Those days have been gone when black and mocha flight attend uniform was introduced by Bruce Oldfield during 2008. Now Macdonald customer service staff will serve crisp fries and burgers in Fred Perry style polo shirts, the gherkin green for women and mustard yellow for men, and this will have to complement the palette of redesigned restaurants nowadays.
McDonald’s uniforms were never stylish to begin with, but now, with some help from “Mad Men,” the fast food work wear will have certain ’60s flair.Hemingway, who founded the Red or Dead fashion label, revealed that he drew his inspiration from AMC’s “Mad Men,” the TV show set in the ’60s. Basing his designs off costumes from the hit show and the era’s mod style, Hemingway created a new line of uniforms for the U.K.’s 87,500 McDonald’s employees.
In an interview given to Telegraph fashion magazine, Hemingway expressed about new Macdonald dress as “We wanted classic design. A narrow tie will always be fashionable. There is a very subtle hint to the mod look, which has never gone out of fashion,”
The line is composed of skinny ties, pencil skirts and Fred Perry-style polo shirts. Hemingway also traded McDonalds’ classic bright red
and yellows for muted colors like gherkin and mustard and substituted smaller jockey-style hats for baseball caps. Another upgrade in new dress is including the lower-cut collars for female employees, intended to give off a more feminine look.
In alignment with the stylistic upgrades, the new uniforms are now eco-friendly. When the pieces get too old to wear, the fabric will be rehabbed and used to make new uniforms for minimal waste. According to Time, this will make McDonald’s the first company in the U.K. to implement such a “closed loop” system.The new aprons that are part of the uniform have all been designed to be, and use materials that are, closed loop compatible and recyclable using the expertise of Worn Again,” he said. “The aprons will be collected at the end of use to be recycled into new materials.”
McDonald’s has been marketing its brand heavily in the U.K. as the London 2012 Olympics near. The fast food chain will open its largest restaurant to cater to the masses during the event and has also drawn up plans to, well, bribe bloggers, i.e. offer free gifts in exchange for positive reviews. People are fundamental to the success of MacDonald and it really matters to how a uniform should be looking like for the operating staff, this was told by Vice President of People at Macdonald in UK, Mr. JezLanghorne.