McDonald's Revenue By Country

In 2022, McDonald’s generated much revenue from franchised restaurants in the US vs. international markets. Indeed, McDonald’s generated $6.58 billion in revenue in the US from franchised restaurants and $2.83 in company-operated restaurants.

McDonald’s follows a heavily franchised business strategy, where over time, the company is turning most of its stores into franchises.

mcdonalds-strategy — McDonald’s finally transitioned to a heavily franchised business model in 2022, reaching its long-term objective of 95% of franchised restaurants vs. its total restaurants worldwide. Approximately 95% of the restaurants at year-end 2022 were franchised, including 95% in the U.S., 89% in International Operated Markets, and 98% in the International Developmental Licensed Markets.

Our research identified three types of franchising business models that move between franchised to chained business models.

This is in contrast, perhaps, with a company like Starbucks which follows an entirely different strategy skewed toward company-operated stores.

mcdonalds-vs-starbucks — McDonald’s and Starbucks sit in the opposite spectrum of retail business models. Indeed, whereas McDonald’s follows a heavily franchised business model, Starbucks follows a heavy-chained one.

A similar strategy to McDonald’s is employed by Burger King.

mcdonalds-vs-burger-king — In 2020, McDonald’s generated over $19 billion in revenue, compared to Burger King’s almost $5 billion in revenue, in the same period.

An hybrid model is followed by Coca-Cola, which we call “franchained” where Coca-Cola uses an owned strategy in the short term as complex operations are established.

Yet, over time Coca-Cola turned its subsidies into a sort of franchised operation, where the company can keep proper control through distribution deals and ownership stakes.