fast food companies

Fast food can be an occasional unhealthy indulgence - but fast food stocks can be a healthy dose of profit for your portfolio.

Imagine you were one of the first to buy shares of McDonald's Corp. (NYSE: MCD), the world's largest publicly traded fast food company.

When the "golden arches" opened its doors in 1960, it offered just six menu items - including a 15-cent burger and five-cent fries - at its 102 locations. Now it operates more than 33,000 restaurants in 118 countries and serves more than 64 million customers a day.

McDonald's went public in 1965, selling its shares for $22.50; now its stock trades around $90 a share.

That means today, after 12 stocks splits, 100 shares of the original McDonald's stock that cost you $2,250 would have grown to 74,360 shares worth roughly $6.7 million - and that doesn't even count dividends paid out by the company.

No other restaurant chain has matched McDonald's success, but others have shown phenomenal growth with impressive profits - and I'm going to show you how to find them.

Four Must-Have Factors for Fast Food Stocks

To find a winning fast food stock we have to look at what will drive growth - and related profits - in the future. There are four dominant themes you need to look for.