Day 257 - 06 Jun 96 - Page 38


     
     1   Q.   But the number of pairs of feet, 650 million pairs of feet
     2        have come into your restaurants over the years?
     3        A.  Yes, that is correct.
     4
     5   Q.   So what Mr. Morris says is, if you have 21 million
     6        individuals providing those 650 million pairs of feet, they
     7        basically come about on average 30 times each?
     8        A.  They could, yes, on average, that is certainly the
     9        case, yes, which, if you think about it, is not too far
    10        away from the figure coming from the AF2 document of about
    11        19 times a year when you get the correct multiplying factor
    12        for the various levels of frequency in the case, so it is
    13        not horrendously out as a figure.
    14
    15   Q.   I do not understand how you get from 19 to 30.  Or from 30
    16        to 19.
    17        A.  The fact is that on average 30 may well be the case if
    18        you use our internal data to do a calculation, like that,
    19        but using the AF2 data which actually multiplies by the
    20        percentages by age group or by group that do visit, it
    21        moves the figure to 19.  There is never any attempt in our
    22        calculation to tie the two things together because the two
    23        things inherently will not go.  There is no way you can
    24        make a calculation back from that 650 number, which I think
    25        I used in a slightly different context to the one that is
    26        coming from this data.
    27
    28   Q.   They could not both be right can they?
    29        A.  Neither are right, in the purest sense of the word,
    30        they are both ways of assessing customer visits to
    31        McDonald's, both are assumptions about user behaviour based
    32        upon existing factual data.  The skill in my particular job
    33        is making interpretation of the relationship between the
    34        two and a management judgment on what business currently
    35        is, and that is why we pull information in in those ways.
    36
    37   Q.   The only possible difference, let us say that the 19 is
    38        approximately two thirds of the 30, but for every two pairs
    39        of feet which went in there was an extra pair of feet which
    40        was under the age of 16 because your figures are only, in
    41        one survey, 15 and upwards, and in the other it is 16 and
    42        upwards, but does that account for the difference?
    43        A.  Yes, it does, and I think in AF1 we see something like
    44        54 per cent or 50 per cent of visits are accompanied with a
    45        child nought to nine, and that would make up some of that
    46        difference.
    47
    48   MR. MORRIS:  Well, you will have to help me here.
    49
    50   MR. JUSTICE BELL: I would like to ask one more question. 
    51 
    52   MR. MORRIS:  Please do. 
    53
    54   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  It seems to me the vast number of visits you
    55        get a year, 6 million,, is very often used to show how
    56        successful McDonald's is?
    57        A.  That is correct.
    58
    59   Q.   The Americans might use it as a "Gee, whizz", figure or
    60        whatever they choose to call it?

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