Article

Jack in the Box upgrading its burger line

Chain jumping into increasingly heated "better burger" space.

November 22, 2011 by Alicia Kelso — Editor, QSRWeb.com

The quick-service burger competition is about to get even more heated. Wendy's and Burger King recently upgraded their signature items, and now Jack in the Box is ready to do the same.

The company announced an impending burger launch during its Q4 earnings call earlier this week.

The chain reported a profit for the quarter, buoyed by its strong breakfast daypart. New products, such as the $2.99 jumbo breakfast platter, drove the increase in sales and were part of what CEO Linda A. Lang called "quality improvements we've made to our core products that are clearly resonating with our core customers."

Jack in the Box put a plan into place several months ago to improve overall guest experiences in order to drive long-term sustainable sales.

The jumbo breakfast platter reflects that plan because it focuses on innovative new products and redefined value, Lang said.

"The platter is the perfect example of the type of bundled value deals that are really very compelling and they're meeting the needs of those consumers that are looking for value in today's market," she added.

Although breakfast turns in the strongest performance for the chain, Jack in the Box has also honed in on its classic burgers, which will be reintroduced later this month across the entire system with what the company calls "several improvements."

"We have completely reformulated our hamburger patty and that has improved taste, texture, juiciness. All of that has been done through our R&D efforts and we know we have a statistically significant preference with the new patty," Lang said. "We also have rolled out an improved bun and we have new saucing procedures."

The new burger line will be supported with advertising, merchandising material and social media initiatives later this quarter.

Such a launch comes at an opportunistic time, as foodservice research firm Technomic recently released a report outlining burger chains' sales growth of 1.6 percent last year, reaching $65 million.

Much of that growth is attributable to the "better burger" trend that sprung from the swiftly growing fast casual segment. The category continues to outpace the restaurant industry as a whole, with the top 100 fast casual chains growing 6 percent, to nearly $18.9 billion.

"Better burger," however, doesn't automatically equate to "fast casual" anymore and, as a concept, is becoming a bit trickier to define. The idea is especially blurred as QSRs continue to make improvements to their burger options, according to Mary Chapman, Technomic's director of product innovation.

Jack in the Box also continues its reimaging efforts, with menu board and uniform upgrades. Lang said, because of these changes, the company has already seen more dine-in business.

"We've seen fantastic growth in our dine-in business as a result of the reimages," she said. "We've even staffed more at late night so we're seeing the benefit of the late-night staffing focusing on order accuracy, friendliness and cleanliness and we're seeing all that come back and we're seeing in the research where we're getting higher attribute ratings in those areas. So it's really positioning around the entire guest experience."

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