McDonald's Holding Co. announced Monday it will form a joint venture with NTT DoCoMo Inc. to use the cell phone company's services to distribute e-coupons and gather customer information for marketing.
McDonald's currently prints coupons about a dozen times a year, 30 million copies each. The fast-food chain hopes to cut costs by sending out coupons via e-mail or having consumers access its Web site with their mobile phones.
"It costs a huge sum of money to hand out 30 million coupon sheets," said McDonald's President Eiko Harada. "I am confident that our cost performance will improve."
DoCoMo's service will allow McDonald's to send coupons to a certain age group or customers living in a particular area, he said.
Harada also said DoCoMo's credit card service installed in its cell phones will allow McDonald's to gather information on customer purchasing behavior when they use the credit service to pay for food at its outlets.
Although the announcement covers only DoCoMo users, Harada said he will consider cooperating with KDDI Corp. and Softbank Mobile Corp.