Dynamic Restaurant Brands Don’t Stagnate

 

In the fast-evolving world of foodservice, stagnation is the enemy of success according to Steven Johnson Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®. While some brands have faded into the background, others have continuously reinvented themselves, adapting to changing tastes, technology, and consumer expectations. Here, we explore the historical journey of three national restaurant brands that embody the dynamic spirit of evolution: McDonald’s, Domino’s Pizza, and Chick-fil-A. Each has defined innovative strategies to remain culturally relevant and operationally successful today.

You Can't Build a Vibrant Brand

Standing Still

 

McDonald’s: A Legacy of Reinvestment

Founded in 1940, McDonald’s became a household name with its pioneering assembly-line approach to fast food. Yet, it is their adaptability that has solidified their dominance.

1.       Menu Innovation: McDonald’s introduced healthier options like salads, fruit, and oatmeal to appeal to health-conscious consumers. Their international menu items, such as India’s McAloo Tikki Burger, demonstrate adaptability to local tastes.

2.       Technology Integration: By adding mobile app ordering, self-service kiosks, and delivery partnerships with platforms like DoorDash, McDonald’s has streamlined customer convenience.

3.       Sustainability Goals: The brand’s commitment to sustainable sourcing—from cage-free eggs to responsibly sourced coffee—has appealed to eco-conscious consumers.

4.       Modern Store Designs: “Experience of the Future” renovations include digital menu boards, cozy seating, and improved drive-thru operations to elevate customer experiences.

Domino’s Pizza: Transforming the Delivery Game

Since its inception in 1960, Domino’s has morphed from a basic pizza delivery company into a tech-forward leader in the industry.

1.       Digital Dominance: Dominos built a powerful app and online ordering platform. They pioneered features like the Pizza Tracker, providing transparency and reliability to their customers.

2.       Menu Expansion: Offering pasta, chicken, sandwiches, and desserts has moved Domino’s beyond pizza to become a broader food delivery option.

3.       Rebranding Efforts: Dominos ditched its "Domino’s Pizza" name in 2012 to emphasize its wider menu and food innovation.

4.       Delivery Innovations: Drone delivery trials and investments in driverless vehicles keep Domino’s at the forefront of the convenience revolution.

Chick-fil-A: Building Culture and Community

Chick-fil-A started in 1946 as a humble diner and has grown into a symbol of exceptional customer service and community commitment.

1.       Service Excellence: Consistently ranked high in customer satisfaction, Chick-fil-A’s focus on training employees and fostering a positive work culture sets it apart.

2.       Innovative Menus: While maintaining its iconic chicken sandwich, Chick-fil-A added seasonal items like the Peppermint Chip Milkshake and healthy options like Superfood Side salads.

3.       Community Engagement: Chick-fil-A supports local communities through scholarships, charity events, and disaster relief programs, bolstering its reputation as a community-driven brand.

4.       Strategic Expansion: By intentionally limiting new store openings to sustain high service standards, Chick-fil-A ensures quality control while keeping consumer demand high.

Lessons for Restaurant Success

Each of these brands demonstrates that survival and growth in the foodservice industry require reinvention, cultural awareness, and forward-thinking strategies.

From reimagining menus to embracing technology and community values, dynamic restaurant brands show that evolution is not just an option—it’s a necessity for enduring success. These iconic names exemplify the power of continual reinvestment in the business, customers, and communities they serve.

For international corporate presentations, regional chain presentations, educational forums, or keynotes contact: Steven Johnson Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions.  His extensive experience as a multi-unit restaurant operator, consultant, brand / product positioning expert, and public speaking will leave success clues for all. For more information visit GrocerantGuru.com, FoodserviceSolutions.US or call 1-253-759-7869

Looking A Customer Ahead, Domino's Continues to Excel

Success does leave clues and watching Domino’s drive innovation coupled with customer relevance in branding, while edified with customer facing technology is simply a professional pleasure. Starting with a complete menu overhaul from crust to sauce Domino’s has been on an 9-year run that can only be described stellar according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA Based Foodservice Solutions®.

While Domino’s and Nuro, a robotics company, are partnering on autonomous pizza delivery using a custom unmanned vehicle known as the R2 later this year. Consumers are once again being invited to see, sample, and suggest how best to use the R2. This once again will drive new electricity.

A brand is an invitation, no one has done a better job of food branding better over the past nine years than Domino’s Pizza according to Johnson. Domino’s has taken bold steps, the ilk of dramatically evolving it core product and was successful garnering customer migration.  That’s huge, remember what happened to Coca Cola when they tried that! Coca Cola experienced everything from customer abandonment to out right revolt. Domino’s edified customer touchpoints, drove top line sales and bottom-line profits systemwide.

Domino’s will use Nuro's unmanned fleet to serve select Houston Domino's customers who place orders online. This partnership will expand Nuro's autonomous delivery operations, which have safely and successfully been running in the Houston metro area since March 2019.

Kevin Vasconi, Domino's executive vice president and chief information officer  stated "We are always looking for new ways to innovate and evolve the delivery experience for our customers," … "Nuro's vehicles are specially designed to optimize the food delivery experience, which makes them a valuable partner in our autonomous vehicle journey. The opportunity to bring our customers the choice of an unmanned delivery experience, and our operators an additional delivery solution during a busy store rush, is an important part of our autonomous vehicle testing."

The consumer is dynamic not static.  How are you evolving your brand, are you evolving your food offerings, technology, points of distribution? Does your company look more like yesterday than tomorrow?  

Invite Foodservice Solutions® to complete a Grocerant Program Assessment, Grocerant ScoreCard, or for product positioning or placement assistance, or call our Grocerant Guru®.  Since 1991 www.FoodserviceSolutions.us  of Tacoma, WA has been the global leader in the Grocerant niche. Contact: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or 253-759-7869

Dynamic Domino’s Dial’s Up Innovation

Once again success does leave clues.  At the intersection of fresh flavorful food, food technology, and food marketing one company continues to standout according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.

That company is Domino’s.  The clear reason is that Domino’s domestic same-store sales up in Q2 6.9% once again leading the all large chains and many others in same store sales, innovation, and customer relevance according to Johnson.

Johnson continued saying that today’s consumers are on the run; and apparently running to Domino’s Tech Hotspots”. Domino’s Pizza Inc. grew domestic same-store sales 6.9 percent in the second quarter, helped by technological innovations like delivery hotspots, according to Ritch Allison, Domino’s CEO..

Allison continued “For the second quarter ended June 17, Domino’s net income rose 17.7 percent to $77.4 million, or $1.78 a share, from $65.7 million, or $1.32 a share, in the prior-year period. Revenues were up 24 percent to $779.4 million from $628.6 million in the same quarter last year.”

 Allison continued “our second quarter was highlighted by yet another innovation in food delivery with the launch of Domino’s HotSpots, of which there are now more than 200,000 across the United States

As regular reader of this blog know we reported in April, the company introduced the HotSpots, which feature non-traditional delivery locations including parks, beaches, local landmarks and other gathering spots. In the United States, Domino’s generates more than 60 percent of its sales via digital channels, and at the time said this was a win for Domino’s and a win for consumers. Well once again we were right.

Foodservice Solutions® specializes in outsourced food marketing and business development ideations. We can help you identify, quantify and qualify additional food retail segment opportunities or a new menu product segment and brand and menu integration strategy.  Foodservice Solutions® of Tacoma WA is the global leader in the Grocerant niche visit Facebook.com/Steven Johnson, Linkedin.com/in/grocerant/ or twitter.com/grocerant

Domino’s Smooth Technology Integration is ‘Better-for-You’

Integrating marketing with the ‘halo’ of better-for-you is hard to do for most food marketing teams.  However at Domino’s Pizza it stated with branded oven loaded delivery cars and today it is  driving saving pizza sales, one pothole at a time garnering attention, elevating differentiation, all while elevating branded messaging according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.

We all know that cracks, bumps, potholes, and other road conditions can put good pizzas at risk after they leave the store. Now Domino’s is hoping to help smooth the ride home for our freshly made pizzas. Domino’s is asking customers to nominate their town for pothole repairs at www.pavingforpizza.com

Russell Weiner, president of Domino’s USA. “Domino’s stated “Have you ever hit a pothole and instantly cringed? We know that feeling is heightened when you’re bringing home a carryout order from your local Domino’s store. We don’t want to lose any great-tasting pizza to a pothole, ruining a wonderful meal,” Domino’s cares too much about its customers and pizza to let that happen.”

Domino’s has already worked alongside four municipalities to help repair roads that directly affect their customers, including Bartonville, Texas; Milford, Delaware; Athens, Georgia and Burbank, California. Customers interested in nominating their town for a paving grant from Domino’s can enter the zip code at pavingforpizza.com. If their town is selected, the customer will be notified and the city will receive funds to help repair roads so pizzas make it home safely.

Customers can celebrate smooth roads with Domino’s carryout special, featuring large three-topping pizzas for $7.99 each. Customers can order the carryout deal over the phone, in-store, at dominos.com, via Domino's mobile ordering apps or any one of Domino’s AnyWare platforms, including text, tweet, Google Home or Apple Watch.

Are you trapped doing what you have always done and doing it the same way?  Where is your new electricity coming from?  Interested in learning how www.FoodserviceSolutions.us can edify your retail food brand while creating a platform for consumer convenient meal participation, differentiation and individualization?  Email us at: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or visit:  www.FoodserviceSolutions.us for more information.

Domino’s Success Branded Invitations

Success does leave clues and Domino’s ability to extend the brand via an consumer focused interactive participatory invitation is a success clue everyone should make note of according to Steven Johnson Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.

When Domino’s reached out to customers inviting them to submit their own recommendations for Domino’s Hotspot delivery locations across the U.S. food marketers around the country took notice. 

While more than 150,000 Domino’s Hotspots were launched in April, giving customers the option to receive deliveries at locations without traditional addresses.  New-nontraditional points of fresh food distribution the ilk of dog parks, beaches, and sports fields. That was a nod to Millennials seeking food discovery.  With this new invitation Domino’s will add even more local delivery spots based on customers’ feedback at dominos.com/suggestahotspot.

Dennis Maloney, Domino’s chief digital officer stated “We heard from customers about places in their communities that would make perfect Domino’s Hotspot locations,”.. “We’re excited to now have a system for customers to share those locations with us, making our easy-to-use Domino’s Hotspots even more relevant to our local neighborhoods.”

Here is how it works customers visit dominos.com/suggestahotspot, they can identify a new location on the delivery map for their nearest store and then mark it as a potential Domino’s Hotspot for the local franchisee to review. Once approved, customers will receive an email letting them know the location is ready to accept deliveries and the Domino’s Hotspot will appear on the map for customers to select.

So just what is your New Electricity?  How are you engaging consumers? Success does leave clues www.FoodserviceSolutions.us  is the global leader in grocerant niche business development.  We can help you identify, quantify and qualify additional food retail segment opportunities.  Has your company had a Grocerant ScoreCard completed a Grocerant Program Assessment, or new Grocerant niche product Ideation?  Want one?  Call 253-759-7869 Email: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us

Pizza Hut Sensing Competitors Weaknesses Targets Larger Share of Pizza Sector

Domino’s CEO announced he will be departing, Papa John’s CEO just left and Papa Murphy’s CEO is still listening to franchisee so the oldest legacy national pizza brand that has capitulated market share for 20 years is stepping up. So what do you think they are doing now?

Well according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions® “under the skillful tutelage of Yum! Brands CEO Greg Creed  Pizza Hut will be empowered to leverage product innovation, pricing, and marketing acumen to position Pizza Hut with top-of-mind customer relevance driving top line sales and bottom line profits.

Pizza Hut announced its $5.99 Medium Two-Topping pizza deal, the first of its kind for the Yum! Brands chain.  Pizza Hut is targeting its primary target customers while firing a warning shot to the pizza sector they mean to garner market share in 2018 as they leverage price to gain a larger share of stomach according to Johnson.

Zipporah Allen, vice president of marketing for Pizza Hut  stated "Great tasting pizza at a great price is a no-brainer,” ... “We know our pizza stands above the rest, so we’re excited to give our customers an offer to satisfy their craving.”

According to Johnson, McDonald’s success with deliver help expand the food delivery space all the while empowering consumers to choose something other than pizza as a first choice for the office get together, family meal, or student non-traditional meal leaving the pizza sector a bit flat footed.

The consumer is dynamic not static and clearly Yum! Brands CEO Greg Creed understands that the retail foodservice business model is evolving fast and brands must evolve as fast or fasters according to Johnson. In fact Pizza Hut announced a global partnership with Toyota to look at the future of pizza delivery with a self-driving car the Toyota E-Palette.

Let’s be clear here the foodservice space is evolving very fast, as regular readers of this blog know  department store chain Kohl’s is planning to partner with retailers like convenience stores or grocery stores to lease the white space left by the roughly 300 stores it has “right-sized” over the past several years, CEO Kevin Mansell told CNBC just yesterday.  Let’s admit it, most retailers know that Grocerant niche fresh food is booming.  That was just in case you missed it according to Johnson. That is the a contributing force driving restaurant chains to evolve or fade away if they want to admit it or not.

Johnson believes legacy restaurants must invest in garnering segment market share in 2018 any way they can because the fast evolving retail foodservice business model is going to displace those who do not. By now you know that Walmart & K Mart raised both wage and employee benefits. The increases to $11 per hour while simultaneously expanding maternity and parental leave benefits have elevated the restaurant employee retention and acquisition problem to a new high, one where yesterday’s solutions are today’s quagmire.

The undercurrents conditions impacting the growth of the foodservice sales have been well documented by the team at Foodservice Solutions®.  We ask is your restaurant, c-store, or service deli prepared for today’s retail conditions or yesterdays.  Why do we ask?

Well, recently we spent time listening to many foodservice CEO’s talk about implementing delivery as a strategy.   It’s kind of like thinking restaurant delivery is the answer to sales woes.  Restaurant food delivery is integral and maybe required in-order to maintain customer relevance today.  However we must caution operators that food delivery as a strategy was valuable 20 years ago. Today, food delivery is simply a marketing tactic of yesterday.   

Today food delivery is simply a tactic being implemented by followers who were unable or unwilling to see the forest through the trees back in the day or last year.  It must be noted if a food company is touting food delivery as a strategy the only thing clear is that they still don’t see the forest as the weeds they are standing in are simply too high according to Johnson.

In Q4 2017 restaurant same-store traffic declined 1.9% in the fourth quarter, including a 1.8% decline in December after very weak numbers in 2016.  That my friends is an example once again that the restaurant business model is broken.  Has your brand created a new platform capable garnering incremental customers and sales while driving store cost down edifying the franchisee while driving corporate profit? Why not?

Success does leave clues www.FoodserviceSolutions.us  is the global leader in grocerant niche business development.  We can help you identify, quantify and qualify additional food retail segment opportunities.  Has your company had a Grocerant ScoreCard completed a Grocerant Program Assessment, or new Grocerant niche product Ideation?  Want one?  Call 253-759-7869 Email: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us

Wendy's: Delivery Worked for McDonald’s and the Pizza Sector Why Not Us?

There are times when the customer moves and you simply have to move with them according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.  Bandwagon marketing / copycat marketing has been around for a long time there are times chains simply have to jump on the bandwagon or risk losing customers, sales, and profits.

The first thing regular readers of this blog will want to know is will the Pizza Sector slip even more?  The simple answer is no.  We will see the Pizza sector sales flatten but they should stabilize a bit as McDonald’s had a greater impact on the pizza sector than will Wendy’s.  That said Wendy’s delivery will show very positive results according to the team conducting grocerant scorecards at Foodservice Solutions®.

By January 1, 2018 Wendy’s expects to offer delivery via DoorDash a close to 2,500 restaurants in 48 markets. Wendy’s president and chief executive officer Todd Penegor said during a conference call Wednesday the chain was “excited about expanding access to our brand further and continue to find new ways to provide convenience to our customers.”

Delivery will help extend same store sales growth at Wendy’s.  This we Wendy’s announced that they had their 19th consecutive quarter of positive same-store sales in North America. The brand opened 42 new restaurants in the third quarter and has opened 110 units year-to-date, which is almost 30 more than this time a year ago. Delivery will help drive top line growth and bottom line profits along with incremental customer relevance.

Are you trapped doing what you have always done and doing it the same way?  Interested in learning how www.FoodserviceSolutions.us can edify your retail food brand while creating a platform for consumer convenient meal participation, differentiation and individualization?  Email us at: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or visit:  www.FoodserviceSolutions.us for more information.

Grocerant Niche Sell Hot Food Hot and Cold Food Cold

Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru at Tacoma, WA based global foodservice consultancy Foodservice Solutions® reminds us “that in our evolving retail food world that the basics are still important.  That food integrity matters, packaging matters and you better be selling Hot food Hot and Cold food Cold.”

Pizza Hut is one company that continues to evolve when they announced new packaging the team at Foodservice Solutions® assumed they were trying to keep up with Domino’s oven in the car.  The fact is they might have been but did not want to spend that kind of money.  Which is too bad because that car and over are working great for the Domino’s. 

Instead after exhaustive due diligence I’m told Pizza Hut's New 'Oven Hot Delivery System' is Space Age.  Now if that is not marketing spin I have never heard it.  However, let’s teak a look.  Pizza Hut said it “is now using the same material as space blankets, winter jackets, and home insulation to keep pizzas up to 15 degrees hotter than existing boxes during the delivery process.”

The brand’s new delivery system contains a pouch made with 3M Thinsulate Insulation thermal technology and a pizza box with crisp sheet inserts. That is in addition to a reengineered pizza box and a new crisp sheet, the research sparked the development of an all-new pizza delivery pouch featuring three different thermal insulation materials to help ensure the pizza stays oven hot, the cheese stays melted, and the crust stays crisp:

·         The first layer is 3M Thinsulate Insulation, the same technology that is commonly used in ski jackets

·         The second layer is a PET Aluminum Radiant Barrier, which reflects heat from the pizza  back into the pizza, and is the same material found in space blankets.

·         The third layer is a polyester fiber padding like insulation found in homes that traps heat inside

“By implementing the unique power of our Thinsulate Insulation, which is warmer than almost every comparable material on the market, we’re able to help Pizza Hut achieve their goal to deliver customers a hotter pizza than ever before,” said Mindy Murray, brand communications Manager at 3M, in a statement.

Regular readers of this blog know that we are in the food business and doing the basics matter and selling Hot food hot and cold food Cold is still at the top of the list for consumers.  Technology, innovation, and consumers all evolves and you brand should be evolving all of the time.

Invite Foodservice Solutions® to complete a Grocerant Program Assessment, Grocerant ScoreCard, or for product positioning or placement assistance, or call our Grocerant Guru®.  Since 1991 www.FoodserviceSolutions.us  of Tacoma, WA has been the global leader in the Grocerant niche. Contact: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or 253-759-7869