All language subtitles for The Food That Built America - The Kings of Burgers

- 75 McDonald's
hamburgers served per second.

4,000 Burger King
Whoppers a minute.

Generating more than $22
billion in revenue a year.

- If you asked anybody who
was not a native-born American

what the American food is,

they would say, without
batting an eye,

the hamburger.

- The two main competitors
in the fast food war

have always been
McDonald's and Burger King.

- But
just 60 years ago,

upstart McDonald's is
the only game in town.

But now, a new challenger
is gunning for them.

- You wanna beat McDonald's?

You have to think like them.

- Igniting
a bitter rivalry.

- If one of my
competitors were drowning,

I'd toss 'em an anchor.

- Their battle
for supremacy will create

some of the most iconic
foods in American history.

- Burger King
develops the Whopper.

- That's as good as it gets.

- McDonald's develops
the Big Mac sandwich.

- Now we're talking.

- The Whopper or the
Big Mac is a question

that I don't think has
quite been settled.

- Their
innovations transformed

the way Americans eat

and revolutionized fast
food around the world.

- Whoa, whoa!

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa!

- It's the 1950s,
and a thriving postwar economy

brings employment levels to
a record high of over 80%.

With demand for a quick
meal on the go soaring,

fast food is one
of the country's

fastest growing new industries.

- There was a race
going on at the time,

but there were a whole
lot of entrepreneurs

who were trying to figure out

the way to take their
fast-food business

and replicate it in a
number of different places.

- White Castle
is growing in the Midwest,

Hardee's in the East, and
Dairy Queen in the South.

- So, you had a lot,

a lot of these local
regional companies.

You really didn't have
any national brands.

- But
one fast-food chain

is leading the charge toward
McDonald's.

- For basically any company,

McDonald's is the gold
standard at this point

because to create something
that goes national

is the ultimate dream.

Smaller companies see
how they're expanding

and they all want a piece of it.

- The man behind
McDonald's growing empire

is a brilliant entrepreneur

who bought out the
original founders,

the McDonald brothers,
for just $2.7 million.

- Congratulations, gentlemen.

The American people will never
forget the name McDonald's.

- A cunning
visionary named Ray Kroc.

- I think it's kind of amazing

that two brothers lost their
own name and the Speedee System

to a man with the
last name of Kroc.

He then takes this notion
of same taste all the time

and applies it nationwide.

- He understood that
you need a small menu.

You need a menu based on seven
items that you can put out,

many with the same ingredients,

at a fast pace, and
you streamline it.

- Starting in 1955,

Kroc opens 34 locations
in just three years

across the Midwest, using
McDonald's Speedee System.

- That Speedee System let
them mass produce good food

in a very quick way.

People were waiting
just so they can see,

"Oh my gosh, I can
get a hamburger

in a matter of moments?"

- But most
important to Kroc

is replicating the McDonald's
experience perfectly

at every restaurant.

- Fast food is all
about consistency.

And in order to create
a consistent product

for all its consumers, you need
a strong culture of training

committed to quality,
service, and value.

- Ray Kroc doesn't want anyone

who's gonna veer from
the franchise script

that he's meticulously created.

- To make sure every
location is up to standards,

Ray Kroc crisscrosses
the country himself,

conducting random inspections.

- Get over here!

Get over here.

What the hell is this?!

Enchiladas?!

Burritos?!

McDonald's menu is supposed
to be the same everywhere;

the whole point of the concept!

Get this stuff off
the board, now!

- Ray Kroc was driven.

He was not what
anyone would call

a really warm and cuddly guy.

He had very high standards
and he could be almost cruel

to people who didn't live
up to what he expected.

- Christ's sake.

- Ray Kroc definitely
wrote the playbook

on expanding restaurants,
especially restaurant chains.

I think a lot of
restaurants emulate

what he and his company did

to take that one store
to many locations.

- Kroc oversees
his growing empire

with an iron fist.

And by 1959, he opens
his 100th restaurant.

And despite a slew of imitators,

there's no real challenger
to McDonald's, for now.

In one of the few states that
McDonald's hasn't yet reached,

an ambitious former
restaurant worker

is looking to forge his
own path in fast food.

His name is Dave Edgerton,

and he's just poured
his life savings

into buying two
little-known burger joints

call Insta Burger King.

- David Edgerton
bought Insta Burger

from the original founders,
the Kramers and Burns,

who had been inspired when
they had gone to a McDonald's

out in California.

- Dave Edgerton is
this ultimate tinkerer

in that American sense.

He's the kinda
guy who's obsessed

with assembly lines and speed,

and he fed into the tech
fascination at the time.

- After
a year in business,

Edgerton is struggling
to stay afloat

and he's looking for investors

to inject much-needed capital.

- So, that's where the
customers place their order.

Sometimes the line snakes
all the way back that way,

but it moves quick.

- Guess sometimes not, huh?

- One potential fit
is a shrewd Cornell graduate

with dreams of becoming the
James McLamore.

- James McLamore was,
without question,

the guy with the business savvy.

He was a restaurateur and he
was deeply entrepreneurial.

- We have got everything
down to a science.

Drinks take four seconds,
shakes take about six.

- And fries?
- They cook in batches

on two-minute cycles.

- McLamore looks up to Ray Kroc

and it influences
everything he does.

McDonald's didn't
exist yet in Florida.

- This...

This is our secret weapon.

The world's first
fully-automated

burger-making machine.

- Huh.
- Mm-hmm.

- Called
the Insta-Broiler,

Edgerton's answer to
the Speedee System

can churn out 100
more burgers an hour

than a team of
McDonald's employees.

A chain drive moves
the hamburger patties

through a broiler.

A second level toasts
buns and even adds sauces

before the burgers are
assembled and served.

- She can cook 400
burgers in an hour,

and that's something you're
not gonna find anywhere else;

not at White Castle,
not at the local dives,

not even at McDonald's.

We're making a 28%
profit on every sale.

- Before
he agrees to invest,

McLamore combs through
Insta Burger King's finances

for the last year.

- How much did you say
you were making in profit?

- About 28% on sales.

That's just an estimate.

- I'm showing a 56% loss,
per order.

- What?

No, that can't be right.

- These sales figures, I mean,
it's a hundred orders a day?

That's nothing; that's...

Bad.

- Yeah, Insta Broiler can
make that many burgers

in about 15 minutes.

- No, it's not the concept;
it's a good concept.

Just, I think it's the market.

People aren't used to this,

you know, fast-serve
kinda place.

You know, getting outta
their car to order,

paying before they eat.

- It'll catch on.

- Yeah, but not before
you're outta business.

No.

If I'm gonna do this,
we'll need more locations.

- More locations?

But you just said this location
isn't even making any money.

- No, exactly.

Because people don't
know what it is.

But they will if
there's more of 'em.

Look, you wanna beat McDonald's?

You have to think like them.

- I think it's a little crazy

that McLamore was trying
to open more franchises

before the first
one was flourishing.

I doubt there is a restaurateur
in the 21st century

that would do that.

- But McLamore wants
to build something that's

bigger and bolder, brasher,
enormous than McDonald's.

- Welcome to Insta Burger.

- McLamore invests
his entire life savings

of $20,000 into his new
strategy of expansion.

- Love it, I love it.

- And he
and Edgerton take out

tens of thousands more in loans.

- Having one store is one thing.

But when you're opening
multiple locations,

that takes a lotta capital.

You're really just
using your own sales,

putting everything
back into the business.

I think you have to be a
little insane to do that.

But insanity is not
necessarily a bad thing.

- Over
the next four years,

they open five new Insta
Burger Kings in Florida,

bringing their total to seven.

But their gamble
isn't paying off,

and sales at every
location are dismal.

- Hey, is anybody
paying attention here?

This is raw!

Hey, who's spot-checking these?

No one?

Oh, oh, you have
gotta be kidding me.

Ow!

Dammit, agh!

- What's going on?

This thing crap out again?

- The problem with
the Insta Broiler

was that it broke
down too often.

When you are building a concept

that's all centered on
speed, it has to work

or else the line backs
up and the concept fails.

The fact that the Insta
Broiler was something

that kept breaking down
over and over again,

it's like a ticking clock.

- Whoa, whoa.

Whoa, whoa, hey!

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa!

- By the late-1950s,
fueled by the baby boom,

the American population
explodes, with annual birthrates

surging past a record
four million a year.

- People get married,
they're starting families.

There's this huge
increase in our population

and the economy is doing well.

- The boom, for Americans,
is going to be revolutionary

in a very different way.

You'll see the explosion of
a number of entrepreneurs

and businesspersons
bringing items to market

which aren't necessarily
staples or essentials,

but will have high
demand just the same.

- In the Southeast,

job growth has
transformed Florida

from the South's
least populous state

to one of the most
inhabited in the country,

with a population of
over three million.

And a booming tourism industry

draws an additional four
million visitors a year.

Jim McLamore and Dave Edgerton
hope to seize the opportunity

and dominate Florida
before McDonald's

can move into the state,

but their vaunted Insta
Broiler has failed them.

- Rather than just
walk away or fix it,

Edgerton took a hatchet

and he sunk it right
into the Insta Broiler.

That's a huge moment,
where you acknowledge

that something is fundamentally
broken in your business.

- Edgerton and
McLamore resort to closing down

all seven of their Insta
Burger King locations

until they can fix the problem.

Edgerton works to
simplify the design

and maximize reliability
without sacrificing capacity.

- He actually built a
conveyor-belt grill,

so deeply efficient,
could grill the burgers

and quite literally
move them down

and keep the service speedy.

- She can
even broil patties.

- A jet of
flame gives it a kiss

of fresh-off-the-grill flavor,

so Edgerton names it
the flame-broiler.

- Yeah?

- Yeah.

- The flame-broiler gives
Burger King this edge

in a lot of ways

because McDonald's burgers
are made on flat griddles.

They don't taste like something
that has flame behind it.

The flame-broiler has
this backyard taste.

- Armed with
their new flame-broiler,

Edgerton and McLamore reopen
their seven restaurants,

unleashing a weapon
that will soon

start a war with McDonald's.

In Chicago, Ray Kroc
works relentlessly

to dominate the fast-food market

by creating the same
customer experience

at every one of
his 100 restaurants

spread across the country.

- Louie, talk to me.

Don't give me that.

Look, all I'm hearing
is excuses from you.

- And while
he standardized the menu,

ingredients still vary
wildly from region to region.

- Yeah; no, it's not our fryers.

It's the potatoes.

That's what I thought.

- In 1960,
McDonald's uses a staggering

175 varieties of potato,

with local farmers supplying

almost exclusively
for local markets.

- A potato in California
and a potato in Idaho

will inherently
not taste the same.

- So, what Ray Kroc had
to do was choose potatoes

that would track and would scale

in all different
corners of the country

where McDonald's was coming up.

- Kroc inspects
some of his bestselling fries

from across the country.

- This is it.

- In an
unprecedented move,

Ray Kroc chooses one
potato, the Idaho russet,

to make all of
McDonald's french fries.

- Buying potatoes
from the same place

so all the potatoes
taste the same.

You help create that
one flavor profile

that makes McDonald's
something familiar.

It's sort of like America's
neighborhood restaurant,

and I think therein
lay Ray Kroc's genius.

- And Kroc's
demand for uniformity

goes beyond the flavor alone.

- McDonald's wants a
certain size french fry.

Ray Kroc helped first
develop french fries

that were .28 inches
over and over again.

Don't mess with the
McDonald's details.

- Most Idaho
potatoes are harvested

between September and October.

- This is the
actual freezing facility.

Generator's gonna be over here.

- To supply
his franchises year-round,

Kroc commissions a $3-million
flash-freezing warehouse

and orders six million
pounds of Idaho potatoes,

almost single-handedly
transforming

the way they're farmed.

- Ray Kroc wanted
all the potatoes

to come from one vendor.

So, instead of what
was fresh on the farm

dictating what you
served on the menu,

now what you served on the menu

dictated what you grew
and raised on your farm.

Kroc actually controlled

what came outta the
ground at origin,

and it was really the beginning

of what we now refer
to as factory farming.

- By the early-1960s, McDonald's
grows to over 300 locations

and Ray Kroc rolls out
uniform french fries

in every single one of them.

- The McDonald's
fries are so iconic

because they have scaled
to a huge proportion.

- Not only is it hot and tasty,

a little extra salt on it,

but it's the same thing
you get wherever you go.

You can rely on those french
fries from McDonald's.

- McDonald's is
now a national juggernaut,

with franchises in every state.

Meanwhile, Dave Edgerton
and Jim McLamore

have reopened their seven
Insta Burger King locations,

each equipped with
their new flame-broiler.

But with McDonald's now
operating in Florida,

it's even harder for Insta
Burger King to draw customers

and they're bleeding money.

- Lunch break.

Picked these up at a little
nothin' spot along the highway.

You shoulda seen the
line at this place.

- Uh-huh,
I'll get to it later.

- Just look at it.

- My god, there must be

a quarter-pound of beef on this.

- I know.

- Imagine what we can
do with something like this.

- So, for Edgerton and McLamore,

to create an item that could
compete with McDonald's

is the ultimate challenge.

It's the ultimate possibility.

-
McLamore and Edgerton

immediately begin working
on a bigger burger

they can cook with
their flame-broiler,

allowing them to stand
out from the competition.

- In the 1950s, they were
used to a smaller burger

than we would consider today.

Whether it's the
White Castle slider

or the McDonald's burger, it
was pretty modest in size.

- All right, so
what do you think?

One patty, two patties?

- Hey, I think it's gotta be one

or the price is gonna be
higher than people wanna pay.

Nah, get rid of that,
it's not big enough.

Try...

- Let's go-
- We gotta go

much, much bigger bun,

like this right here.
- There we go.

- So, let's
try a little crunch.

- Edgerton
and McLamore experiment

by adding different toppings
to their bigger patty.

- It's almost there.

- What if we put a layer of mayo

right on the bottom?
- Yeah, perfect; perfect.

- Until they hit
the perfect combination.

- They used a bigger
piece of meat,

had a lot of lettuce, it had
the tomato, it had the pickle.

It was a much bigger hamburger

than had ever been sold before
in a fast-food restaurant.

- And to
make their new creation

even more unique, they make
the groundbreaking decision

to give their burger a name.

- Back then, burgers didn't
have their own special name.

It was new.

- McLamore
and Edgerton introduce

the first signature burger
in fast-food history.

It's called the Whopper.

- The Whopper was
deeply revolutionary

'cause it was the
first large burger

with fixings from a franchise.

People were getting
a bigger meal,

a meal that tasted like it
came off their barbecue.

And for Insta Burger King,

it could be an immediately
recognizable product

that would put them on the map.

- Edgerton and
McLamore finally have a weapon

that McDonald's doesn't,

and they're ready to make
a name for themselves.

- Dave Edgerton and
JJim McLamore have spent years

trying to put Insta
Burger King on the map.

- Hey, I got six Whoppers all
day that just got ordered.

- Six.

- And with
the launch of their new

revolutionary flame-broiled Whopper

in all seven of their
Florida locations-

- I mean, look at this line!

- Sales are
up 40% within weeks.

- Keep it up!

- When the Whopper's introduced,

very quickly, it becomes
insanely popular.

It takes off.

- Insta Burger King was
talking about their restaurant

as a place for people
with big appetites,

a place where you can get
something like the Whopper

that takes two hands to eat.

- And after
years of operating

under they name they inherited,

Edgerton and McLamore decide
to make a pivotal change

to something shorter
and punchier.

- They wanna brand themselves

as the best that
there possibly is.

It's different from
just being fast.

It's being best.

- Their new
name is Burger King,

and the dub themselves
the "Home of the Whopper."

- Compared to Burger King,

Insta Burger King is um,
is a stupid name.

It's a bad name.

And I'm glad they changed
it, for them if nothing else.

Driven by the Whopper's
resounding success,

McLamore and Edgerton
begin to expand further,

with dreams of becoming
a national chain.

- 'Cause all the traffic
basically flows from

southwest up-
- Yeah, I think you're right.

That's our money spot.

- They identify
key cities to target,

including Wilmington, Delaware,
New Orleans, and Chicago.

But before staking a
claim in the Windy City,

McLamore makes an
unscheduled pit stop.

- Can I help you?

- Hi.

I'm looking for Ray Kroc.

- Is he expecting you?

- No, I don't think so.

- What's your name?

- Jim McLamore.

- Jim!

Hey!

Remind me, how do
we know each other?

- We don't, actually.

I own and operate a small
number of burger joints

outta Miami.

- The
competition, huh?

- Well, no, not yet.

But I'd be lyin' if I said that
wasn't the dream.

- In any good mythology,

there is a meeting
of mortal enemies,

and that exists in
American fast food.

McLamore wanted
exactly what Kroc had.

- Say, listen,
you got any advice

for an aspiring franchiser?

- Well, if you work just for
money, you'll never make it.

But love what you do and
always put the customer first,

you'll be just fine.
- Oh, come on.

I mean, don't give me
the fairytale version.

- All right.

It's a dog-eat-dog world.

Someone's always
trying to cut you down.

I've crushed everyone
that's ever come for me.

It's called survival
of the fittest, Jim.

If one of my competitors
were drowning,

I'd toss 'em an anchor.

Would you?

That's what it'll take to
succeed in this business.

Been nice meeting you.

Oh, what was the name
of your chain again?

- Burger King.

- Best of luck, pal.

- More
determined than ever

to compete with McDonald's,

McLamore spearheads an
aggressive expansion campaign.

- I had one other, I
had one other thought, right?

Because-

- And by 1962,

just eight years after opening,
the Home of the Whopper

is in 23 different cities
across the country.

Within the next year, their
profits more than double,

soaring to over $150,000,

the modern-day equivalent
of $1.2 million.

And McLamore and Edgerton
decide to innovate further,

television advertising.

- Television is this gigantic
leap in food advertising.

Before this, all you could
see is perhaps a drawing

or a photograph as an ad.

All of a sudden, you
could actually see someone

take a bite of the product.

- Burger King
becomes the first company ever

to air a commercial for
a signature sandwich

on national television,

taking aim at every competitor

that doesn't have a trademark
burger, including McDonald's.

- Burger King was very
bold and very aggressive.

And in fact, Burger King
was one of the first

fast-food restaurants to
actually call out a competitor

by name in its commercials.

- Burger
King's sales explode.

And in 1964, profits
rise by over 50%

across all 72 of
their locations.

- The Whopper,
the wall-to-wall hamburger,

so big that just
one is a whole meal.

- And the
extraordinary rate

of their growth
has caught Ray Kroc's eye.

♪ The bigger the burger,
the better the burger ♪

♪ The burgers are
bigger at Burger King ♪

- And he's
about to strike back.

- For years, Ray
Kroc's McDonald's

has dominated the competition,

building an empire
400 locations strong,

worth the modern
equivalent of $8 billion.

Now, Burger King has
launched an all-out assault

with their groundbreaking
signature burger, the Whopper.

- I think the Whopper
shocked Ray Kroc.

They were bigger.

They were a noticeably
thicker sandwich.

And when you compared what
McDonald's was selling,

which was this pretty small
hamburger, to a Whopper,

you really noticed it.

- The Whopper had
the name recognition.

It was distinct to Burger
King and it was delicious.

People loved that
flame-broiled taste.

- All right, come on, let's go.

Meeting started
five minutes ago.

Come on, guys.

- To maintain their
stranglehold on the market,

McDonald's needs a
way to fight back.

- What we need is a
signature product.

Burger King has the Whopper.

McDonald's is home of the what?

Let's reach out to our
franchise operators

and see what they come up with.

- I think that a
brand like Burger King

keeps a brand like
McDonald's on their toes

because having that kinda
competition from Burger King

is what forces
McDonald's to innovate,

forces them to think
outside the box.

- Meeting's over, get to work.

- Great, keep it up.

Keep it up!

- In Miami,
Edgerton and McLamore

invest all their profits
into rapid expansion,

even taking out loans
to speed up the process.

And by 1965, they have
over 120 locations,

with the same rate of
growth as McDonald's.

- What about regional ad spend?

We can certainly
trim from there.

- I don't wanna touch marketing.

- Maybe we raise franchise fees;

nothing huge, just some.
- Absolutely not.

No, growth is too important.

I won't risk it.

- When we're thinking
about expansion,

it's never really about,

"How much money did
we make this year?"

It's really more about,

"Well, where do people
want us right now?"

But as a business, you
always have to care

about your bottom line.

- Jim McLamore, he
had overextended them

by opening too many franchises.

- I mean, we gotta
keep feeding the machine!

- For how long?

- I mean, for
as long as it takes!

Look, we can't lose momentum.

Trust me on this.

- Burger King being the largest
threat in the burger land

is the only brand that
could really compete

with McDonald's supremacy.

- Even
though the company

is growing by leaps and bounds,

they're barely keeping pace
with their considerable debt.

- Hello?

You're speaking to him.

Sure.

We'd be open to
hearing a proposal.

- Who's that?

- Absolutely.

That was a guy from Pillsbury.

- And?

- They wanna make us an offer.

I think they wanna buy us.

- It's 1966,

and after nearly a decade
of relentless growth

and compounding debt, Jim
McLamore and Dave Edgerton

receive an offer from massive
food conglomerate Pillsbury

to buy Burger King outright,

leaving the future of
the company in doubt.

- We're not seriously
considering this.

It's too soon.

- This wipes our debt.

Guarantees our cashflow.

- The
offer is $18 million,

the equivalent of over
$140 million today.

- This is how we
beat McDonald's,

with Pillsbury's backing,

with their deep pockets.

We keep expanding, but
they take on all the risk.

- Burger King could
use the influx of cash

and the broad range
of the Pillsbury brand

to allow them to compete against
the much-larger juggernaut

of Ray Kroc's McDonald's.

- I don't trust them.

- We need the money.

- McLamore would give
up control of his baby

to compete with McDonald's,

but Edgerton was a
little more suspicious

of what would happen
to Burger King

when Pillsbury
got into the game.

- McLamore
knows this deal could be

his last shot to
overtake McDonald's.

But right now, Ray Kroc
is traveling the country,

looking for a new
weapon of his own.

He's meeting with
his franchisees,

hoping that one of
them has a new product

that could top the Whopper.

- Ray Kroc would exert
real quality control

and make sure that
menu items are uniform

from one location of
McDonald's to the next.

So, it's kind of crazy
that now McDonald's

was allowing menu
diversification

and trying to beat Burger
King with the next big thing.

- Kroc finds
himself in an Ohio town,

meeting with a franchisee who
has one solitary location.

- Here's what I've
been tinkering with.

It's a filet of cod,
breaded and fried,

with a dollop of
homemade tartar sauce.

- Lou Groen's store is located

in Monfort Heights, Cincinnati,
which is 87% Catholic.

And on Fridays, Catholics at
that time didn't eat beef,

so he would see his
sales routinely drop

every single week.

So, he reached out
to Ray Kroc and said,

"I have this idea
for a fish sandwich."

- Cheese on fish?

- Yeah, you're right.

Now we're talking.

- Fish was already
a frozen product

that was easily available,

so they're able to provide
a lightly-breaded fish filet

on a roll that would be already
developed and ready to sell.

- Ray Kroc rolls out
the Filet-O-Fish nationwide.

- Let the fish that
catches people catch you!

- But
it's still not enough

to compete with the Whopper.

- Part of the menu expansion
that Kroc is undertaking

is trying to find something
that is a signature item.

And he's finding all of these
different smaller options

that kind of have
their own iconic nature

but don't hold a
candle to the Whopper,

which is its own holy
grail of burgers.

- In Miami,

after agonizing over
Pillsbury's buyout offer,

McLamore has convinced
Edgerton to unite with him.

They accept a deal valued
at the modern equivalent

of more than $140 million.

- Pleasure doing
business with ya.

- At that point, Edgerton
steps outta the picture.

He cashes out.

McLamore, he's now
part of Pillsbury,

and he remains
faithfully devoted

to the idea of Burger
King becoming huge

and hoping that Pillsbury
will make it happen.

- Pleasure
doing business with you.

Thank you, sir.

- But far
from Miami or Chicago,

in a small town in Pennsylvania,

a McDonald's franchise owner
is working on something new.

And it's about to blow
the burger wars wide open.

- It's 1967, and Ray
Kroc's decade-long hunt

for a signature burger to pit
against the Whopper is over.

- From franchise
owner Jim Delligatti

out of Uniontown, Pennsylvania,

consisting entirely of
ingredients already found

in every McDonald's

slice of cheddar-blend cheese,
crispy iceberg lettuce,

little secret sauce,
crunchy dill pickle,

toasted club slice, and not
one but two hamburger patties

under a lightly-toasted
sesame seed crown.

- And now,
all it needs is a name.

- I call it
the Aristocrat.

Or perhaps
the Blue Ribbon Burger.

What?

- It's a bit...

- It's a bit what?

- Ray Kroc wanted it to be
called the Blue Ribbon Burger,

which speaks to his
own ego a little bit,

but also to the fact that he
wanted a really great burger

to compete with the Whopper.

- How about
the Big Mac?

- Someone just earned a raise.

- The
soon-to-be-legendary Big Mac

gets its name from a
21-year-old secretary

named Esther Glickstein.

In 1967, armed with
his new weapon,

Ray Kroc unleashes an
unparalleled assault

on Burger King.

He introduces the Big Mac
at all 800-plus locations

and launches one of the
most aggressive ad campaigns

in company history.

- The creation of the Big Mac

is like throwing a match into
a flame-broiled tinderbox

and the whole thing explodes.

- They were really
spending a lot of money

on competitive advertising.

Those ads were everywhere.

The idea behind the Big Mac

was to counter the
size of the Whopper.

There was a fun commercial
that listed the ingredients.

- Two all-beef
patties, special sauce,

lettuce, cheese, pickles,
onions on a sesame seed bun.

- Big Mac.
- And people loved it.

- I always appreciated
the flavor of the burger

in the Whopper, but I
always felt the Big Mac

had the toppings
game down better.

It was like a much more
pleasurable bite through.

- The Burger King Whopper
had a bigger patty,

but McDonald's gave you two.

So, by keeping the
patties the same size,

they were able to stay
within their framework

and still compete
with the Whopper.

- Within a year,
the Big Mac accounts for 19%

of all McDonald's sales,
reaching over $400 million,

an unprecedented attack on
the Whopper's dominance.

- Jim McLamore is desperate to
counter McDonald's offensive,

but he's now under
Pillsbury's management,

and they're not interested
in a costly battle.

- When Burger King made
the deal with Pillsbury,

in their perspective, they
thought that they would have

financial resources
to draw from.

- But Burger King is one
column in their ledger,

and so he's now part of
a corporate structure

that he no longer
calls all the shots.

And all of McLamore's
hopes for expansion

and rapid growth hit a snag.

McLamore's obviously crushed.

- While
McLamore's hands are tied,

McDonald's triples
their rate of expansion,

leaving Burger King in the dust.

- In the 1970s, McLamore
slowly begins to realize

that his plans for world
domination are gonna be stifled.

And he reaches this moment
where he says to himself,

"Maybe it's time for me
to finally step away."

And so, he steps away.

- Though their
battle with Burger King

will rage on for decades,

Ray Kroc's legacy
has made McDonald's

the largest burger
joint in the world.

- But these are
ongoing rivalries

that you see lasting for years.

- Today,
there are over 36,000

McDonald's
restaurants worldwide.

Burger King has over 18,000.

- McDonald's has
often set the tone

and the pace of the
fast-food industry.

They were one of the
first national brands

to show that they could
be successful overseas.

Brands like Burger
King followed suit.

- Burger King's sales

are over $76 million per year,

a fraction of McDonald's
$100 billion annual sales.

- McDonald's is number one
and Burger King is number two,

but I love Burger King
because they set the table

for American fast food
to become truly iconic.

And on that table,
there weren't utensils,

there weren't plates, there
was just an enormous hamburger,

and that's all you needed.