Dawn Meats maintains its historic collaboration with McDonald's, highlighting Ireland’s grass-fed beef excellence and commitment to quality, succession, and sustainability in a global supply chain.Dawn Meats has built its business on the link between farm and fork, and that principle still shapes its work with McDonald's decades after the partnership began. Richard Clinton, the group's commercial director, said the company’s approach starts with the animal and the people who raise it, reflecting a model that has helped turn a Waterford-based beef business into an international supplier with more than 30 sites and 12,000 employees.

The company traces its origins to 1980, when three farming families joined forces in Waterford. Its history has been marked by steady expansion and a long-term focus on quality, with a significant contract with McDonald’s arriving in 2012, according to Dawn Meats’ corporate history. The partnership with the fast-food chain has since become one of the company’s most important commercial relationships, built on consistency, collaboration and the demands of a global supply chain.

That connection reaches back to the farm gate. Kilkenny beef farmer John Phelan described a family holding that began modestly after his parents married and gradually developed over half a century from mixed farming into a more specialised beef operation. Speaking about the change in direction, he said, "We sat down to see what type of beef they were looking for and if we could supply that type", capturing the practical, market-led approach that has linked Irish farmers to large processors and, in turn, to McDonald’s. 

Ireland’s appeal in that system is rooted in climate and grassland, which give beef producers a natural advantage, and Dawn Meats has used that to strengthen its premium positioning. The company and its Dunbia arm won 26 medals at the 2025 World Steak Challenge in Amsterdam, while Dawn Meats separately said its 32-day aged Irish Angus striploin was named the world’s best steak in the same competition. Bord Bia and RTÉ both reported that Ireland led the medal table, underlining the country’s standing in grass-fed beef production.

For Dawn Meats, the commercial relationship is also about succession and skill. The company backs initiatives such as McDonald’s Progressive Young Farmers programme, which is intended to bring new talent into Irish agriculture and support the next generation of managers and leaders. McDonald’s says it has worked with Irish farmers and local franchisees since opening on Grafton Street in Dublin in 1977, and it now operates 97 restaurants in Ireland while spending heavily with domestic suppliers. Over the past decade, Dawn Meats says it has produced more than five billion patties for McDonald’s across Europe. As Clinton put it, "You don’t stay with a business as long as I have if you don’t have an immense pride in what you do and in the people working with you."

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