Obama effect shows in US CEOs' wish to be community organisers

The Barack Obama era is growing curiouser and curiouser. Six years after the former community organiser moved into the White House, a strange form of mimicry has become evident in the land. Some of the leading corporate chief executives in the US are starting to sound as if they want to be local political activists themselves.

The latest example is Steve Easterbrook, a 47-year-old product of Watford in England, who was installed this year as chief executive of McDonald's after its US sales and share price slumped. Briefing Wall Street analysts this week on his plans, Mr Easterbrook sounded at times like a man perched atop a soapbox - pledging to act in solidarity with the people he serves in more than 100 countries around the world.

Mr Easterbrook vowed repeatedly to transform McDonald's into what he called a "modern progressive burger company" - a concept that he defined in surprisingly explicit political terms.

His company, he said, will seek to " be more progressive around our social purpose in order to deepen our relationships with communities on the issues that matter to them". Or, as they say in business school: ?Viva la Revolucion!

It's a long way, of course, from two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles and onions on a sesame-seed bun. But it has been a long time since such high-calorie sales pitches worked particularly well at McDonald's or many of the other big US food and beverage purveyors - and desperate times call for desperate measures.

The fundamental problem facing McDonald's and its ilk is that younger Americans are turning against them. These consumers want fresher, organic fare, prepared by people they respect. Processed-food makers, industrial brewers and old-fashioned fast-food chains are all struggling to find ways to win over the millennial generation.

The challenge for corporate leaders is to get on the right side of essentially left-leaning consumers without looking silly in the process. "Progressive" can be a pretty slippery little adjective - as many of us learned the hard way during the 1970s when the word was used to describe some of the pretentious rock bands to ever plug in a Moog synthesiser - and accidents will happen.

Even a master marketer such as Howard Schultz of Starbucks was tripped up in March when he urged his employees to talk with customers about racism in the US. Widespread mockery followed in social media and Mr Shultz toned it down for a while (one wonders, however, whether the subsequent Baltimore riot chastened his critics).

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When asked whether any US stores would be "refranchised", as McDonald's puts it, a spokesperson, replying via email, said the "announcement does not largely affect the US, where we are already 89 per cent franchised". With apologies to readers for that cumbersome construction (life was simpler when people spoke by phone!), I believe it means more company-owned US stores could become franchises, raising the possibility that some minimum-wage employees who thought they would be making more money could be in for a nasty surprise down the road.

Yet however effective they ultimately prove, the Obama-esque public poses being struck by some of our corporate leaders are a fascinating sign of our marketing times. Chief executives such Mr Easterbrook or Mr Schultz could be talking about other things - reducing their taxes or their regulatory burden, for example - but they are opting instead to thrust their corporate fists into the air in the progressive manner. They undoubtedly have their reasons - and plenty of research to support them.

To my mind, the resulting spectre serves as a reminder that for all the ups and downs of the Obama administration, the president remains one of the more successful marketers in American history. If you are trying to sell stuff to US consumers, particularly of the younger, poorer or non-white variety, you can do a lot worse than copy the "yes, we can" man.

At the same time, I suspect this kind of corporate marketing can only serve Mr Obama's own interests. When he ran for president, Mr Obama said he hoped to tilt the country's political conversation to the left, just as Ronald Reagan shifted it to the right in the 1980s. The wannabe community organisers of the C-suites suggest he is having an effect.

With less than two years to go in the Obama presidency, the progressive brand is doing well enough to rate a place among the offerings at McDonald's. Go figure.

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