Food Folk’s responsibility is to make that system work. They recruit and support franchisees, manage the documentation that governs how restaurants open and operate, and ensure that McDonald’s standards are upheld across four countries. The contracts Marianne Baurne manages are not administrative paperwork. They are the legal and operational foundation of each restaurant. They determine ownership, obligations, land status, renewal periods and the relationship between Food Folk and every franchisee.
In other words: the quality of the contract process directly impacts the quality of the entire McDonald’s Nordic system.
But when Marianne arrived, parts of that process were still surprisingly manual.
“When I started in 2020, the process of drafting contracts was not very digital. Agreements were saved in local folders but were also printed and physically sealed.”
Marianne Baurne, Contract Manager, Food Folk
A franchise ecosystem too complex for “standard” contract tools
A franchise agreement at Food Folk is not just one document. It is an interconnected set of contracts, attachments and decisions that must all be aligned. Since these vary based on factors such as country, type of restaurant, whether land is owned or leased and whether a franchisee is new or existing, every agreement requires careful tailoring.
Before Precisely, Marianne had to enter the same information multiple times across the documents in each package. But the bigger challenge was maintaining full oversight when information arrived at different times from different stakeholders. With several agreements and ownership changes often happening simultaneously, and feedback rarely coming in at the same pace, Marianne had to manually track what had been updated, what was still missing, and which steps in the process were already complete.
“The complexity was not only about entering information multiple times, but about keeping track of different pieces of information coming in at different points from several stakeholders, across several agreements at once.”
The existing tools could not fully support Food Folk’s needs. They needed something that could mirror their franchise model without forcing them to simplify it.
Turning complexity into structured automation
With Precisely, Food Folk began a phased rollout, starting with the franchising department where the need was greatest. This became a collaborative effort between Food Folk and Precisely’s Customer Success team, shaping a system that reflected how agreements actually work in the Nordic network.
The biggest change came from Precisely’s question flows and formulas. Instead of assembling each agreement piece by piece, Marianne now enters the core information once. The system uses her answers to:
- Select the correct clauses
- Calculate the right dates, durations and values
- Ensure that all connected documents use the same consistent data
“The drafting process has become much more efficient. The combination of questions, conditions and formulas ensures that the correct templates, clauses and calculations are generated automatically, and that all documents in the project are managed in one place.”
This logic-based automation is something Food Folk could not achieve with traditional CLM tools designed around single-document workflows. Precisely supports real business structures, not just document storage.
A Nordic-wide contract archive
Another breakthrough was the creation of a central archive. All signed agreements for all countries now live in one platform. Users no longer need to search through folders or question whether they are working with the correct version. Access is structured and consistent, and ensures that the right people automatically have access to the right documents according to Food Folk’s standards. The centralized setup supports daily collaboration and creates a more reliable and transparent contract environment across the Nordic organization.
The platform also captures structured metadata that helps maintain accurate franchise master data and manage ownership changes across the Nordic system.
Food Folk now plans to connect Precisely with other systems through APIs, allowing data to flow between platforms rather than being maintained manually. This will make the process even smoother, automate key steps further and ensure that Precisely becomes a natural part of Food Folk’s broader ecosystem rather than a standalone silo.
“Our goal is to implement API integration so other systems can retrieve data from and communicate with Precisely.”
Onboarding that matched the complexity
Marianne highlights the collaboration with Precisely as essential to success. Food Folk’s agreements are complex. They required creative thinking, careful configuration and ongoing problem solving.
“The collaboration went exceptionally well. Many of our agreements are very complex, requiring brainstorming and creative problem solving.”
This onboarding experience is one of Precisely’s biggest differentiators. Instead of forcing customers to fit a rigid system, Precisely adapts to the customer’s real workflow and builds a structure that supports it. Marianne then continued the adoption journey internally by leading workshops, creating a Food Folk specific user manual and offering tailored introductions to new users.
Results: A more accurate, more controlled, more enjoyable process
After the implementation, the work changed fundamentally.
Drafting contracts became faster and smoother. The approval flow became clearer. The automation ensures that the correct structure and calculations are applied without manual coordination, and both the Franchising and Legal Departments have gained better visibility into their agreement portfolio.
“It has been a tremendous time-saving tool for drafting contracts. The approval process has also become more efficient and clear.”
For the first time, Food Folk had a contract process that matched the scale and complexity of their franchise network.
The road ahead
Food Folk is now expanding its use of Precisely. More templates will be imported. All documents requiring signatures will use the e-signing tool. And upcoming API integrations will improve data accuracy even further.
“I am proud to have played a key role in implementing Precisely and improving our contract processes.”
The result is a contract workflow that not only supports, but strengthens, one of the most operationally intensive franchise systems in the Nordics.
TL;DR
Food Folk, which operates the McDonald’s system in the Nordics, used to manage complex franchise agreements through manual, repetitive workflows where information arrived at different times from multiple stakeholders. Precisely allows them to generate complete agreement packages from a single data entry, using conditions, formulas and question logic to ensure the correct templates, clauses and values every time. Agreements are now centrally stored across all four countries with structured, role-based access, and the approval and signing flows are clearer and faster. Precisely’s tailored onboarding and configuration were key to making the system match Food Folk’s complex franchise model. The result is a more efficient, more controlled and more scalable contract process.
