Heart attack kills McDonald's boss

THE 60-year-old boss of McDonald's - who loved to eat a Big Mac - has died of a heart attack. Jim Cantalupo's death plunged the world's biggest fast-food chain into new crisis just as it seemed to be recovering from a slump.

It also put McDonald's high-fat burgers and fries menu under the microscope again.

Cantalupo, the chairman and chief executive, had worked to revitalise the McDonald's brand and achieve a healthier image in the age of obesity.

He tried to downsize McDonald's huge, high-calorie meals by phasing out Super Size fries, and bucket-sized 42oz drinks, and introducing salads and a McGriddle breakfast sandwich.

But critics say he was not doing enough. The McGriddle is a pancake-style sandwich full of syrup.

Cantalupo - known as the boss with ketchup in his veins - died at a McDonald's owners' and operators' convention in Orlando, Florida. Officials said he was on his way to breakfast when he collapsed.

Wall Street analysts said his death could not have come at a worse time - or in a worse way - for the company.

Commentator Art Hogan said: 'Here's McDonald's trying to change its image and promote itself as providing a healthy diet and the big boss dies of a heart attack. What does that say about the company's meals to the average consumer? A lot of people could be avoiding Big Macs in future.'

Cantalupo, who worked for McDonald's for 28 years, was chairman and vice-president when he took early retirement in 2000. But he returned to take over the reins of the troubled corporation, which has 30,000 outlets worldwide, after former chief executive Jack Greenberg announced his retirement at the end of 2002.

In the last three months of 2002, McDonald's reported its first-ever quarterly loss since it went public in 1965.

Greenberg was criticised for letting the chain stagnate, with complaints of shoddy service and bad food. Cantalupo slowed McDonald's breakneck expansion, closed restaurants and added the lunch and dinner salad and breakfast sandwich to its menu.

The fast-food chain, which celebrates its 50th anniversary next year, dropped the old 'We love to see you smile' slogan, replacing it with 'I'm lovin' it', which was aimed at appealing to younger customers.

Cantalupo said: 'We don't want the company to look and feel 50 years old to our customers. We want McDonald's to be forever young.'

But it faced more criticism in a forthcoming documentary, Super Size Me, showing how film-maker Morgan Spurlock put on two stone living on McDonald's for a month.

Last week, the company announced the creation of Adult Happy Meals with salad, bottled water and a pedometer to encourage people to walk.

McDonald's strategy seemed to be working on Wall Street. The company made a profit in 2003 and its shares, which had slumped to £9 at the end of 2002, bounced back to £16.95.

They dropped to £14.69 on the news of Cantalupo's death, but recovered to £15.28 after the company announced that 42-year-old president and chief operating officer Charlie Bell would become chief executive.

Cantalupo's death comes two months after revelations about the poor health of the inventor of the high-fat, high-cholesterol Atkins diet. Dr Robert Atkins, 72, died a year ago after slipping on an icy street.

Earlier this year, a leaked report by the New York medical examiner revealed that he had a serious heart disease and at 18 1/2 stone was clinically obese.

The report showed that Dr Atkins had suffered a heart attack, congestive heart failure and high blood pressure before his death. But colleagues said his weight had ballooned because of fluid retention while he was in a coma after he collapsed.