mcdonaldsInvestors eagerly await McDonald’s 2013 fourth-quarter earnings release, hopeful that the fast-food chain will rebound from disappointments in recent quarters. McDonald’s performed beautifully during the recession but in 2012 started to wobble, and as recently as October its revenues fell short of Wall Street’s expectations. 

Although the suburban Chicago company has tried to improve margins in some areas—for example, adding dollar-plus items to its renamed “Dollar Menu & More”—much of its bid for consumers’ wallets involves new food items, from Fish McBites to Mighty Wings to Pumpkin Spice Lattes. McDonald’s said that, beginning in 2020, it will offer healthy sides, such as salad, fruit and vegetables, rather than just fries, in its value meals.

Consumers are driving the options, McDonald’s USA’s senior director of menu innovation, Elizabeth Campbell, told QSR magazine. “It really boils down to bold flavors and real, fresh food—that’s what they’re looking for from us.”

The changes are too little for some critics: Mark Bittman scolded McDonald’s in The New York Times for not doing more, saying “its tardiness in marketing real, healthful food solidifies Big Mac’s public image as a pusher and profiteer of junk food, incapable of doing (or unwilling to do) the right thing.” 

Some formerly loyal customers have been underwhelmed, too. We talked to Keith in Chicago, a lifelong McDonald’s customer, who, despite the menu changes, doubts he will visit more often —unless he ends up working right next to a McDonald’s again. For him and many others, McDonald’s food is good enough, but they do not go out of their way for it. They go when there’s a store nearby. 

Their loyalty is splintering. They do not visit or buy as frequently as they used to, and they buy legacy items—the Quarter Pounder, fries and a Shamrock Shake. They try new products and sometimes like them, such as Keith’s hankering for McDonald’s Angus Burgers, but not enough to generate meaningful sales growth.

Here’s what Keith told us: 

“I’m a 48-year-old married father of a five-year-old girl. My relationship with McDonald’s ebbs and flows, but it has become more a part of my adult diet than I expected. The only real explanation for this is convenience. When I worked in Chicago’s Loop, McDonald’s was across the street and I would wind up there three to four times a month. When I work from home and McDonald’s is several blocks away, I eat there maybe once every two months. 

“To me, McDonald’s is a substitute for what I would really like to eat. A burger? I’d rather go to Five Guys. Healthier chicken? My preference would be a fresh turkey sandwich at Jimmy John’s. A fried chicken sandwich? If I’m going that full-on, grease-and-batter route, I would go to Kentucky Fried Chicken. Salad? I usually keep salad at home. Shakes? I would rather go to a local ice cream parlor or Baskin-Robbins. Yet I still visit McDonald’s, because it’s just there. 

“There’s no specific McDonald’s item that makes me make a special trip. I usually buy a Quarter Pounder or another big sandwich and a couple of items from the ‘Dollar Menu & More.’ I usually make the big sandwich a value meal, with fries and a diet Coke, though if I go back to an office, I try to share the fries with coworkers. The Chicken Biscuit for breakfast is one of my staples, although I would love a sandwich with chicken sausage or turkey sausage. For lunch, the Angus Burgers were the rare thing I would actually seek out— but McDonald’s no longer serves them. 

“There are really only two things I don’t buy at McDonald’s. One is a salad. I love salad and eat one almost every day, but I don’t want to buy my salad from a burger place. The other item is coffee. I don’t know if I am a coffee snob, but if I’m buying coffee out, I go to Starbucks. Convenience doesn’t help McDonald’s when it comes to coffee. If there’s a McDonald’s, I can usually find a Starbucks nearby. 

“My relationship with McDonald’s has changed over the years. As a kid, my family went out for burgers maybe once a month as a ‘special treat,’ usually to a local takeout place. Among chains, I preferred Burger King. My favorite was a Whopper with cheese, and I liked its shakes better. Wendy’s opened near us when I was a teenager and became my go-to place for a burger and fries. I liked the option of putting what I wanted on the burger, loved a Frosty and thought the thicker fries were better than McDonald’s. Still, when I got my first job when I was 13, I used my first paycheck to take my family out for dinner at McDonald’s. Somehow, it seemed like the right thing to do. There was a nice combination of affordability (it was a pretty small paycheck) and food that everybody kind of liked. 

“For a couple of years, I did not go to McDonald’s at all. Then a business meeting took me to the Golden Arches. I ordered a Quarter Pounder with cheese, fries, diet Coke and Shamrock Shake. I liked it so much, I went again the next day and probably eight times in the next month. For some reason—maybe the abstinence, maybe menu improvements—the food tasted better to me. 

“That was in the mid-2000s, and since then I have gone months without a trip to McDonald’s, followed by periods where I go once or twice a week. My wife and I do not go there with our daughter if we’re in town, but on the road we sometimes stop for a burger, apple slices and 2 percent milk (although we prefer skim). My daughter has no particular attachment to McDonald’s, preferring grilled cheese and fruit or vegetables at neighborhood restaurants. The healthier options in the future might help on the margins, but I doubt they will draw us into McDonald’s as a family.” 

To overcome the convenience-only mode of Keith and many other McDonald’s customers, the chain needs to innovate toward fresh, healthier options. The trick is to do that without alienating longtime customers. One way is to offer limited-time specialty items. Another is to become more transparent—for example, to share nutritional information. It often does not make a difference in what customers buy, especially if a store is well placed and has short lines. 

Such transparency generates goodwill, as it did with Keith: 

“The nutrition information on the menu board reinforces what I already know, and if there is a line and I have a couple of minutes to really think about the calorie count, there is about a 50 percent chance that I will walk out. I give McDonald’s credit for making that information available before many competitors, first online, then on tray liners and bags and finally on menu boards, though the last step was prompted by changing laws.” 

Still another way to build customer connections and strengthen loyalty is with stories around food, showing customers where their food comes from and how it is made. McDonald’s has made efforts there as well, touting where its ingredients come from (5 percent of French fries and hash browns served at McDonald’s in western Washington are from Washington, it said in 2010), sharing stories about its suppliers and making videos about its sustainability and animal welfare efforts. But unlike small companies sharing information, McDonald’s honesty and authenticity is sometimes doubted—and such campaigns can be short lived. 

McDonald’s has a lot: Convenience, a menu that Baby Boomers and others feel nostalgic about, and a larger footprint and customer base than many popular, up-and-coming chains. As recent quarters have proven, it needs to keep pushing its boundaries around new items, as well as the ingredients and communications tied to legacy items, to keep bringing people back.