Welcome to Chopping It Up. I'm your host, Mike Hanlon, the senior Restaurant and Food Service Analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence. Our research and that a bi's five hundred analysts around the globe can be found exclusively on the Bloomberg terminal. Today, we're joined by George Felix, chief marketing officer of Chili's Grill and Bar. So in my research, I noticed you're a Notre Dame guy. That was a tough loss last week, George.
Yeah, Mike, I wish we would have talked maybe a week before. That was a far far better time for the fighting Irish.
Yeah, it was. It was pretty rough.
My family and I went to the text A and M game. We were riding high and then obviously major letdown last week. So we'll see if they can they can rally the troops and uh and recover. But still still can't believe it.
Well, the good thing about the extended playoff scenario is that you know you're not finished after one loss, so so they're still in it.
That's right, Still still still some hope.
Yeah. I'll be in South Bend next week for the game against Miami of Ohio. It's going to be my first time over there.
Oh nice, we'll have to we'll catch up offline on on on all the spots you got to hit.
I'm going to be there the week after for the Louisville game.
Okay, awesome. Yeah, you read my mind about the spots, all right, good stuff, So I'll definitely pick your brain.
Okay.
So for those of you that aren't familiar with George, he's worked on some of the most iconic campaigns I can remember Old Spices, Smell like a Man Man KFC's Colonel campaign, you know. Jim Gaffikin was was phenomenal. He was so funny. But the extra crispy Colonel I think was my favorite. Oh yeah, so good at George Hamilton. But do you do any of those hold a soft spot in your heart?
They all do, to be honest with you, like, I learned a ton from from getting to be a part of great brands. Uh, you know, the Old Spice work, you know, definitely holds a special spot in my heart, just because it's the It's literally the first thing I worked on, you know, when I when I got into marketing and at a business school and and so getting to work with the people I did. We had a great team at Old Spice, an amazing agency, Widen and Kennedy. It was it was probably the best, the best way
to start a career. I was worried that like that was going to be the only thing I ever I ever did, But thankfully I've been able to work with some great brands and some great people along the way. But that thing happened. It was wild because like it was not planned. It was all kind of in response to a competitive launch in market, and it happened in the matter of months. And so it taught me a
few things. One like, sometimes when you don't have as much time you make, you can make better decisions because you don't overthink things and you kind of go, you go with your gut and uh, and we did that a lot on that. And then the second part was, Uh, creativity can really be a way to solve business problems. And I think that's something that I've tried to carry
through through my career since then. So certainly that one has a has a special place for me, just because it was it was the first one and really kind of got me hooked on on on brand, brand building and and and trying to make breakthrough creative.
Yeah, it was phenomenal. And Andre, are are you like a parent and you're not allowed to admit it? Or do you have a favorite kernel.
Let's see now that i'm you know, now that I'm off KFC, I guess I could probably answer that. I mean, they were there were so many great ones, so uh, you know, there's there's something fun on each one, but probably Norm MacDonald, I would say, And you know, rest in peace, Norm, But he really kind of got that thing moving for us, so that you know, that holds
a special place for me. But man, just getting to you know, he was he was one of our longer running kernels, so we had several several shoots with him, and he was phenomenal to be with on set. He had us just dying laughing, you know, offset and just the stories and just such a such a nice guy.
So I think I.
Think Norm Norm would probably be my number one. His Twitter account, I don't know if you ever followed Norm on Twitter, it was unbelievable. He just just randomly on a Sunday afternoon, just live tweet like a really super random golf tournament, like for no reason.
I mean, and it's amazing too, how how his like old like late night TV clips are all over Instagram and TikTok killed it forever.
Man. Oh yeah, he had this great he had this great story.
H He was telling us like he was like his son came up to him and was like, oh, man, Dad, have you seen Seth Myers on Weekend Update on SNL. He's so funny. And Norm just looked at him and said, do you even know how time works?
I did that.
I was way better than him, like twenty years before.
That's fantastic.
Man.
Yeah, So I didn't realize that you work for Kevin Hawkman CEO Kevin Hackman at P and G as well as Young Brand. So he must be a great boss.
He sure is.
Yeah, yeah, he He and I have been together since I guess two thousand and eight. The summer of two thousand and eight, I was in a business school intern at Procter and Gamble working on the Old Spice brand, and he was the marketing director there, and so I worked for James Morehead was our brand manager, and James worked for Kevin, and those two guys really, you know, really responsible for me getting into marketing, and they taught
me a ton and so Yeah, Kevin. Kevin hired me there and we worked together at P and G and then I follow him to a few more stops. So I think this is our our fourth brand that we've worked on together.
Very cool. So what is it about the CpG marketing guys tend to do pretty well in restaurants?
What is it that's That's a good question.
I don't know if I totally have the answer, but you know, I think CpG is Personally, I think it's uh, there isn't a better place to learn about brand building and marketing than the CpG and certainly Procter and Gamble. You know, for me, it was it was almost like getting another MBA, to be honest, like the training you get I still reference to this day so many of the things that I learned there in my first few years there. And so I think, I think there's just
a really strong foundation. So I don't know if it's just in the food industry, to be honest, I'm guessing CpG marketers probably do well in a in a host of industries. And then you know, I think I think the big change for a CpG marketer moving into food is the is the pace And that was the biggest change.
And Kevin told me that when when when I joined him at Young and uh, you know, I don't know if that's for everybody, but you know, I think CpG has a very slow pace, right, like just by nature of the product development life cycle and selling it into the retailers and and all that. Whereas you know, food, you know, you get results every single day, right, you get a sales report every morning, and and and you're
you're being judged on a much different timeframe. And so I think some people, you know, take that that base foundation they learn and CpG on how to build a brand, and then really are able to apply that into a retail business that that you can move move quickly on. And I think that that tends to be a pretty good combination.
Great all right, So other than than Kevin, what attracted you to Chili's.
Well, it's, uh, it's a great brand, uh, you know, there's it's one of those places where when I when I tell when I tell people I work at Chili's, like generally speaking, they all a smile kind of comes to their face. And and it's a brand that that people have fond memories of, whether it's you know, a family with friends, maybe first dates, you know, after baseball games, whatever the case may be. And uh, it's a brand that people kind of root for, I would say, like,
which is not always the case with brands. And so you know, for me, you know, I've I've worked on several kind of turnaround brand brands that we've talked about, right, Old Spice, KFC, Pizza Hut kind of all all similar and and you know, I've put Chili's in that same in that same group in terms of a brand that that had a had a heyday and and now maybe
you know, had lost some of that momentum. And so when I'm looking at a brand, you know, I'm looking for a brand that has great bones, something to work with as as a marketer. And I felt, I felt Chilis kind of checked the check that box and then the other piece that you know, you can't really know until you until you get here. But in talking to the people going through the process before joining the culture
here at Brinker and at Chili seemed really unique. And I've now you know, been having been here two years, I can say it's you know, it's the best culture I've worked in, and it is it is something special, right like every other you know, seemingly every other person that I work with here in a meeting, it's like, oh, I've been here fifteen years, I've been your twenty years, I've been your twenty five years. And you don't see
that very often. And you know, we've got three three members of our of our leadership team and our c suite, Our chief operating officer, chief people officer, and chief financial officer all started as hourly team members working in restaurants and are now.
You know, running the company.
And I don't know how many companies that's like even possible at anymore these days. So those are those are kind of the big things that that kind of drew me, drew me in obviously, in addition to to Kevin being here.
Yeah, very cool. Yeah, it's interesting because I felt like for a while, Chile's kind of lost its way. It was kind of differentiated, and then it became very similar to the to a lot of other casual dining brands. A CFO that I used to work with, Larry Hyatt, he was excellent. He worked for a Cracker Barrel and this was you know, maybe ten years ago. He's you know, he used to call them, TGI, Chillibees. You know, everybody's got the same menu, serving the same things.
All right.
You mentioned two years at Chile's. You know, the turnaround has been impressive. I'd really like to dig into maybe your first six months, you know, right Sizing the amount of transactions on deal, simplifying the menu, and identifying sales opportunities were all kind of points of emphasis on the team's very first earnings call. How did you id and prioritize the lowest hanging fruit?
Yeah, you know, when we came in, you know, you're doing that.
Kind of you're assessing the landscape to see what's going on in the business, and you know, a couple of things we noticed right away. One the brand had not been you know, from a marketer standpoint, the brand had not been advertising for three plus years at that point. And you know, part of that was COVID and a lot of brands you know, made that decision. But it
wasn't all that like that. That there had been some intentional decisions to to move some of that investment that was going into advertising and paid media into you know, other other places. And so some of those places were third party you know, third party delivery virtual brands which were which were started during during COVID and then also
you know, the using our my Chile's rewards database. Uh, there was a lot of discounting like being sent out and so it was basically twice per week, so once you know, on every Monday, and then that that offer was kind of good Monday to Thursday, and then another offer was sent on a Friday for the weekend and it was going out to the entire you know, the
entire database. And so you start looking at that and you know, you go from nationally advertising driving awareness to not doing that anymore and talking to the same kind of group of people and kind of starting to encourage that discount deal mentality. It's it's kind of a recipe for for the brand not being as relevant and top of mind anymore. And so that was kind of where
we wanted to start. And so, you know, one of the first things we did is really pull back on a lot of that discounting that we were you know, sending out and take that money to reinvest into advertising and putting Chilis back out there in a different way and reminding people about Chili's and and the and the value that we offer. And then you know, the other piece was, you know, we have we had a great a great construct here, a great everyday value construct and
the three for Me. There are some tweaks that we needed to make to it. You know, I think in some ways, you know, it was it was almost you know, the three for Me, like there was almost too many things in it, right, which made it too too easy to get into that. And so we wanted that to be you know, for the people that are looking for that amazing every day value. You can find it very easily every single day, but you know, you're gonna have
to make choices, right if you want that value. You know, there's going to be a select menu that you can choose from all all are going to be great options, but we didn't want to put some of our core favorites like a fajitas or things like that and into that and those need to be signature items that you know, you know, it's it's still a great value for us, but you can't find it on that three for Me menu. So we made some tweaks to you know, what was
what was available in three for Me. We have the price tiers and uh, and then we start talking about it right and and tell people about it so you know,
you can you can get out there. And so that was really you know, when we were diagnosing what was going on, those are some of the big, the big ticket items that we felt like we needed to address right away and get after the the other piece I would I would say that that stood out to us in that early in those first six months was just complexity, the complexity of the menu, you know, in terms like you said, I think a lot of casual dining chains fall into this habit of or this trap of trying
to be everything to everybody. And so there's a balance there, right, you need a good variety so that you know everyone can find something they like, but you also want to do things in a way that you know you can make the menu manageable and execute it consistently. And so so there's a lot of low hanging fruit there in terms of ways to simplify the menu but also just simplify the job of our team members. And Kevin's really great.
He brought a culture of listening to the field to Chili's and so he spent probably the first you know, six months he was here on the road most of the time just in restaurant, watching, observing, getting in there himself and really talking to team members to see what are the things that we could do here to support them and make their jobs easier so they could deliver great service to our guests. So a big focus on
simplification both in terms of procedures and menu. I'd say it was the other big kind of low hanging fruit there.
Great And how long did it take for the operational improvements to kind of take hold so that you felt like you could really be comfortable ramping up the marketing?
You know, honestly, we were able to move fast.
And I'll tell you that's one that's one nice thing, you know, for us, at least for you know, some of us that have come from other from other concepts, you know, with with Chile's being primarily company owned, we've been we've been able to make some pretty fast, fast moves and and a lot of that's a testament to Doug Cummings and he's our chief operating officer and the work that are our vice presidents of operations across the country.
Do you know, we just started get after it and like you know, we're we just started making making changes implementing it.
You know, we we.
Were some of the things we you know, we decided not to test and just roll, and you know, we don't get everything right, but but our hit rate's pretty good. And so we started to see improvements pretty quickly, at least feedback wise from you know, from team members and terms of the impact I was having. And now i'd say, you know, so we we probably we probably started advertising.
Maybe let's think about this, maybe like nine months in, like six six, six to nine months in we started, we started advertising after I joined, and at that point, we were already starting to see the the the positive feedback from our team members internally. And now what's great is we're seeing that really translate into the metrics, into into actual metrics that we're seeing from our guests, so that they're they're experiencing a you know, a better, better atmosphere,
a better service at Chili's. And we're seeing that, you know, in our internal metrics as well as you know, things like Google ratings and another ways to measure the experience.
All right, So we're renovating the core four. So for my fellow Yankee fans, it's not Jeter Mo, Georgie and Pettit right, But it's burgers, chicken crispers, Marks and Figita's for Chili's. You know, that was an early initiative. It's wrap up this year with Fajidas. Can you share a little bit about what's to come?
Yeah, you know, I think it goes back to that point on the menu, right, like you know, well, well, we always need to offer a wide variety of things to appeal to the masses. We also felt it was important to have a strong point of view on the things that that Chili's really stands for and the and that core for really is it. And and so we've been you know, on a on a steady, steady pace here.
We've got a great innovation team and culinary team that's been working on this, and so chicken Crispers were really the first piece of that that's been you know in market for over a year now and been doing great, great for our business and really making us more relevant in a category that you know, is continuing to grow every single year. We then have been tackling Margarita's, which has been really fun for me. The alcohol space is a news space for me coming to Chili's and so
you know, being being a destination for Margarita's. It's a great time to be that tequila has never been more popular. I've learned a ton since, uh, since joining here in the last couple of years, and so we're really you know, we we talk about this Barbell strategy.
Right.
You can come in and get a six dollars margria the month, every day of the year at Chile's, which has uh, you know, great flavors, great spirits in it and and is obviously a great value. But we've also innovated on the top end, which I'm really proud of. And so we've got a whole top shelf lineup that includes Cosamigos, Patron and we're gonna be We're going to be bringing on Don Julio here and uh basically next
week that's going to be on our menus. So so I think, you know, being able to to innovate on both the value side of that and the premium site has been great. Burgers, the big smasher uh has been a big, a big success for us and a big driver of our success recently. And now we're hitting fajitas and and I'll tell you that's the most complex of the core four for a lot of reasons. It's just there's there's more components to it, obviously, but there's there's more,
there's more parts of that experience. You know, there's the the little the literal theater of it all. And you know, so we've been looking at every piece of of the fajita experience. And so whether it's the proteins that are coming with the fijidas, the you know, the onions and the peppers that come on the skillets. We've upgraded our tortillas, We're looking at dippable fijidas as well as you know, other other things that that that can make that experience great.
And so those are all in progress and so we're excited to bring those out later, you know, later in our fiscal year here, which would be the last of the core four. Now it doesn't mean we're done. There's tons of things outside of the core four that we're going to be looking at, whether it's desserts, appetizers, things of that nature. And then you know, we're going to continue to look at those core four categories and you know, what's the next thing on crispers, what's the next thing
on burgers. So we've really you know we didn't really have a pipeline of innovation or a culture of innovation when I got here that the branch just hadn't been innovating. And so we've we've had great success there. Our director of culinary Brian Paquett and Mary Allan Scott, who's our director for the innovation side of things, has really kind of created a new culture and a new process here that now we do actually have a pipeline and in a formal way that we bring new new items to market.
Yeah, I'm looking forward to seeing what you come up with the fajitas. The Caesar Milan skillet whisper campaign was a funny one, man.
You know, it's so funny like that, there's such a it's just there's such a fun like I don't I'm sure you see all the things on you know, on Instagram or whatever, and like just like, uh, there's just such a fun cultural thing about being the person that orders fajitas at the table and like what what happens next? That I'm really excited to start exploring some of that space.
Yeah, the sounds, the smells, it's just.
It's a great experience and that's what Chili's is all about right, like like a great Chili's experience. You should be hearing that that Margarita shaker coming to your table, You should be seeing that sizzlin Fahida coming through. It should just be a you know that that atmosphere is what we want to get back to. And so so we're definitely excited. And Fajidas is in our DNA. We we introduced uh, you know, the country to Fijidas.
You know.
Yeah, I went, yeah, and even the team members singing happy birthday, right, oh yeah, I got some crispers and wings with my son last night. They were both great. Oh awesome, awesome, that's great, very good experience. Yeah, and I saw you had renovated the sauces, which is so big.
Yeah, like I mean just sauces in general are yeah, I mean yeah, like you can see it across the industry, like it. I think people consumers are really craving that that experience, but also just that flavor exploration. So we we we did revamp our sauces. You know, I think
there's still tons of room to grow there. And I think at Chili's, like we it's part of the Chili's experience too, Like there's so many so many of our things, whether it's chips and salso, whether it's you know, Caso's, Crisper's. You know, there's so many things that are that are kind of dipped at Chili's. It's just becoming part of part of that experience as well.
So at the twenty twenty three investor Day you mentioned red marketing, you know, those surprize coming from young brands that represents relevant, easy and distinctive for the for the listeners, Chili Shore feels culturally relevant again. Right tied into Jenna and Angela from the office, you brought some nineties nostalgia back that you know, I told you before I'm a huge fan of the Brian McKnight three for Me commercial.
And so if you could talk a little bit about how important it is just making you know, Chili's culturally relevant again and how that ends up bringing it into the consideration set for all consumers, and I just i'd imagine younger consumers too. Yeah.
Absolutely, you know, I'm I'm a big believer in that that read philosophy. The folks that Collider Labs kind of coined that and and learned that when I was at young and.
You know, relevance.
I think cultural relevance I think is just absolutely imperative for if you're building a brand, and especially in the situation we're in with Chili's, where we're a brand that lost you know, we had it and we've lost it, right, And so I think when when you look back when Chili's was at its best, you know, we were a brand in culture, you know, whether it's uh, you know, the Office, whether it's Austin Powers, you know, whatever, like in sync, Like, it was a brand that was in culture,
and so we wanted to get We're we're pretty adamant we want to get back to that. And so, you know, I think I think that's uh, I think that's part of you know, a signal that that you're back in the mind space right, because in restaurants particularly, I think it's such a battle for for being top of mind right because you have so many choices. It's easier than ever. You don't even have to leave your house anymore. You
can get everything brought right to you. So I think, you know, beyond just kind of the tactical kind of advertising that we that we all need to do, I think cultural relevance can really be that thing that kicks, you know, kicks you up a notch on top. And so we've been you know, I'm a big believer and just taking taking swings and you got to take a lot of swings. They're not all going to hit, but the more swings you take them, you know, the more odds you have of being able to to do that.
And so it's something that we did back on the KFC days and you know, trying to bring that same philosophy here so you know, the office ladies, I think it was a fun way just to dip back into nostalgia.
And you know, we don't we also don't want you got to be careful.
I think working on a on a heritage brand that you don't just kind of go back for nostalgic sake, but you want to do things that you know are relevant. You know, you know you're taking the things that are great about the brand, but you're making them relevant today.
And so you know, when we do things is like with the you know, Jenna and Angela or Brian McKnight or Boys to Men, we want to still you know, do it with a little bit of a self awareness and a wink, but we also want to make sure we do it in a way that's that's relevant today. And I think our creative partners have really done a nice job with that. I think more recently some things we tried to do, you know, just in the past years. Is also like reaching different types of audiences that we
think overlap with casual dining. So NASCAR is a big one, right, Like the NASCAR audience loves casual dining, loves Chili's and so you know, we we partnered with Spire Motorsports to sponsor a car this past year in the Daytona five hundred. It was all about catcher Rita. We had all these QR codes on the car, and you know, we wanted to do something that was felt felt fun for the NASCAR fans, but do it do it in an authentic
way for Chili's. Another audience that we think needs to be you know, more more prevalent at Chili's is the Bravo audience. I don't know, Mike, if you're a you're a Bravo fan at all, but but a lot of people are a lot of a lot of a lot of women in particular, and so you know, the number one show on cable is Vanderpump Rules. And so when we when we launched our take on an espresso martini, who better than you know, Katie and Sheena from vander Pump China happened to be a former chili head working
at Chili's. So yeah, so that was a lot of fun. And then you know, gaming, we we had some fun with bringing back Burger Time, which was a game I used to play on an Apple twoey, but we made it all about the big Smasher and defeating the evil Fast Food syndicate. And so, you know, there's there's lots of different ways. You know, my goal is for people to kind of come across Chili's in an unexpected way and and kind of say, hey, do you see what Chilis just did? And and kind of you know, show
up in unexpected places. And so we're going to continue to to surprise people hopefully and and and put Chili's into that cultural conversation.
And you mentioned you like to take a lot of swings. Took some swings at fast Food this year. You got any you have any bullets left?
Well, you know, I'll here's what I'll say on that the conversation was happening. You know before we kind of we got in and that's as a marketer, you know, it's always better to tap into an existing conversation than try and start, you know, something brand new. And you know, we just saw it online. I'm sure you saw it too. There's a lot of frustration with people in the drive through, like sticker shock, frankly, like how in the world did
I just spend this much money? And so I think just with the rising cost of fast food, it kind of brought us into the conversation because when you talk about you know, the Chili's three for me, it's it's a nearly half cound burger, fries, bottomless chips and sauce, a bottomless drink for ten ninety nine. That's that's going to beat most most drive throughs, both in terms of not just price point, but also the quality of the
food you're getting. You're getting full service. So, you know, we started to see the groundswall of like you know, popping up on social media. Our social teams start jumping in a little bit, having some fun with that, and then you know, really we just wanted to you know, capitalize on that insight. And so when we launched the Big smasher, which obviously is a is a take on a familiar fast food burger, but on a chili's burger.
We really saw that as an opportunity to go squarely, you know, right at it and and really just kind of address the thing that that people were already talking about. And so you know, we're going to keep We're going to keep at it just because you know, I think it's it's not it's not something that's going away if
you turn on the news or morning shows. You know, I feel like it's a it's a pretty common topic of conversation, and and we were really proud of the fact that we can deliver every day value that is that is really you know, we believe the best in the industry, and you know, we we believe it's it's not just about the lowest price point.
It's it's what you get for what you pay.
And we don't think we can be beat both on the price and the quality and abundance of the food that offer.
Everyday value is where it's at. Man. Yeah, absolutely, the discounting, you know, you're just training your customers that the food's not worth the menu price, right.
Absolutely, And I think you're I mean, frankly right now, I mean you see this same way I do. Like there's a lot of brands throwing a lot of stuff out there right now that you know they're they're kind of scrambling and throwing some some low prices out there. But you know, I just I don't know. To me,
it doesn't look like it's going to be sustainable. And you know, I feel really confident about where we are because the thing we've been talking about the three for me for eighteen months now, it's built into our it's built into our business model, and we feel really good about the way it's constructed. So you know, we're we're really excited about where we are. And it seems like there's a lot of a lot of concepts out there that are kind of, you know, scrambling right now.
For sure.
Can you talk about your investments in TikTok and influencer marketing and what is doing for your business?
Yeah, I think it comes down to relevance again, like this is you know, you got to you got to adapt to where people are and where where they're spending time. And my god, increasingly TikTok is is where people are, right It's uh it's it's it's unavoidable. It's not even you can't even just say it's where younger, younger consumers are. It's it's where everybody is now. And so I buckled.
I buckled and downloaded about a month or two ago.
Yeah, it's crazy, right that that for you page like it's it's it's wild how they know exactly the content you're looking for. And so for us, we've got an
amazing social team. Louse bickert Uh heads that up with with Jack Hayley, and they they do a great job of really helping us understand what's going on trend wise, what are people talking about, and and it goes beyond TikTok, it's across all these platforms and and that's that's something they've they've really honed in on, is like we have to have a different presence on each platform because it's got you got to you know, each each one has
its own nuance. I think the thing that we found on TikTok is there is a real power there like unlike any other platform. I think TikTok showing the ability and other concepts of seeing it as well to really move the needle when you have something that.
Takes hold and takes off.
And so what we saw happening, you know, probably back in May, was a big fascination on TikTok with with our triple Dipper, which is this you know, amazing appetizer platter where you get to choose three items, and in particular our fried mozzarella, which I don't know if you had with your son last night, but it's it's phenomenal. It's not you can't even call it a cheese stick. It's like a plank of fried mozzarella. It's really it's
really great. And the thing that took off was people eating it and then doing this like cheese pull to
see how far they could pull the mozzarella cheese. And so we started seeing these, you know, just they start picking up each day, more and more coming out, and a lot of it was happening organically, and so then our social team really kind of jumped on that and said, how do we pour gas on the fire and so how do we work with influencers to to kind of there this further this trend and you know, we saw probably in that timeframe, you know, over fifty million views
you know, between paid and organic on TikTok of people cheese pulls in their cars, in the restaurant wherever, and we could see it. We could see that, you know, play out in sales, you know, whether you know Triple Dipper and in our Frid Mozzrella, which was which was great and really correlate, you know, when you started to see the TikTok spikes, you could start to see it
in our in our sales. And then then we decided, you know, like, hey, how can we how can we capitalize on this, And so at the beginning of August, we we released a new version of the Frid Mozzrella which was in our toss in our natural hot sauce, so it was Nashville Hot Mots. And we did that as a secret menu item because we want to move fast. So just in a matter of weeks we kind of got that from our test kitchen out into our restaurants.
But you know, we didn't have a menu to reprint or anything like that, so we just kind of put it out on on on TikTok with with again you know, some influencer work to help get that started, and man, it took off again and and you know, some of it was certainly from from the paid work that our social team did with influencers, but a lot of it, again was organic, and we probably had another fifty million views, you know, just over the last you know, four to six weeks on that.
On that as well.
So it's really just kind of kept that conversation going and kept that that experiential part of what makes Chili so fun in the forefront. So, you know, we really see influencer marketing as being a pretty you know, like pretty solid channel for us going forward, if you want to think of it that way, as as a media channel.
And you know, we're honestly learning as we go to be to be totally honest, but we're starting to codify the things that work and how we can you know, we can supplement some of the organic work with with some some paid influencer work as well.
Great, and I fumbled, you know, I hadn't remember reading and seeing some stuff about the Nashville Hot Lutz and I fumbled. I didn't order it last night.
But next time, well next time, now you've got a reason to go back.
How's the loyalty program revamp coming.
It's coming along really well. So we brought in we're around Steve Kelly.
Who's a VP on my team to really lead that work, and uh, we're we brought on Gail as our agency partner there and so you know, it's, uh, it's one of those things that is easier said than done, I would say, And so having the right people and the right strategy is is critical. And I think what I appreciate about what they did is it wasn't a race to say we're going to go you know, this is this is the change we're going to make, or this is what we're gonna do.
It's like, hey, what do we need to do?
Really, we got to get our data data strategy in order first, and so we've been working on that. We're we're getting you know what we call it, you know, token data, so we can have a better understanding of you know, our first party data to underst and what's going on with our consumers, you know what what's uh you know frequency, what are they buying all of those things? Because we did we just didn't have a great handle
on that. That is progressing really well. The other piece we're working on now is how do we how do we move our our CRM focus from that kind of shotgun blast that we used to do, which was not very strategic to now taking that data and the understanding we have of our consumers, segmenting them to know, you know, whether it's frequency bands or the types of food they like to eat, and being able to now be smarter
about the communications we're sending them. And so, you know, Steve uses the term surgical CRM, which is, you know, still you're talking about large groups of large audience groups, but hey, you know, like great example, you know, Crispers. We we we now know you know, people that have not ordered Crispers. They've been to Chile's, but they haven't ordered Crispers. Great, great opportunity for us to send them something.
And that's an offer that I'd be happy with, right because if it's getting them back into a Chili's and getting them into one of the products that we're really proud of and we think is something that I'll keep them coming back, that's a that's a great way to incentivize a visit to Chili's. So we're starting to get
more into that surgical CRM. I think that the last piece of this, you know, when you talk about like true like loyalty programs, I think one of the things we're we're still working on, to be honest, is, you know, what does the loyalty program at Chili's look like? You know, we know that, you know we offer free chips and so also when you join my Chili's Rewards, which we think is you know, a great way to get people
into the program. You know, We're not as certain is I don't think we're leaning towards like a points based program like you might see in a lot of QSRs or things like that. I think just the frequency of casual dining, you know, it doesn't necessarily lend itself to that. And I think you're seeing a ton I'm sure you know you probably know this better than me, but like it feels like every few weeks you see another program that's announcing a re vamp of the points and what
the value is and all that. Right, So I don't think that's the direction we want to go. I don't think that's probably right for our business model. But I think with the with the improvements in our data understanding and the improvements and our ability to segment that audience, I think we're going to be able to do some pretty interesting things in terms of how we reach out to how we how we interact with with those guests.
In a smarter way. Yeah.
We had a whole podcast episode a couple of months back about you know, loyalty two point oh, you know, and the headline is that everybody's doing it over because it didn't work the first time.
I kind of deal exactly.
Yeah, Yeah, we don't want to we don't want to follow that. We don't want to be on on the next episode that Loyalty three point oh. So, so I think, thankfully we've got we've got great you know, the partners we have a gale are really experts in that space.
And and so we got the right people thinking on that.
Ten years later, ziosks are back of back, baby, Well I didn't they work the first time? I'm and why why are customers adopting them now?
Well, I don't have all the you know, all the previous knowledge obviously, because you know, I wasn't here, you know, my my hunches. You know, it might have been a little little cutting edge, you know, ten years ago, a little bit early. You know, in my experience on tech, I don't particularly want to be on the bleeding edge. I like to be more you know, once it's proven out and then you're able to to to jump on
jump on that. I'll tell you now though, like you know, with with the Ziasque, we've just rolled out into our restaurants. You know, we see a couple a couple of big advantages. One, I think just the the device itself, I think feels you know, very very modern, very you know, intuitive for our guests to use. You know, the big advantage that we think those tabletop devices give us is payment. For sure, it's a great experience for the guests. It's also great
for our team members. It you know, it takes some of that friction out. You know, I don't know about you, but when I'm out dining with my family, there's a point of there's a point where it's like it's time to go. You don't want to be you know, waiting for you know, waiting for the server who might be working with you know, a few other tables. You can kind of control then that last part of the meal
and kind of go on your own terms. We obviously also get you know, a ton of great feedback from our guests just through the surveys that that that device offers. Through the payment process, and so you know, I was shocked at how many services we get millions and millions of surveys, which are far more than you'd get on like in my past world, where you know you'd ask people to fill out a survey on a receipt, you just don't.
You just don't get as much engagement on that.
So that data is really valuable for us just to make sure we're we're staying on top of the experience that we're delivering. And so you know, we we we think there's there's exciting opportunities there. I think right now we're focused on just getting the fundamentals right and making sure that experience is really good. But you know, in the future there could be some more things we do in terms of the interaction with the guests and the devices.
Great, all right, last question, Well, the chicken fried steak ever make it back on the menu?
Wow, chicken fried steak fans. It is not currently on our innovation pipeline. I'll just put it that way, but since you brought it up, it might have to be something we take a look at. But I can't, I can't, I can't make anything.
The chicken fried steak was really good. Back in the day, you know. But when I ate it, you know, I was in my late teens, early twenties, and anything I ate turned into lean muscle. I'm not quite you know. Forty seven year olds aren't really the you know, chicken fried steak crowd, I don't think.
But that's right, that's right. But I'll put it on the list. We'll take a look at it.
I appreciate it, George. Thank you so much for doing this. Brinker's been so much fun to cover for the last couple of years. And yeah, I look look forward to continuing work with you and following the story, and I'll look forward to following your marketing campaigns.
Especially.
Hey, thanks a lot. It's awesome to be on. I appreciate the work you do to cover the industry, and you're interested in what's going on at Chili's.
Great and thanks to the audience for tuning in. If you liked the episode, please share it with your friends and colleagues. Check back soon for a conversation about the election and its impact on consumer spending with Nathan Dean, bi's litigation and policy analyst,