Question: I recently purchased a fish sandwich from the McDonald’s Palolo. It cost $4.19, which I thought was quite expensive. I did not remember paying that much at other McDonald’s locations. Sure enough, the same sandwich at the Kahala McDonald’s was $2.99. I called the Palolo location, and the manager said they can set prices as they see fit because they are a franchised operation. Can the prices differ so greatly at the McDonald’ses just miles away from each other?
Answer: It doesn’t matter if a McDonald’s restaurant is a franchise or company-operated, said Melanie Okazaki, regional marketing manager for McDonald’s Hawaii. It can set a price different from other outlets.
“Each of our locations has a unique set of cost circumstances to manage, which occasionally calls for a different price structure, regardless if it’s individually or company-operated,” Okazaki said. “In addition, each restaurant can offer products at a special price for promotional purposes.”
Of the 75 McDonald’s restaurants in Hawaii, 51 are franchised and 24 are company-operated.
“While we have found it necessary to adjust prices accordingly, we believe we continue to provide the best products at a reasonable cost, which represents a great value to our customers,” Okazaki said.
SAVING THE NENE
Credit for saving the nene goose, the state bird, from extinction should go more to a Hawaii island man, not to an English nature reserve.
Thanks to Paul Breese, director emeritus of the Honolulu Zoo, for pointing out the contributions made by the late Herbert C. Shipman of the well-known kamaaina family on Hawaii island.
A park in Keaau is named after Shipman, who died in 1976, and the historic W.H. Shipman House in Hilo, Ainahou Ranch in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park and Shipman Beach in Puna are all named for his family.
Breese noted that an Oct. 24, 1976, obituary in the Hawaii Tribune-Herald described Shipman as a “well known Puna conservationist, rancher, businessman, philanthropist, and humanitarian, who ‘saved the Nene,’ Hawaii’s state bird.”
It turns out that Breese, who will turn 91 next month and who served as the zoo’s first director from 1947 to 1964, also played a role in saving the nene.
Our Sept. 9 column explained why nene can be found in many places outside of Hawaii and noted that the Wildlife and Wetlands Trust in Slimbridge, England, is credited with saving the native bird from extinction in the early 1950s.
But in a letter to us from his home on Hawaii island, Breese said that in the 1940s there were only 13 captive nene and an estimated 30 in the wild, all on Hawaii island except for one at the Honolulu Zoo. Eleven of the captive birds were in a flock maintained by Shipman.
In 1949, Breese said, the Honolulu Zoo and the Territorial Department of Agriculture and Forestry partnered to establish the Nene Restoration Project at Pohakuloa on Hawaii island.
“Herbert Shipman donated two pair of his nene to begin our project,” Breese said. He also sent three nene to the Slimbridge preserve.
“In time our project at Pohakuloa raised over 2,000 nene, most of which were released on the Big Island and Maui to build the wild population,” Breese said.
He said Slimbridge also was successful in raising nene, and between 1962 and 1978, 197 nene raised at Slimbridge and 285 from Pohakuloa were released on Maui.
There now are more than 2,500 nene in the wild on Hawaii, Maui, Molokai and Kauai, Breese said.
“There are probably as many nene in zoos and private collections throughout the world as in the wild in Hawaii.”
Breese said avian historian Arleone Dibben-Young, who lives on Molokai, is working on a book about the state bird.
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