DENVER: Chipotle Mexican Grill, a McDonald’s-owned restaurant group, handled communications in-house for its eagerly awaited IPO last week.
Chris Arnold, whose title with the offbeat chain is "director of hoopla, hype, and ballyhoo," said that the company did not use any outside financial communications firm for the offering. Chipotle uses several regional agencies for consumer PR in various markets, as well as one national agency, which Arnold declined to name.He also noted that Chipotle's communications team is totally separate from that of McDonald's. The IPO "adds new wrinkles to what we've got to do," he said.
The Chipotle offering was met with a high level of interest from the investment community, causing the company to raise its price by $2.50 per share, to $18-20, shortly before the offering went on the market.
McDonald's will still hold a majority stake in Chipotle after the IPO. The chain's growth potential is large, partly because it operates in less than half of the states in the US at the moment.
