Hardee’s Elevates Star Pals Meals

Limited Time Offers (LTO’s) are key to driving top-line growth, bottom-line profits, and customer engagement according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.

When Hardee’s announced the return of Star Pals meals LTO to its menu for the first time in eight years it was a reminder that customer relevance meets at the intersection of past and present creating new electricity in the brand relationship with all customers.

Hardee’s is teaming up with kids’ entertainment studio pocket.watch and Ryan’s World for a first-of-its-kind partnership as YouTube creators continue to transform the toy industry.  Jenna Folk, director of Brand Marketing, Hardee’s stated  “When we decided to reintroduce Star Pals to our menu, we wanted to ensure we had a partner that families would be excited about,”  “Ryan ToysReview has seen tremendous success on YouTube and beyond, and we are thrilled to have exclusive Ryan’s World toys in our Star Pals meals this summer.”

This ideation of Star Pals meals will feature an exclusive toy line under the massively successful Ryan’s World consumer products brand, designed by Ryan, the seven-year-old YouTube star with more than 19.4 million subscribers. The toys will be available at participating Hardee’s and Carl’s Jr. restaurants across the country beginning June 19, 2019.

Edwina Cumberbatch, manager, Sales and Co-Promotion, pocket.watch  stated “This partnership with CKE is a perfect extension of Ryan’s World, the amazing character universe created by Ryan and his family,” .. “And, it really builds on pocket.watch’s mission to bring kids and families more of what they love from their digital worlds.”

Elevating consumer choice Hardee’s new Star Pals meals come with three protein options including Kid’s Hand-Breaded Chicken Tenders, a Kid’s Hamburger or a Kid’s Cheeseburger. All Star Pals meals have the option of a side of applesauce and a milk beverage.

The Ryan’s World exclusive toys available within the Star Pals meals will include:

·         Mystery Egg Puzzles: Open your egg to find out what puzzle you’ve got inside! Next, spread out your pieces on the table and start to put your puzzle together. There are two sides to each puzzle, so if a piece does not look right, try flipping it over. When you have finished putting together one image you can take it apart and solve it again to complete the image on the other side—collect all three.

·         Rockin’ Ryan Figures: Place Ryan down on a flat surface and gently press the top of his head to watch him bounce up and down and raise his fist into the air—collect all three.

·         Gil Squirter: Squeeze Gil to blow out all of the air and submerge him into water, then slowly release to fill him up with water. Remove him from the water and squeeze his sides to squirt water from his mouth.

·         Combo Panda Roller: Place Combo Panda down on a sloped surface, and push him gently to watch the wheel roll along. Combo Panda will rock back and forth as he rolls, but will never fall down.

The program will continue later in the summer with the introduction of a new line of toys from HobbyKids Adventures, a new animated series from pocket.watch based on YouTube family HobbyKidsTV. HobbyKids Adventures Star Pals meals will be available at participating Hardee’s and Carl’s Jr. restaurants nationwide in August.  Is your brand creating a platform to drive a new electricity?

According to Johnson, “Brand relevance is in part driven with innovation in new menu related products in combination with new avenues of distribution all of which are the platform for the new electricity.”

Johnson stated “that in my minds-eye the new electricity must be very efficient for the supply and includes such things as fresh foods, plant based  foods,  sampling, toy’s, beer, developing brands, unique urban clothing, grocerant positioning, Fresh food messaging, autonomous delivery, cashier-less retail, plates, glasses, cash-less payments, digital hand-held marketing.

All food retailers to survive the next generation of retail must embrace the artificial intelligence revolution while simultaneously embracing fresh food that is portable, fresh, with differentiation that is familiar not different

Are you looking for a new partnership to drive sales? Are you ready for some fresh ideations? Do your food marketing tactics look more like yesterday that tomorrow?  Visit www.FoodserviceSolutions.us for more information or contact: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us Remember success does leave clues and we just may have the clue you need to propel your continued success.