets anymore. Let's just say that between you, me and Santa, it's magic."

In the beginning, Ronald was so tightly controlled that McDonald's wouldn't even let him take the costume home with him. He had to change clothes at an advertising agency. When McDonald's first introduced Ronald in 1963, he visited many restaurants. Now he may appear at a restaurant twice a year and spend the rest of the time on the road visiting schools, hospitals and nursing homes. He's often booked a year in advance.

Ronald McDonald was the brain-clown of two people: Washington advertising executive Barry Klein and renowned Ringling Bros. clown Michael "Coco" Polakovs. At the time, Klein's clients included a McDonald's franchisee and a local Bozo the Clown television show. Klein persuaded the franchisee to run commercials on the Bozo show to reach out to children. After the kiddie show was canceled in 1963, Klein regrouped with Bozo, then played by Willard Scott, who gave the McDonald's clown his name: Ronald McDonald.

Scott, the longtime weatherman for NBC's Today show, donned the first Ronald get-up that year, using a paper cup as a nose and a cardboard tray as a hat. When McDonald's executives wanted to launch Ronald nationally in commercials, they hired Polakovs to give Ronald a makeover.

When McDonald's decided to make Ronald a national figure in 1966, the company dumped Scott, fearing it would be hard to find people in each market with Scott's big build, recalls Klein.

[zonelistener]

Originally posted by Flaming Friar Sr
When McDonald's decided to make Ronald a national figure in 1966, the company dumped Scott, fearing it would be hard to find people in each market with Scott's big build, recalls Klein.

They dumped the fat guy.

Trouble finding fat guys???? How about in line at the local franchise.

[Flaming Friar Sr]

Originally posted by zonelistener


They dumped the fat guy.

Trouble finding fat guys???? How about in line at the local franchise.

yes that part surprised me too. or have times changed so much since then??

[FizzingWhizzbees]

i could be a ronald if i wanted to be.

[Bad Ronnie]

It's common knowledge that a high payin' Ronald can earn up to 50K a day. Even more if you lose some weight, cause Unkle Ronnie is a skinny dude. Things are always movin' and groovin' in the Ronnie kitchen.

Uncle Ronald will soon be popping up in the most unexpected places, such as subways, sewer tunnels and your pants. I'm an icon of childhood! Kids love me!

Wanna know why? Cause I offer them more purple than ever before!

[Lurk the Dog]

*bites Bad Ronnie's leg



*pees in ronnie's big red shoe

[Bad Ronnie]

Hey kid, do the flippin' Ronald.

[Lurk the Dog]

*humps ronnie's leg

[notiti]

Let it be known that Ronnie poping up in my pants is not unexpected, though it is annoying.

[Red Ships of Scalla-Festa]

show me a picture of someone doing the ronald.

[notiti]

And I'll show you a man with no soul.

[Bad Ronnie]

This person used to do the Ronald. Alas, poor Robert Downey Jnr. I knew him well.

[Red Ships of Scalla-Festa]

i dont see any special sauce.

[Bad Ronnie]

Lots of people do the Ronald!

[Red Ships of Scalla-Festa]

if you stop and think about what that picture really is, its downright horrifying.

[Bad Ronnie]

You want the special white sauce, you'll have to get it from the dispenser.

[Red Ships of Scalla-Festa]

ronnie, there was a rumor going around recently about you assisting the germans in 1944 and 45 when they were in dire need of militairy supplies. can you confirm or deny this allegation?

[Flaming Friar Sr]

go play in pleba ronnie