At the end of a 16-year term during which he brought McDonald'sto a 60-restaurant network with 4,000 employees and over 100million euros in sales, Marian Alecu is categorical about the factthat his new business will "be in a completely different sectorthan the restaurant business."
Thursday 1:00 PM. The McDonald's restaurant on the ground floorof Bucharest's Unirea Shopping Center, the first restaurant opened14 years ago on the Romanian market, is half-full. Customers stilllook like they have 30 minutes off, and quietly enjoy theirhamburger, coffee or potato chips. There is no queue, but everycustomer is greeted with a "You can use this cash register, if youwill," and the transaction takes 2 minutes to conclude.
The fact that Marian Alecu, 52, CEO of the largest fast foodchain in Romania, is leaving the company has not altered in any waythe pace of operations in the McDonald's restaurant, although theemployees are aware of the management changes.
"He created a system that is working very well on its own rightnow. He also trained us so the system would work despite thechanges," says Lidia Cristea, restaurant manager, who has beenworking at McDonald's for 14 years.
McDonald's Romania, which posted a 108 million-euro turnover in2008, now has over 4,000 employees in its 60 local restaurants,with 40% of them working on a part-time basis. These are just someof the results that stand out in Alecu's CV.
The executive has decided to take a sabbatical year until early2010, when he decides to start a business on his own in a newsector.
"The time I spent at McDonald's has been very good bothprofessionally and personally. Personally I must admit it washelpful from a financial point of view. Professionally, I developeda network of contacts, especially since I had a big name behind.Now I will take a break," Alecu admits.
Whereas in the first few years from its launch McDonald's postedlosses because of Romanians' low purchasing power, of thedepreciation of the RON and of inflation, the company broke evenafter 2000, and then started to make a profit.
"Years ago, Romania was an uninteresting country, owners did nothave very big plans to invest on this market. Financially,restaurants in Romania did not make sense, but I practically foughtthem so we could go further, and last year we opened the mostmodern restaurant in Europe, the one in Drumul Taberei, followingan over four million-euro investment," says Alecu, who admits thereis a staggering difference between a restaurant opened more than 10years ago and a recently opened one.
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