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Grinding It Out: The Making of McDonald's

Ray Kroc,

Robert Anderson

4.05 · Rating details · 5,050 ratings · 375 reviews

Few entrepreneurs can claim to have actually changed the way we live, but Ray Kroc is one of them. His revolutions in food service automation, franchising, shared national training and advertising have earned him a place beside the men who founded not merely businesses but entire new industries.

But even more interesting than Ray Kroc the business legend is Ray Kroc the man ...more

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Mass Market Paperback, 256 pages

Published April 15th 1992 by St. Martin's Press (first published 1977)

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Jun 13, 2016 Andrew rated it really liked it · review of another edition

When Ray Kroc wrote this book back in 1977, he was optimistic about the growth of McDonald's' breakfast. And suggested they might even one day serve pizza (LOVED IT!).

So this is obviously a little dated. That and references to housewives.

But it's a fascinating business story. This guy didn't kick off McDonald's until he was 52. Which makes me feel a lot better about my career. Before that he was a Depression-era salesman and piano player who epitomized that American gung-ho hard work ethic. He's ...more

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Jan 30, 2015 Jason Navallo rated it it was amazing

I re-read this book after watching the movie. What an inspiring story about persistence! Ray Kroc was truly a great American entrepreneur. My only regret is that I did not get a chance to interview him for one of my books!

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May 05, 2016 David Rosage rated it it was amazing

This was an amazing read. It simply amazes me that he started MCDonalds at age 52 and in 25 years had over 4000 stores and 3 billion in sales. Favorite quote: "PRESS On: Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent" - Ray Kroc ...more

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Dec 01, 2017 Ashley Glovasky rated it liked it

In a nutshell: Ray Kroc is an asshole, but he gave us McDonald’s, so there’s that...

Recommendation: It’s always interesting to know how a big company came to be, so if the topic interests you, I’d say this is worth a read.

I wanted to read this after I watched The Founder... I didn’t learn that many new things other than more about Ray Kroc as a person and it made me hate him even more.

“People have marveled at the fact that I didn’t start McDonald’s until I was fifty-two years old, and then
In a nutshell: Ray Kroc is an asshole, but he gave us McDonald’s, so there’s that...

Recommendation: It’s always interesting to know how a big company came to be, so if the topic interests you, I’d say this is worth a read.

I wanted to read this after I watched The Founder... I didn’t learn that many new things other than more about Ray Kroc as a person and it made me hate him even more.

“People have marveled at the fact that I didn’t start McDonald’s until I was fifty-two years old, and then I became a success overnight. But I was just like a lot of show business personalities who work away quietly at their craft for years, and then, suddenly, they get the right break and make it big. I was an overnight success all right, but thirty years is a long, long night.”

Ray Kroc was always a hard worker but couldn’t seem to make ends meet. He was a milkshake-mixer salesman by day and an amateur piano-player at night. One day, he is confused when a customer purchases multiple mixers at once and decides he needs to travel to the location to see what’s going on. He arrives at the McDonald brothers’ burger stand in San Bernardino, California and is blown away by the operation, from the efficiency and “take-away” service style to the taste of the food. He has to be a part of it and urges the brothers to the franchise. Eventually, Kroc swindles his way into taking over the entire organization and the McDonald’s brothers are bought out and led to close their original store. Through his life, Kroc had 3 wives, leaving one each time he met someone more attractive and agreeable to him, happily took away the McDonald brothers’ legacy and is now credited as the creator, and let his success get to his head with his arrogance.

Even though this book gets three stars, I judged it based on the interesting subject matter. But I docked points for Kroc just being an awful human being.

So, this is a cool story because it tells you how the fast food nation came to be and how McDonald’s basically started the entire movement. But it wasn’t Ray Kroc’s idea. He stole it from the McDonald’s brothers. Or... I don’t know if steal is the right word. It’s just all super shady. Basically while selling milkshake mixers he found the McDonald’s brothers and was blown away by the efficiency and quality of food during the era of car hops. He somehow got the brothers to agree to franchise McDonald’s, even though they were really reluctant at first. After selling off a bunch of franchises and making a lot of changes, Ray Kroc bought the brothers out and opened one of his restaurants right across from the brothers’ original restaurant and thus drove them out of business, THEIR dream.

Also, Ray Kroc was sexist. Let’s get that straight. All the executives he chose were men. He explicitly explains that he only wanted to sell franchises to men and then their wives took over the administrative duties. And he talks about his own bookkeeper and how great she was but he uses language to suggest that she’s beneath him and that as much as he apparently respects her, he judges her work based on her gender. Like how she went above and beyond her line of duty and this was incredible given the fact she was a woman. As if most women aren’t capable of going above and beyond with their work and don’t have the same mental capacity. Ridiculous. AND he had 3 wives. On it’s own, that seems fine. But he left his wives when he met another more attractive woman and married her instead. His second marriage happened because he couldn’t get with this other married woman he wanted, and then when the married woman came back years later and said she was ready to leave her current husband, he divorced his current wife. What a dirty scumbag.

It’s also pretty clear that Kroc was arrogant. The book is filled with his judgments of other people and how awesome he thinks he is in comparisons. Not to mention he fills the books with quotes from other people and McDonald’s executives who have told him how awesome he is. They don’t add much context. He basically just adds them in the middle of a chapter when he needs to inflate his already huge ego.

I know this all seems like me complaining about the book, yet I still gave it three stars. But this book is supposed to be a book about McDonald’s and Ray Kroc’s life. And it succeeds in that... which is why I still gave it three stars. ...more

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Jun 26, 2020 Ryan rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites-of-2020, business-leadership, 20th-century, business-history, non-fiction, favorite-books-of-all-time

After watching The Founder I naturally believed Ray Kroc to be an irrepressible, rapacious—yet bizaarely talented—bastard. He apparently only operates in a French-fry scented sea of amorality, and seemed to think nothing of his complacent-yet-mostly-supportive wife.

And yet, the film would have us believe he still ostensibly wakes up to smell the grease and relish his daily submerging of his enemies in the proverbial deep fryer.

But after consuming Grinding it Out in earnest, I felt that this vie After watching The Founder I naturally believed Ray Kroc to be an irrepressible, rapacious—yet bizaarely talented—bastard. He apparently only operates in a French-fry scented sea of amorality, and seemed to think nothing of his complacent-yet-mostly-supportive wife.

And yet, the film would have us believe he still ostensibly wakes up to smell the grease and relish his daily submerging of his enemies in the proverbial deep fryer.

But after consuming Grinding it Out in earnest, I felt that this view of Kroc was most certainly not the hot-blooded, notorious hellspawn he is made out to be—at least according to his own account of himself. Naturally, it’s quite charitable and generous towards his own apparently amazing feats of business and personal successes. Still, I’m actually more partial to his own account far more than I thought I might be—even if it is far rosier than perhaps is the case.

He not only is like a real life Horacio Algers hero (from zero to ‘hero’ through sheer determination and resourcefulness, and the like), but also a late bloomer! And personally, I am always excited when older folks buck the ’30 Under 30’ cultural zeitgeist, and show you never needed to be a national champion of [insert prestigious thing] by the age of 12.

Still, he ripped what is now McDonald’s from the eponymously named brother’s hands and devoured it the same way a greedy child scrounges down a Happy Meal. But that aside, it really says something that despite knowing this about Ray Kroc, he is so goddamn likable.

I’m serious: he comes off as so excited about life and passionate about success, that one would be a fool to, at minimum, not see the man with at least some kind of begrudging respect: he turned one great Speedee System propelled restaurant and exploded into an international feeding frenzy. No one can knock him for this. Yeah, the philandering, zany enthusiasm, and sharp-teethed, raw and ruthless competitive zeal all ‘complicate’ and highlight his intense flaws, but he frankly seems like an extraordinary man.

He also perhaps saw beauty in things others could not:

“Consider, for example, the hamburger bun. It requires a certain kind of mind to see beauty in a hamburger bun. Yet, is it any more unusual to find grace in the texture and softly curved silhouette of a bun than to reflect lovingly on the hackles of a favorite fishing fly? Or the arrangement of textures and colors in a butterfly’s wing? Not if you are a McDonald’s man. Not if you view the bun as an essential material in the art of serving a great many meals fast. Then this plump yeasty mass becomes an object worthy of sober study” (Kroc, 167-168)

In conclusion, when the dust settled in Kroc’s golden-arched McEmpire, he has accomplished something few other humans in history ever have: a celebrated empire—even today, despite it not being fashionable to admit, McDonalds is still roaringly popular: it brought in a total revenue of $21 Billion in 2019—which still entices and (in a kind of slice-of-life sort of way) even enchants its customers—which could very well persist for the next century. This makes Kroc, no matter what may think of him, more than just a man who sold franchises and ‘ground out’ a living, but the progenitor of something now embedded in the firmament of quintessential American culture, and perhaps one of the pinnacle symbols of Americana. That makes him an undeniably successful and worthwhile person of study, despite his undeniable flaws. ...more

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Apr 17, 2011 Tiffani rated it really liked it

This was a great book about the effect of hard work and a determined attitude. I admire Ray Kroc for remaining 'green' in his thinking and seizing a business opportunity at 52. ...more

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May 30, 2020 Jay Pruitt rated it it was ok

The autobiography touches on many of the twists and turns of Ray Kroc's life. Not as much discussion as it'd hoped about the buyout of the McDonald brothers, and certainly not as it was portrayed in the movie, The Founder. There were some interesting chapters (I thought it was particularly interesting to hear about Ray's public chastising of the San Diego Padres), but I found the book to be mostly pretty slow. ...more

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Aug 13, 2019 João Peliteiro Coutinho rated it it was amazing

After watching “The Founder” I was intrigued with the story behind McDonalds and decided to buy this book, which tells with much more detail how Ray Kroc found out this little restaurant in the middle of the desert and in just a matter of years managed to build an empire with the same “hamburger model”. Moreover, it describes the early career days of him, since when he was a piano player and afterwards a best seller of paper cups.

I love the “starting from the bottom” stories and this one really ...more

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Aug 03, 2012 Amy! rated it liked it

I'm not really sure how this book ended up in my to-read pile, but it was short and so I grabbed it for a recent plane trip.

I was surprised to find that it was a rather engaging read. Finished (even this 2nd edition) long before McDonalds became the anti-health and corporate manipulation punching bag that it is today, I found it was rather charming to think of McDs as a tiny little operation with a small menu selling 15 cent hamburgers. I kind of wish I had been able to try their fries back whe ...more

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Mar 08, 2017 Mikedariano rated it it was ok

It could have been that because this book was written 30 years ago (1977), but the style was not what I expected. Kroc has a co-author, yet the text isn't crisp.

There are some good lessons here but the largest is the rewards and consequences of ego. Kroc built out the most successful fast food franchise ever. He created a large charity, owned the San Diego Padres, rubbed elbows with so-and-sos and more. The ability to think 'I can do this' requires some amount of optimism, ambition, and ego.
Bu ...more

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Jul 06, 2018 Sumit Gouthaman rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: management, business

I did not know about Ray Kroc's story until I watched "The Founder (2016)". Initially I debated whether it was worth reading this book, having watched the movie already.

Turns out it was a great decision. This book adds another dimension to the McDonald's story that the movie does not do complete justice too. It is very interesting to read and understand Ray Kroc's internal though process as he made decisions that seems ridiculous at the time.

There a lot of things to learn from Ray Kroc's story, ...more

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Apr 09, 2016 Mike Adeleke rated it it was amazing

In recent times, it seems that those who rise to success are always bright, young, and precocious. They hit on an idea and in a relatively short amount of time rode their prowess and an economic wave to success. This was not Ray Kroc founder of the modern McDonalds. Ray Kroc was a journeyman of sales moving from one product to another. When he met the McDonalds brothers and looked to expand their brand he was 52 years old! But as the book states, he simply made it a habit to grind it out. This s ...more

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Feb 08, 2019 Arthur Sperry rated it really liked it

The way McDonalds came to be is studied by many people in business, and is well known, but this book adds some interesting facts and info to the story from the perspective of the man who made it a business and food empire. The book is full of a lot of interesting observations on human behavior. I still personally think having decent morning coffee is crucial to their success! Lol.

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May 16, 2018 Ludovic rated it did not like it

Shelves: biography

Can't finished it. Boring as hell... ...more

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Oct 20, 2020 Bhargav Pandya rated it it was amazing

A guy who felt greener than ever at the age of 52! A guy who was a paper cup salesman (and eventually a milkshake milti mixer salesman) for 30 years!

They think he suddenly had an overnight success. But he credits it to the journey he followed throughout his life. Hence he says that if I am an overnight success, then 30 years is a really long night!

Even though this book had so few pages, it took me quite a while to finish this one. Mainly because the author took the great efforts to explain the ...more

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Feb 25, 2018 Leslie Goddard rated it really liked it

I was surprised how engaging I found this short, entertaining biography. Surprised because (a) the basic story is now so well-known -- how Kroc took a good basic premise from the McDonald brothers and built it into a food juggernaut. There's no real question what the end will be -- massive financial success and a big push towards upending of the traditional American way of eating.

Surprised also because, (b) McDonald's today represents so much that is questionable about the American diet. It's ha I was surprised how engaging I found this short, entertaining biography. Surprised because (a) the basic story is now so well-known -- how Kroc took a good basic premise from the McDonald brothers and built it into a food juggernaut. There's no real question what the end will be -- massive financial success and a big push towards upending of the traditional American way of eating.

Surprised also because, (b) McDonald's today represents so much that is questionable about the American diet. It's hard to remember that in the 1950s a meal from the McDonald brothers restaurant was made from fresh beef, potatoes that were scrubbed, soaked, peeled, cut and cooked in-house, and milkshakes made from actual ice cream and milk. I would love to travel back in time to taste a 1954 meal from the San Bernadino restaurant and compare it with a modern McDonald's hamburger, fries and shake.

The rah-rah explanations he gives for his success (dream big, insist on quality, value, and cleanliness, be willing to take big risks) were fairly predictable. I can see why they'd be inspiring, but they seem rather typical and unsurprising.

What impressed me much more was Kroc's ability to tell a good story -- storytelling was clearly fundamental to his success both as a salesman and as a fast food entrepreneur. The story of how he discovered potatoes had to be 'cured' to get the wonderful taste was genuinely fascinating. And I also was impressed by his honesty, especially about his (clearly powerful) temper. For all the stories about his helping to clean McDonald's parking lots, you also hear about his chewing the head off those who disagree with him.

For me, McDonald's has come to represent such a different thing than it did in the 1970s when this book came out. Kroc himself has come to be seen, in the wake of The Founder, as a far more problematic figure, whether that's true or not (his story about why he opened a McDonald's across the street from the McDonald brothers' later restaurant "the Big D" and drove them out of business is very, very different from what The Founder suggests).

I tend to think of McDonald's as providing cheap, nutritionally deficient food served by adults who work several low-paying part-time jobs to make ends meet. It's useful to remember how different it was in the 1950s/1960s/1970s. Back then, it was much easier to see McDonalds in terms of its positive impact -- things like clean restaurants, predictable food, great value, employment opportunities for teenagers and young adults.

Maybe the great value of this book is that it's a reminder that it's too easy and too simplistic to see McDonald's as either "good" or "bad" for Americans. ...more

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May 08, 2017 Joshua rated it it was amazing

The title says it all. Ray Kroc was 52, had diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis and suffered from a gallbladder surgery all while starting McDonald's. Ray was an average American who simply worked at his goals until he attained them. His story is very similar to Sam Walton's 'Made In America' and they both had similar approaches to how they ran their businesses. Ray was simply a brilliant salesman, promoter and story teller. The fact that he was able to identify a winning formula for a franchise and ...more

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Dec 23, 2020 Grant rated it did not like it · review of another edition

Plainspoken, almost to a fault. Kroc certainly wasn't a great writer, though I wasn't expecting him to be, either. But business books can sometimes have style, e.g., "The Soul of a New Machine" or "Kitchen Confidential". This is not a business book with style.

Ray Kroc was really into himself. There's not much in this memoir in terms of humility or even self-reflection. He describes his career in a linear, matter-of-fact way, and there's no denying that he achieved financial success. But the care Plainspoken, almost to a fault. Kroc certainly wasn't a great writer, though I wasn't expecting him to be, either. But business books can sometimes have style, e.g., "The Soul of a New Machine" or "Kitchen Confidential". This is not a business book with style.

Ray Kroc was really into himself. There's not much in this memoir in terms of humility or even self-reflection. He describes his career in a linear, matter-of-fact way, and there's no denying that he achieved financial success. But the career stories aren't particularly interesting--reading about the workings of the paper cup business is tiring--and whenever Kroc encountered a problem, he usually managed to (somewhat) work his way out of it by throwing a tantrum. Not necessarily a model to follow. There is also some rather unfortunate sexism in the book--Kroc at one point recounts how he knew he had to get a male secretary because, well, the job he had in mind would be more suited to a man. Yes, those were different times back then, but we have also evolved as a species and a 2016 edition of this book should have edited that nonsense out. Kroc also takes an unfortunate anti-liberal arts stance at the end of the book, citing crudely that "we have too many baccalaureates and not enough butchers" and proposing that universities ought to add technical training branches. Well that's what technical colleges are for, Ray, and if you had any appreciation of the liberal arts throughout your life, maybe you would have written a better book.

The McDonald bros. are suddenly painted out by Kroc to be unreasonable people. Leaves you wondering what the "other side of the story" is--and it isn't here. What was somewhat interesting was reading about the franchising process and how that got started, and some of the recipe-related challenges Kroc faced, including how to duplicate those famous fries. But also a lot of dry stuff about licensing and contract details that the average reader won't find engaging. Kroc only mentions marketing and advertising in passing; would have liked to see more details on the creative campaigns from those years that helped grow the company. Kroc was a dogged, hardworking and enterprising guy--no denying that--but we don't need to be reminded of that so often. This is too self-congratulatory, one-sided, and not particularly well written. ...more

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Jan 02, 2021 Niranjana Sundararajan rated it liked it

Mc Donald's is just one of those great American stories of extraordinary entrepreneurship during the golden era for business.

It's a great story but this narration felt a bit like a grandpa telling us stories of his life (which although fun, are always a bit exaggerated, seem to portray the grandpa as infallible and as someone who can do no wrong-which, can get a bit tiresome).

One thing is clear, Ray Kroc thought of himself a master salesman before anything else. To me, that's a bit of a strange ...more

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Feb 17, 2021 David rated it it was amazing

You may be thinking to yourself what could possibly be interesting about a book titled Grinding It Out: The Making of McDonald's by Ray Kroc. The honest answer is a lot! The author created the fast food industry at the age of 52 with revolutions and innovations in food service automation, franchising, shared national training and advertising. Kroc was on the road selling Multi Mixer machines to restaurants and other businesses who were selling milkshakes and malts when he met the McDonald brothe ...more

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Sep 01, 2019 Dillon rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: business, owned

Another incredible story about the building of an American empire. I enjoyed this nearly as much as I enjoyed "Sam Walton: Made in America". This was an incredible book and an incredible journey to go on. Very glad I hadn't watched the movie yet, but now I will definitely have to check this one out.

If you want to be inspired to take risks, push yourself to always stay "green and growing", then this book here will help light that fire. If you're looking to become an entrepreneur in the future or ...more

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Jun 01, 2018 Jorge Carvalho rated it liked it

Shelves: business, biography

Fascinating corporate success story and fascinating man!
Who doesn't dream to be able to launch a second career after his 50's and build a billion USD corporation? Ray Kroc shows we should at least give it a try, life allowing you so.
Not the very best literary style, but who cares? Plenty of good ideas on how and what to do if you want to launch your startup after your first quarter of a century professional career.
I personally value the corporation and the principles that entail its management, ...more

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May 27, 2018 Eleonora Pogorelova rated it it was amazing

One of the first business books I read. It's an amazing success story about the person, who managed to set a goal and achieve it ...more

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Jul 02, 2019 Jingwei Shi rated it really liked it

Shelves: brands

This is an entertaining book about the rise of McDonald's from Ray Kroc's perspective. The only drawback is the lack of McDonald business details. ...more

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Mar 06, 2020 Alex rated it liked it

Written in the 1970s whilst Ray Kroc was still alive - so very outdated. 1/3 of the book covers the interesting history of one of the most influential and disruptive (franchising and supply chain) companies of all time, 1/3 of valuable business lessons from Ray Kroc's unlikely rise and 1/3 of unbearably relentless self promotions. ...more

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Nov 17, 2020 Sarah Moritz added it

An incredibly arrogant man's perspective to read about but interesting nonetheless to read about the beginning of the famous golden arches! ...more

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Sep 09, 2020 Miriam rated it it was amazing

Some impressive data:
This book was first published in 1977.
Ray Kroc started his work with McDonald in in his 50s back in the 50s.
The first McDonald's were by the McDonald brothers.
It is a short book worth reading... ...more

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Sep 05, 2018 Max rated it liked it

Shelves: nutrition

I enjoyed the documentary more!

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Jul 27, 2019 Piotr Pabis rated it it was amazing

Easy to read autobiography of an exceptional entrepreneur. Although I don’t ethically agree with deeds of McDonald’s, I can understand it was started in different time period.
One of the memorable parts of the book is the fact that it’s not important if someone steals our business processes, they still can’t read our minds and they don’t necessarily follow “go forward” principle, which states that nothing in the world can’t beat persistence: not talent, not genius, not education.

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Sep 03, 2017 Jennifer Tanzi rated it it was amazing

Great book - couldn't put it down. Ray Kroc was a genius! ...more

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About Ray Kroc

Ray Kroc

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Raymond Albert Kroc, popularly known as Ray Kroc, was an American businessman, who brought about a revolution in the fast food industry, making McDonald’s the biggest fast food chain in the world.

Once referred to by Harvard Business School as “the service sector’s equivalent of Henry Ford”, Kroc but had a modest beginning. Initially, he sold various items such as paper cups, milkshake mixers befor ...more