McDonald’s signals further expansion in UK and Ireland with 200 new restaurants

Fast food giant McDonald’s said it plans to create 24,000 jobs across more than 200 new restaurants in the UK and Ireland over the next four years.
Details of planned £1 billion (€1.2 billion) expansion were contained in a report to mark the franchise’s 50th anniversary in the UK and Ireland.
The company, which has 94 franchised restaurants in Ireland, employing approximately 6,000 staff, did not detail the expansion planned specifically for Ireland, insisting only that the new restaurants would be tailored to meet “the needs of the community”.
“The plans will also see a renewed focus on opening high street restaurants, demonstrating an ongoing commitment to supporting successful high streets across the country as town and city centres continue to evolve and respond to a variety of challenges,” the company said.
“Alongside new restaurants, the business will continue to upgrade and reimage more than 1,500 existing restaurants across the UK and Ireland,” it said.
The Irish arm of the company enjoyed its most profitable year ever in 2022, as pretax profits surged 157 per cent to €43.16 million.
The latest published accounts for McDonald’s Restaurants of Ireland Ltd show that pretax profits jumped by €26.37 million, as the business exited operating its own fast food outlets here.
This followed the last owner-operated McDonald’s closing permanently at Dublin Airport on February 28th, 2022.
The move to exit the owner-operator model here came 45 years after McDonald’s opened its first fast food restaurant in Ireland on Dublin’s Grafton Street.
Alistair Macrow, chief executive of McDonald’s UK and Ireland, said: “We have come a long way since we first opened our doors in Woolwich 50 years ago.”
“ We have become an important part of communities across the UK, and I’m delighted that in this milestone year we are able to demonstrate our ongoing commitment to growth, and announce the creation of new jobs across the country as we plan to open over 200 new restaurants over the next four years,” he said.