McDonald's owner 'lovin' it' as he drives through eighth fast-food outlet

Doing a Maccas run is about to become much quicker for Lake Macquarie Square shoppers, with the American fast-food chain set to open its 13^th outlet in the local government area.

Construction on the Mount Hutton McDonald's began on Tuesday, and is expected to take 18 weeks for a slated November 30 opening.

It will be at the entry of the Lake Macquarie Fair in the building that previously housed Smokin' Joe Pizza & Grill.

Franchisee Hayden Smith already owns McDonald's restaurants at Swansea, Belmont, Glendale, and Cardiff in Lake Macquarie and Wyong and Tuggerah Westfield on the Central Coast.

Mr Smith will also officially take over the Edgeworth McDonald's next Monday.

The Mount Hutton outlet is expected to create 170 jobs for construction workers and restaurant employees.

Mr Smith says that, across his eight outlets, he will employ about 800 people.

"I'm really passionate about giving young people a great start, but not just young people, but people of any age," Mr Smith said.

"We're fortunate to have some great people on our team that have been recognised by the McDonald's business as very high performers.

It will be Hayden Smith's eighth McDonald's outlet after he started with Forster 13 years ago. Picture supplied

"So I'm really looking forward to getting in and supporting the Mount Hutton area as well."

Mr Smith said the Mount Hutton outlet will need 90 staff, plus 10 managers.

"It's a good addition to the local economy," he said. "There will be 100 employees ongoing at the store.

"We'll be advertising in the next four weeks. We will hire staff and we'll train them at our Belmont store."

Mr Smith expects the early morning to be peak demand.

"A couple of my stores, particularly Wyong and Swansea, are very busy coffee stores," he said.

"I actually think Mount Hutton in the morning trade will be a good coffee store as well."

Lake Macquarie has the highest concentration of McDonald's restaurants in the Hunter.

The Golden Arches are already at Toronto, Morisset, Cameron Park, Edgeworth, Glendale, Cardiff, Warners Bay, Charlestown (two), Bennetts Green, Belmont and Swansea.

Construction has also begun on stores at the Coorabong twin service stations on the M1 Motorway, and, in February, Lake Macquarie City Council approved a McDonald's, Kentucky Fried Chicken, Guzman Y Gomez, and BWS at Boolaroo.

The Mount Hutton McDonald's is 2.4 kilometres from the Bennetts Green outlet and 4.3 kilometres from Charlestown's Pacific Highway store.

In Australia, McDonald's has 1070 outlets, employing more than 115,000 people.