The story
Background
Ukraine gained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, six years prior to the arrival of the first McDonald's in the country, and in 1997 was beginning to open up to the West.
Entry
McDonald’s opened its first Ukraine restaurant on 24 May 1997, after taking 99 days to build it. This restaurant is located near the Lukianivska metro station in Kyiv. The opening proved a significant attraction, with crowds lining up for multiple days for its burgers. Company officials stated that McDonald's was to invest $100 million in Ukraine and open seven outlets that year, with the second restaurant then planned to open in Kharkiv in eastern Ukraine a month after the first. The company planned to have 85 outlets in the country by the year 2000.
By August 2002, McDonald's had spent a total $76 million to build 49 restaurants in Ukraine; it planned to invest $50 million to double its restaurants in Ukraine by 2007, including 14 restaurants in Kiev, Odesa and other cities in 2003. It also planned to double its staff to 6,000 people by 2007. In 2011, the McDonald’s restaurant at Kyiv’s central train station was the company's second-busiest in the world.
From Wikipedia’s article on McDonald's Ukraine, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4