McDonald's taps into "you" craze with new packages

A McDonald's restaurant is seen in San Salvador December 9, 2005. McDonald's Corp. said on Thursday it was putting pictures of ordinary consumers who eat at the hamburger chain on its packaging, tapping into a media and Internet trend focused on real people.

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - McDonald's Corp. said on Thursday it was putting pictures of ordinary consumers who eat at the hamburger chain on its packaging, tapping into a media and Internet trend focused on real people.

Starting on Thursday, McDonald's cups and bags in North America -- and soon all over the world -- will come in packages that feature the faces of 24 people picked from what the company calls an "open casting call" of 13,000 entries.

The move by the world's biggest restaurant chain to feature customers on its packaging is the latest proof of the importance marketers are placing on so-called user-generated content like the homemade videos and blogs that rule the Internet on sites such as social network MySpace and Google Inc.'s video-file sharing site YouTube.

"People are really interested in reality," McDonald's Chief Marketing Officer Mary Dillon said in an interview, pointing to the rise in popularity of reality television shows. "It's about real people connecting with our brand."

In the last few months alone, the explosive growth of user-generated content prompted Time magazine to name "you" as its "Person of the Year" and led brands Chevrolet and Doritos to allow customers to create their Super Bowl advertisements.

Ultimately, the faces of the 24 McDonald's customers will appear on billions of packages, Dillon said. The "ordinary Joes" range in age from five to over 50 and come from a range of countries in which McDonald's does business, including Korea, Brazil and Canada in addition to the United States.

According to one brand expert, advertisers have become "obsessed" with tapping into the craze for user-generated content -- and McDonald's new packaging is no exception.

"They've really tried to be on the cutting edge of change and the cutting edge is viewed as user-generated content," said Mark DiMassimo, chief executive of New York-based brand agency DiMassimoGoldstein.

DiMassimo added that for companies like McDonald's, packaging has become an increasingly important opportunity to connect with consumers who may not be spending as much time watching television commercials.

McDonald's has already made changes to its packaging in the last year to include nutritional information about its food amid criticism of the fat and calorie content of its burgers and fries. Dillon said the new content would not get in the way of that effort.