KFC's grilled-chicken launch was to be the biggest in the chain's history.
Now it might also go down as a marketing case study in what not to do.
The story starts with a marketer testing the elasticity of its brand.
After all, we all know what the 'F' stands for in KFC, so suddenly insisting the
consumer associate the fast feeder with grilled chicken, rather than the
Colonel's fried version, was always going to be a stretch.
KFC thought the way to meet the challenge was to spend millions on a TV ad
campaign from DraftFCB, Chicago. TV is a marketing channel that's worked
well for other fast-food introductions, but the creative was simultaneously
underwhelming and yet, by telling consumers to "Unthink KFC," seemed to
undermine the chain's main game, fried chicken.
Whether it was working or not we may never know, because this was the point at
which the marketer brought in the big gun, Oprah Winfrey, and the trouble really
started. The company's offer on the daytime diva's talk show May 4 of two
free pieces of grilled chicken, two sides and a biscuit to anyone who downloaded
a coupon within a two-day period should have been a huge promotional coup.
Instead, it turned into an unmitigated disaster when the company was unable to
execute and actually had to rescind the offer.
KFC's offer sent the chain skyrocketing to the No. 1 topic on Twitter. By
Wednesday, blogs began reporting "riots" at New York City KFCs. On
Thursday, local news crews interviewed fuming customers getting turned away in
other markets, including Chicago. Consumers complained about rude service,
and media complained about a PR team that seemed asleep at the wheel. By
Friday, the day after KFC pulled the promotion, NPR was calling KFC "the James
Frey of fast food," referring to the author of a memoir praised by Ms. Winfrey
that was later exposed as fiction.
In the end, KFC managed to strain relationships with three core constituents:
consumers, the media and franchisees that swallowed the cost of the free food
themselves. "This is going to damage their brand," said Gene Grabowski,
senior VP, Levick Strategic Communications.
Just how did things go so far awry?
KFC spokeswoman Laurie Schalow maintained that the chain prepared thoroughly,
given the time constraints. After months of seeking Ms. Winfrey's
approval, she said KFC wound up with a one-week window to execute its promotion.
KFC accepted Ms. Winfrey's projections for response, based on other offers from
her show - and doubled them. About 10.5 million coupons were downloaded,
but in what might have been a twist unexpected by KFC, many were also
photocopied.
There was also a report at the website Consumerist that some KFC franchisees did
not participate in the promotion because they were not reimbursed for the
giveaway by corporate. KFC told Ad Age the company did fund the promotion
for its own stores and franchisees were expected to pay for the free meals at
theirs, but stressed that franchisees have been happy to participate in the
promotion - despite numerous reports to the contrary.
In all, KFC gave away 4 million meals in two days. That sounds like a lot,
but it pales in comparison to the 4 million pieces of grilled chicken it doled
out April 27 alone when it declared a national "Unfry Day" in ads featuring Mr.
Eaton. By the time KFC realized it wasn't keeping up with demand - and
there were 6 million or more coupons outstanding - the chain pulled the plug on
the promotion and issued rain checks to consumers willing to go back to a KFC,
fill out a form and wait for another coupon to arrive in the mail. They'll
be rewarded with a free Pepsi. The chain never called in a crisis firm.
News of the bungled giveaway became so widespread that Mr. Eaton appeared on Ms.
Winfrey's show May 9 and offered this spin: "We had very big projection numbers
on this, but not in our wildest imagination could we believe the response we've
gotten," he said. "It's been absolutely fantastic. But in fact, it's
been so big it's been overwhelming. Yesterday and the day before, some of
our stores, our lobbies were full, the drive-throughs were packed, we had crowds
everywhere."
KFC did accomplish one thing - a sea of buzz for its product. But the
chatter got nasty when the promotion ceased. According to Zeta
Interactive, which monitors blog chatter, KFC generally popped up in about 538
blog posts daily, with 72% of mentions positive. During the promotion,
that number soared to 1,319 mentions, 89% of which were positive. But
cutting the cord on Thursday had an immediate effect, with 772 posts.
Negative ratings shot up, to 33%
"The free-chicken promotion created a sense of enthusiasm within online
communities and enhanced KFC's online reputation," Al DiGuido, CEO of Zeta
Interactive, said in an e-mail. "However, as soon as KFC decided to halt
the promotion, their brand suffered a brutal backlash, plummeting down to 67%
positive buzz. With this overwhelmingly negative response, KFC did more
damage to its brand by running an incomplete promotion than if they had just not
launched the campaign in the first place."
KFC begs to differ. "We have never had more positive customer response," said
Ms. Schalow, noting that about two in four grilled-chicken customers it's
attracted are new or rare visitors to the chain. However, Technomic
President Ron Paul said that's the group easiest to alienate.
Ad Age's Annals of Marketing Disasters
KFC's chicken run will probably end up one of the all-time blunders by
advertisers, and this publication has been there to chronicle them all.
Here are some of our top choices, listed in no particular order.
New Coke: What was Big Red smoking? The Atlanta soft-drink giant
bowed a much-hyped, much-sweeter formulation in 1985 and well, you know the rest
of the story. It's enough to make Mean Joe Green cry.
Kraft's Ready to Roll: It was consumers who thought they'd been rolled
after Kraft accidentally printed too many winning game pieces in packages of its
products in 1989, leaving some 10,000 folks looking for the keys to their shiny
new Dodge Caravans. The pulled promotion ended up costing Kraft some $3
million to $4 million. Ouch.
Hoover: A Hoover marketing deal in the U.K. crashed and burned after it
offered a "buy a vacuum, get two free airline tickets" scheme. After
incomprehensibly failing to realize that was the flier's deal of a lifetime,
Hoover had to suck it up.
Dr. Pepper: Coke might be it when it comes to the most boneheaded gaffe
of all time, but Dr Pepper messed up big when it promised America a free fizzy
if Guns N' Roses ever finished its "Chinese Democracy" album, which was 17 years
in the making. Well, it seemed like a safe bet at the time.
McDonald's Beanie Babies: The fast feeder tried to satisfy America's
insatiable appetite for Beanie Babies during a collecting craze by giving them
away for free with a Happy Meal. But McD's miscalculated. Instead,
moms bought the meals and threw out the food. And the Golden Arches ran
out of Beanies and had an angry mob of moms on its hands.
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