Burger King Goes Halal

After going homo in the United States with its “Proud Whopper”– a regular Whopper but with a new wrapper and a message inside, “We are all the same inside” — Burger King in France is going halal.

WND reports, Dec. 15, 2015, that the U.S. burger chain recently took over the Quick chain of fast-food restaurants in France, thereby boosting Burger King locations in the country from about 30 to more than 400.

Quick employed 19,000 people and had $1.12 billion in revenue last year, more than 820 million euros of which was in the French market.

To appeal to France’s estimated 5 million Muslims, Burger King will make about 40 of the restaurants (or 10% of the total) totally halal. That means those restaurants will eliminate all pork and bacon products from their menu and require that the beef and chicken be certified halal, or slaughtered according to Islamic religious tradition.

According to a report in La Parisien, the Bertrand Group is the biggest shareholder of Burger King France. The Group had already planned for the halal when Burger King acquired the Quick restaurants. While most of the 405 Quick locations being acquired by Burger King will be rebranded Burger King, about 40 will remain Quick. Those 40 Quick restaurants will serve Muslims specifically.

The French halal market is estimated to be more than five billion euros.

The move is believed to be part of Burger King’s continuing attacks on McDonald’s – the big player in the fast food industry across France with about 1,300 stores.

Truth or Fiction icily observed that:

Despite calls to boycott Burger King after right-wing American blog sites picked up on the story, the idea that Burger King plans to operate 100% halal restaurants isn’t “breaking” news. The burger chain has operated halal restaurants in predominately Muslim areas of the world for years. There are three all-halal Burger King locations in Malaysia, for example. Also, in 2014, Burger King made waves when it brought a beef and pork free Whopper to India to cater to both Muslims and Hindus. The burger chain introduced a Chicken Whopper, a Mutton Whopper and a Vegetable Whopper there.

While it is true that Burger King has been serving halal food in Muslim countries for years, that the fast-food chain is going halal in France is significant because it speaks to the rapid Islamization of that former Christian country. France has more Muslims than anywhere else in Europe.