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Byline: Kate MacArthur As the renowned chef prepares to shutter his namesake restaurant after 25 years this month, his influence in putting Chicago on the map as a foodie destination [...]

Byline: KATE MACARTHUR Kyle Hanah is a process engineer. It's not a glamorous trade by any stretch, but Mr. Hanah's linear thinking was just what his employer needed to turn [...]

Byline: Kate MacArthur R. J. MELMAN, Jerrod MELMAN 32, 29, partners, Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises Inc., Chicago When R. J. and Jerrod Melman opened Hub 51 in River North three [...]

Byline: KATE MACARTHUR In the battle to be the place for high-powered executives and politicians, Chicago Cut Steakhouse is testing the loyalty of longtime customers of Gibsons Bar & Steakhouse. [...]

Byline: KATE MACARTHUR James Hyatt needed three years, but he's done what nobody else has managed to do at Cos Inc.: turn a quarterly profit. When the Deerfield-based sandwich seller [...]

Byline: KATE MACARTHUR Chicago is beefing up again. After a couple of years of scrimping to cover the mortgage and car payments, consumers are splurging on red meat, forking out [...]

Byline: KATE MACARTHUR Sandra Franco nibbles on a $10.50 cochinita pibil torta--a grilled Mexican pulled-pork sandwich--at the just-opened Tortas Frontera at O'Hare International Airport's Terminal 1. With two hours until [...]

Byline: KATE MACARTHUR The U.S. outpost of home appliance maker Dyson Ltd. is facing what could be its greatest challenge since tackling loss of suction: growth. Vacuum-cleaner sales have become [...]

Byline: KATE MACARTHUR DraftFCB is fighting to hang onto a pair of its biggest and oldest clients amid turmoil in the executive suite at Chicago's largest advertising agency. Consumer-products maker [...]

Byline: KATE MACARTHUR After a decade of disappointment, Bonnie Weber is getting exactly what she wants for Christmas: the anise-flavored, sugar-sprinkled cookies she remembers dearly from her childhood. 'Right after [...]

Byline: Kate MacArthur Jim and Jason Ebel are in a privileged position in the Chicago beer market. The brothers, along with their father, own Two Brothers Brewing Co. From the [...]

Byline: Kate MacArthur As CEO and majority owner of Budweiser distributor River North Sales & Service LLC, Yusef Jackson controls one of the most coveted markets for the nation's largest [...]

Byline: Kate MacArthur Byron Trott was in the right place at the right time with his recent acquisition of City Beverage-Illinois, the largest Budweiser distributor in the state. City Beverage's [...]

Byline: Kate MacArthur Brothers Chris and Jude Reyes were barely old enough to legally drink when they and their father, Joseph, bought a Schlitz distributorship in South Carolina in 1976. [...]

Byline: Kate MacArthur SARAH ROBB O'HAGAN, 38 Chief marketing officer Gatorade Co. Chicago Few people would have the audacity to tell one of the world's top admen that he's wrong. [...]

Byline: KATE MACARTHUR Pricey new offerings at McDonald's are falling short of sales goals, as customers stick with basic burgers and fries. Specialty coffees, frappes, smoothies, Angus beef burgers and [...]

Byline: KATE MACARTHUR Chuck Hamman and Eli Galayda never dreamed of being bullfighters. But as energy drinks wane for the first time since Red Bull charged into the U.S. in [...]

Byline: KATE MACARTHUR Ray Kroc began his fast-food empire after the milkshake-mixer salesman was wowed by how many shakes the McDonald brothers churned out every day at their burger-and-fries stand. [...]

These days, it seems as though restaurants are giving away the store. After years of trying to wean themselves off deep discounting that cheapens brands and conditions consumers to look [...]

McDonald's is conducting a global brand-strategy study and shifting its breakfast ad account, valued at $100 million. Mary Dillon, global marketing officer, says the study is intended to keep McD's [...]

When McDonald's Corp. announced it would move to a trans fat-free oil, consumers flooded the restaurant chain with complaints that its fries didn't taste as good. But, in fact, the [...]

Now that he's turned many adults off burgers and fries, the author of 'Fast Food Nation'' has penned a book that aims to kill the kiddies' meal. 'With kids aged [...]

Some 50 million customers are thundering through McDonald's-2 million more per day than when its 'I'm lovin' it'' advertising campaign launched two years ago. Determining just how much of that [...]

Byline: KATE MACARTHUR Crain News Service You don't hear a lot about Mary Dillon, McDonald's new global chief marketing officer. That's because the 44-year-old president of Quaker Foods Co. is [...]

Hoping to kick up coffee sales, McDonald's Corp. is bowing to Starbucks Corp. and offering its own premium joe. The sleeping fast-food giant has woken up to the fact that [...]

Splenda has gobbled up more than half the sugar-substitute category in four short years, and competitors want sweet revenge. In the courts and in the court of public opinion, rivals [...]

McDonald's Corp. and other fast-food chains outpaced casual dining chains in the second quarter, reversing the trend of the past two years. Buoyed by better-quality salads and sandwiches, upgraded interiors [...]

Chicago-area marketers are attaching themselves to the Chicago Cubs' unexpected push for post-season glory. 'It's amazing what a winning Cubs season does to the morale of not only our employees, [...]

Bcom3 Group Inc. shareholders are having trouble cashing in some of the chips they collected in the sale of the Chicago-based advertising agency holding company to France's Publicis Groupe SA. [...]

As McDonald's Corp. and chief rival Burger King Corp. slash prices and drag down profits in a heated burger battle, a former McDonald's franchisee is calling for a grass-roots cease-fire. [...]

McDonald's Corp. is flashing a wry smile. The Oak Brook-based burger chain's first television commercial in its 2002 advertising campaign introduces an edgier tone than the lilting ``We love to [...]

Now that soft drink gladiators PepsiCo Inc. and Coca-Cola Co. have dragged their advertising agencies into the cola wars, will the burger wars follow? A fast-food family affair among Burger [...]

A pair of Chicago ad agencies recently elevated women into their top ranks, boosting the total of full-service local shops led by women to seven. Dana Anderson, 47, of Interpublic [...]

McDonald's Corp. and its fast-food rivals are serving up a smorgasbord of promotions for the fourth quarter. ``Since promotion tends to drive faster sales and there's been such skittishness in [...]

A famed New Yorker illustration of a U.S. map shows Manhattan in the foreground, then a vast empty space west of the Hudson River extending all the way to California-a [...]

Happy Meals are giving McDonald's the blues. ``We are beginning to see a softening in our key drivers: drive-thru and kids,'' McDonald's Corp. warned in an internal memo sent by [...]

McDonald's Corp. is emphasizing ongoing variety over quickie promotions in its 2001 marketing plan. At the heart of the strategy is the Oak Brook-based burger chain's New Tastes Menu, a [...]

Donatos Pizza dished out its $15-million advertising account to Martin/Williams of Minneapolis, following a three-month review led by Cleveland-based consultant Rojek Marketing Group. The McDonald's Corp.-owned chain known for its [...]

Burger titan McDonald's Corp. is planning to test two new restaurant concepts, one modeled after a diner and the other after a deli. The chain's lead advertising agency, Chicago-based DDB [...]

McDonald's Corp., fearing it is losing the battle of the burgers, is going on the attack with a top secret new strategic program. Code-named ``Prometheus Project,'' the effort to coordinate [...]

Just four months after McDonald's Corp. overhauled its kitchens to cook burgers to order, customers are complaining about longer waits at the fast-food chain. The new system, dubbed 'Made for [...]

Rave reviews from food critics are not what one would expect for a fast-food chain. Neither are massive burritos and margaritas. But Chipotle Mexican Grill defies convention not only in [...]

McDonald's Corp. and Burger King Corp. are going head-to-head with a pair of prehistoric promotions this summer. McDonald's calls its tie-in with Walt Disney Co.'s release of 'Dinosaurs' the center [...]

McDonald's Corp. is preparing another run at the pizza business with a test of pizza-based Happy Meals. The chain's McPizza flopped in the mid-1980s after McDonald's found it could not [...]