Bite the Damn Burger, Chris Kempczinski

When the CEO won’t swallow his own product, the brand chokes a little too.

AdWeek recently carried a sharp, unsparing account of Chris Kempczinski gamely attempting to eat his company’s newest flagship burger on camera.

It should have been a lay-up.

Instead, it became a small but telling parable about leadership and belief.

The company, of course, is McDonald’s.

The burger is the Big Arch.

The stage was LinkedIn.

And the bite — if we’re being generous — was tentative.

The Clip Heard Round Marketing

Kempczinski opened the box with all the right lines. It was “so good.” It was “unique.” There was “so much going on.” A textbook corporate crescendo.

Then came the moment of truth.

He didn’t take a bite so much as graze the perimeter.

Two per cent consumption. Perhaps three.

A polite nibble from the outer rim, as though the centre contained confidential documents.

He referred to it not as lunch, but as “the product.”

Later, memorably, as “this thing.”

You don’t call a burger “this thing” unless you are negotiating with it.

AdWeek’s coverage rightly observed that the internet noticed.

It always does.

One musician quipped, “This man does not eat McDonald’s.”

Brutal. Viral. Effective.

But this is not about social media cruelty.

It’s about distance.

When Leaders Float Above the Menu

The higher you rise in corporate life, the further you drift from the thing you sell.

You know the brand architecture.

You know the franchisee margins.

You know the quarterly comps.

But you may no longer know what it feels like to hold the thing with both hands and risk the sauce on your shirt.

This is the modern CEO paradox.

You are paid eight figures to sell a nine-dollar combo meal.

Your life becomes optimised, filtered, managed.

The product becomes a slide, a metric, a growth vector.

And then someone hands you the actual object.

Contrast that with Warren Buffett and his devotion to Coca-Cola.

He drinks it because he likes it.

Berkshire owns billions in Coke shares, but the affection predates the asset allocation.

He owns the stock because he drinks the drink — not the other way around.

Or consider Akio Toyoda at Toyota. He didn’t merely endorse performance.

He raced it. Anonymous entry. Nürburgring humiliation.

German machines screaming past.

That experience sharpened Toyota’s sporting spine.

Belief is visceral. It leaves tyre marks.

Then there’s Mark Zuckerberg of Meta, once photographed with tape over his laptop camera.

A tiny square of black adhesive that said more about surveillance anxiety than any congressional testimony.

Alignment matters. Behaviour signals belief.

The Language of Distance

The most revealing moment in the Big Arch video was not the bite.

It was the language.

“The product.”

“This thing.”

When leaders begin to abstract their own merchandise, customers sense it instinctively.

Brands are emotional contracts.

They require congruence between what is said and what is done.

A burger is not a concept.

It is hot, messy, excessive.

You grip it with two hands.

You lean forward. You accept collateral damage.

When a CEO handles it like evidence, the metaphor writes itself.

A Better Edit

Same setting. Same burger. Different posture.

Box opens. No over-description.

He lifts it properly — because that’s how it’s meant to be lifted.

He leans in slightly so the sauce doesn’t redecorate his tie.

He takes a real bite. Three inches. Commits.

He chews. Not theatrically. Just chews.

Maybe he nods. Maybe he says nothing at all.

The camera cuts with half the burger gone and no apology in sight.

That’s not performance. That’s belief.

Close the Gap

AdWeek’s report wasn’t about calories. It was about calibration.

Great brand leaders collapse the distance between boardroom and product.

They drive the car.

They drink the soda.

They use the software.

They eat the burger — not quarterly for comms, but habitually, privately, unselfconsciously.

Because in that moment, the product is not revealing something about the P&L.

It is revealing something about you.

If you hesitate, even slightly, we can taste it.