Max Cooper has been associated with McDonald’s for 55 years.
After helping to build a large public relations firm in his native Chicago, with McDonald’s as one of its clients, Cooper in 1966 jumped at the chance when the fast-food chain offered him a chance to open a McDonald’s franchise in Birmingham.
His company, CLP Corp., has grown from just three restaurants in 1966 to Alabama’s largest McDonald’s franchisee, operating 40 restaurants in metro Birmingham, Gadsden and Anniston.
In an interview inside the renovated Center Point McDonald’s, Cooper talked about what led him to switch from public relations into the fast-food restaurant business, and what keeps him working at age 96.