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" From what you know about pizza made in Italy, you would assume that it&amp;#039;s probably a big deal. You would assume that, yes, there are very specific rules for what constitutes Italian pizza: It &amp;quot;must be round, no more than fourteen inches in diameter, no thicker than 0.1 inches in the middle, with a crust about 0.8 inches thick,&amp;quot; to name a few. In short, Italians care about their pizza the same way the Scots care about their haggis. That&amp;#039;s why we don&amp;#039;t expect any proud Italian to take the news that McDonald&amp;#039;s wants to kill pizza in that country sitting down. &amp;quot;We have convinced our shareholders in the United States that the Italian market has a potential we can exploit,&amp;quot; McDonald&amp;#039;s Italia Chief Executive Roberto Masi told Reuters. The man in charge of the Slow Food association in Italy (an entity dedicated to preserving traditional cuisine) was none too pleased: &amp;quot;We accept it,&amp;quot; chairman Roberto Burdese said, &amp;quot;as a sort of theme park where you can go.&amp;quot; McDonald&amp;#039;s will invest $457 million in 100 new outlets in the recession-hit country and is stressing job creation and a &amp;quot;full-blown advertising offensive playing to Italians&amp;#039; patriotism.&amp;quot; But it is interesting to note that its European sales didn&amp;#039;t grow substantially during the Olympics, despite a focused advertising campaign there. We&amp;#039;ll just have to see if this ploy has any effect. [via Reuters] "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.esquire.com/food-drink/restaurants/a17890/mcdonalds-attempts-kill-pizza-14958754/>