We were conducting a comprehensive Street Fighter Marketing development program for Back Yard Burger, working with the franchisees in the Knoxville area with their local store marketing. In just one month each of the store managers came up with promotions that cost very little yet brought in customers.
Doggy Dog Promotion. One clever promotion was from their Ashville franchisee who came up with the idea, “dogs eat free.” Of course everyone has heard of promotions where kids eat free, but dogs, got our attention. They collect the unused hamburgers that normally would have to be thrown out. They cut them up in the bite sizes pieces and they give them to the customers’ dogs when they go through the drive-thru window. The promotion is done on a specific day of the week and customers come by regularly to take advantage of the promotion. The really clever part of the promotion is that it costs nothing. They don’t have to buy treats since they’re using their own product,
Food And Flicks. The single most successful promotion they did was a simple cross promotion with a Blockbuster. The Blockbuster assistant manager is a regular at Steve’s (the manager) location and he was able to suggest the idea to him without having to leave the store. They traded gift certificates for their employees, who handed out a special certificate that allowed each Blockbuster customer to get a special meal deal. In just the first few weeks of the promotion, Steve generated 92 new customers. To determine if a customer was a first timer, Steve had his counter people ask each customer with the certificate if it was the first time to a Back Yard Burger. This simple question helped to determine a new customer from one that was a regular. That number will no doubt increase over the weeks following. Oddly enough, they received an additional 55 redemptions at one of their other locations further away.
Cookie Sales. The burger bucks promotion was designed for non-profit organizations. In Ashville, they were able to get the Girl Scouts to promote a $1.00 of f certificate with the purchase of cookies. Part of the arrangement was to allow the Girl Scouts to sell their cookies at their two locations. Yet the $1.00 certificates were used at all points of distribution. Only 10% of the redemptions came from the onsite sales. The nice thing about this promotion is that it ties you in with a high-visibility organization and the actual discount is very slow. As a result of this effort, the Boy Scouts approached the franchisee for the same arrangement for the popcorn sales.
Kids Night. Kids nights are always a nice way to pick up business on a slow day. The twist here is that Natalie, the franchise owner, was able to provide an inflatable “moon walk” attraction at two of her locations. Normally they would cost quite a bit, but the vendor just bought three new attractions and wanted to get the word out that they were available for rent at birthday parities and other special events. Fortunately, Natalie’s two locations are on busy streets, so the vendor agreed to provide them, at two locations, every Monday for four weeks. The only cost was $50 each to cover the cost of the person to run the attraction. The vendor will pass out brochures about his moon walk attractions to the customers. Everybody wins.
Doggy Dog Promotion. One clever promotion was from their Ashville franchisee who came up with the idea, “dogs eat free.” Of course everyone has heard of promotions where kids eat free, but dogs, got our attention. They collect the unused hamburgers that normally would have to be thrown out. They cut them up in the bite sizes pieces and they give them to the customers’ dogs when they go through the drive-thru window. The promotion is done on a specific day of the week and customers come by regularly to take advantage of the promotion. The really clever part of the promotion is that it costs nothing. They don’t have to buy treats since they’re using their own product,
Food And Flicks. The single most successful promotion they did was a simple cross promotion with a Blockbuster. The Blockbuster assistant manager is a regular at Steve’s (the manager) location and he was able to suggest the idea to him without having to leave the store. They traded gift certificates for their employees, who handed out a special certificate that allowed each Blockbuster customer to get a special meal deal. In just the first few weeks of the promotion, Steve generated 92 new customers. To determine if a customer was a first timer, Steve had his counter people ask each customer with the certificate if it was the first time to a Back Yard Burger. This simple question helped to determine a new customer from one that was a regular. That number will no doubt increase over the weeks following. Oddly enough, they received an additional 55 redemptions at one of their other locations further away.
Cookie Sales. The burger bucks promotion was designed for non-profit organizations. In Ashville, they were able to get the Girl Scouts to promote a $1.00 of f certificate with the purchase of cookies. Part of the arrangement was to allow the Girl Scouts to sell their cookies at their two locations. Yet the $1.00 certificates were used at all points of distribution. Only 10% of the redemptions came from the onsite sales. The nice thing about this promotion is that it ties you in with a high-visibility organization and the actual discount is very slow. As a result of this effort, the Boy Scouts approached the franchisee for the same arrangement for the popcorn sales.
Kids Night. Kids nights are always a nice way to pick up business on a slow day. The twist here is that Natalie, the franchise owner, was able to provide an inflatable “moon walk” attraction at two of her locations. Normally they would cost quite a bit, but the vendor just bought three new attractions and wanted to get the word out that they were available for rent at birthday parities and other special events. Fortunately, Natalie’s two locations are on busy streets, so the vendor agreed to provide them, at two locations, every Monday for four weeks. The only cost was $50 each to cover the cost of the person to run the attraction. The vendor will pass out brochures about his moon walk attractions to the customers. Everybody wins.
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