McDonald’s Corporation today announced that McDonald’s Bulgaria has transferred to a developmental licensee (DL) structure. The DL structure is a form of franchising used by McDonald’s for about 20 years that enables local ownership and developing the brand.
“It has been a long and careful process to identify those people we wish to entrust with the future of our brand in Bulgaria,” says Denis Hennequin, president of McDonald’s Europe. “We have every confidence in the commitment and entrepreneurial skills of the DL franchisees we have chosen for Bulgaria.
Early in 2006, McDonald’s Corporation announced its intention to find 15-20 countries (about 1,500 restaurants) over the next three years to convert to a DL structure.
There are currently 35 such DL structures around the world. Bulgaria has 21 McDonald’s restaurants that employ over 1,000 Bulgarians and serve over six million customers a year. The first McDonald’s restaurant opened in Plovdiv in 1994.
