At its September 23 investor day in Chicago, McDonald's rolled out a multiyear growth plan called NEXT built around two categories it believes can carry it past beef: chicken and beverages. The headline commitment is an additional 1.5 percentage points of global market share in each by 2030, alongside a low-to-mid 50% operating margin target, free cash flow conversion in the mid-to-high 80s, and roughly 250 basis points of restaurant-level efficiency gains. The company pledged about $8.5 billion in rent relief and capital support for franchisees through 2036, with roughly $5 billion deployed before 2030.
Chief executive Chris Kempczinski told investors the industry should not be counted on for help. With inflation still elevated, he expects traffic to stay "largely flat," and argued that "to succeed... growth must come from capturing greater market share." The plan is explicitly a share grab rather than a bet on a rising tide — a notable shift for a chain that spent recent years leaning on value meals.
The arithmetic behind the chicken push is a cost problem. Kempczinski said beef prices have nearly doubled over five years across McDonald's largest markets; U.S. beef prices rose 5.9% year over year in August, and one tally puts them up more than 50% since 2021. McDonald's holds about a 20% share of the global $130 billion chicken category against roughly 40% in beef burgers, while chicken is growing at about twice the pace of beef. The Guardian cited Mintel data showing 39% of UK consumers used chicken shops in 2025, up from 37% in 2023, with Gen Z usage at 52%.
On October 12, CNBC published exclusive Consumer Edge credit- and debit-card data that undercuts the pitch. Among McDonald's own customers, Chick-fil-A gained 0.58 percentage points of limited-service restaurant spending in the third quarter versus a year earlier — the largest gain of any chain tracked. The implication is blunt: the chicken share McDonald's wants to win is already moving to the operator that does chicken best.
Beverages show the same pattern. Drive-thru-only 7 Brew added 0.4 percentage points of spending share among McDonald's customers, while Starbucks, Dutch Bros and Dunkin' all ranked among the top ten gainers; together the four coffee chains picked up 0.88 percentage points. "There's a big battle for a smaller amount of restaurant spend as people become more selective," said Consumer Edge senior vice president Michael Gunther. McDonald's new cold coffee, crafted sodas and Red Bull energy drink are aimed at exactly those customers.
McDonald's acknowledged at investor day that U.S. comparable sales were slightly negative in July and August, with September expected to turn positive. Second-quarter U.S. comps rose just 0.8%, down from 2.5% a year earlier and far behind Burger King's 8.5%. Placer.ai estimates U.S. visits fell 4.5% in the first half of the year, which the company says it cannot verify; Numerator data show households earning $40,000 or less spent 2.4% less year over year.
Investors punished the strategy on the spot. McDonald's shares fell about 5% on investor day — described as the worst session since March 2020 — and by early October were roughly 29% below their February record. Critics point to a familiar gap: the money is spent now, the payoff arrives a decade later, and the current quarter is still slightly negative. The 50,000-restaurant target also slipped a year to 2028.
Bernstein's Danilo Gargiulo wrote that U.S. beverage launches "had not generated enough sales to offset broader weakness," that the next chicken platform — hand-breaded and grilled items — was further away than he expected, and that the scale of investment required "introduces additional pressure on near-term earnings." Morgan Stanley cut its estimates through 2030 and models U.S. same-store sales down 0.5% in the third quarter and 1% in the fourth, versus consensus for a 0.2% decline and flat growth.
Some of the traffic loss is self-inflicted. Management conceded that only 60% to 65% of the U.S. system followed the recommended under-$3 pricing architecture and that some franchisees raised prices instead, producing discounts without a value perception; roughly two-thirds of the traffic shortfall was attributed to those value-related issues. Guggenheim's Gregory Francfort expects franchisees to negotiate the roughly $1 million per-store remodeling tab down 20% to 40%.
The next checkpoint is concrete: the third-quarter report before market open on October 22, which will show whether September actually turned positive and how much the new drinks and chicken items contributed. Between now and then, pilots of hand-breaded chicken, grilled-chicken bowls pitched at GLP-1 users, and the Red Bull Dragonberry Energizer that went nationwide on August 17 will keep rolling out. Whether the $8.5 billion franchisee package lands at a workable price will decide if NEXT becomes a margin story or stays booked as upfront cost.