El Pollo Loco faced a key challenge: The core of their business, their bone-in chicken, was in sales decline. And had been for years. So much so, they believed it was irreversible. “Expert Analysts” had told them it was a generational issue. That millennials would not eat meat that was still “on the bone”. So, they increasingly relied on LTOs. But LTOs are tricky. And operationally intensive. Rolling the dice on constant innovation, they found for every LTO that came up sevens, another came up snake eyes. Something had to change.
But what El Pollo Loco had to offer wasn’t flawed. It had just been positioned in a flawed way. Touting the authenticity of “pollo al carbon” in a manner that leveraged the emotion of cultural heritage and showcased the unique differentiating factor of their highly visible, highly craveable, on-site grilling turned the tide for El Pollo Loco.
El Pollo Loco needed to get back to their core. To their roots. To their soul. Sure, millennials didn’t instinctively crave bone-in chicken. But we knew what millennials did crave was authenticity. And El Pollo Loco had been an authentic part of California culture for almost 40 years. We created a custom roadmap to success for El Pollo Loco that internally was referred to as “The Road to Authenticity.” Embracing the brand’s roots, we galvanized both their base and new consumers by tossing out the old QSR playbook and serving up the beauty of bone-in chicken as they never had before.
The campaign dramatically reversed the bone-in sales decline. Bone-in chicken sales continue to exceed projection. Traffic +5.3%. Family Meals +4.5%, reversing declining comp sales. Doubling of the stock price, even through the pandemic. Immeasurable impact on internal corporate culture.
El Pollo Loco needed to get back to their core. To their roots. To their soul. Sure, millennials didn’t instinctively crave bone-in chicken. But we knew what millennials did crave was authenticity. And El Pollo Loco had been an authentic part of California culture for almost 40 years. We created a custom roadmap to success for El Pollo Loco that internally was referred to as “The Road to Authenticity.” Embracing the brand’s roots, we galvanized both their base and new consumers by tossing out the old QSR playbook and serving up the beauty of bone-in chicken as they never had before.
The campaign dramatically reversed the bone-in sales decline. Bone-in chicken sales continue to exceed projection. Traffic +5.3%. Family Meals +4.5%, reversing declining comp sales. Doubling of the stock price, even through the pandemic. Immeasurable impact on internal corporate culture.