What explanation can you give for competitors’ inability for so long to match the standards of McDonald’s?

Some strategies are easily countered or duplicated by competitors. Price cutting is the most easily countered. A price cut can often be matched within minutes. Similarly, a different package or warranty is easily imitated by competitors.

But some strategies are not so easily duplicated. Most of these involve service, a strong and positive company image, or both. A reputation for quality and dependability is not easily countered, at least in the short run. A good company or brand image is hard to match because it usually results from years of good service and satisfied customers. The great controls of McDonald’s with its high standards would seem to be easily imitated, but they proved not to be, as no other firm fully matched them until recent years.

The strategies and operations most difficult to imitate often are not the wildly innovative ones, nor the ones that are complex with great research. Rather they seem to be the simple things: doing a better job in servicing and satisfying customers and in performing even mundane operations cheerfully and efficiently.