Background Burger King is a global chain of hamburger fast food restaurants headquartered in unincorporated Miami-Dade County, Florida, United States. The company began in 1953 as Insta-Burger King,in Jacksonville, Florida. After Insta-Burger King ran into financial difficulties in 1955, its two Miami-based franchisees, David Edgerton and James McLamore, purchased the company and renamed it Burger King. Over the next half century the company would change hands four times, with its third set of owners, a partnership of TPG Capital, Bain Capital, and Goldman Sachs Capital Partners, taking it public in 2002.
In late 2010 3G Capital of Brazil acquired a majority stake in Burger King in a deal valued at $3. 26 billion. At the end of fiscal year 2010, Burger King reported it had more than 12,200 outlets in 73 countries; of these, 66 percent are in the United States and 90 percent are privately owned and operated. Burger King has historically used several variations of franchising to expand its operations. The way in which the company licenses its franchisees varies depending on the region, with some regional franchises, known as master franchises, responsible for selling franchise sub-licenses on the company’s behalf.
Burger King’s relationship with its franchises has not always been harmonious. The Burger King menu has evolved from a basic offering of burgers, french fries, sodas and milkshakes in 1954, to a larger, more diverse set of product offerings. In 1957, the Whopper was the first major addition to the menu; it has since become Burger King’s signature product. Conversely, BK has introduced many products which failed to catch hold in the marketplace. Some of these failures in the US have seen success in foreign markets, where BK has also tailored its menu for regional tastes.
After the purchase of the company in 2002, Burger King began to aggressively target the 18–34 male demographic with larger products that often carried correspondingly large amounts of unhealthy fats and trans-fats. This tactic would eventually come to hurt the company’s financial underpinnings and cast a negative pall on its earnings. The 1970s were the “Golden Age” of Burger King advertising, but beginning in the early 1980s, the company’s advertising began to lose focus; a series of less successful ad campaigns created by a procession of advertising agencies continued for the next two decades.
In 2003, Burger King hired the Miami-based advertising agency of Crispin Porter + Bogusky (CP+B). CP+B completely reorganized Burger King’s advertising with a series of new campaigns centered on a redesigned Burger King character accompanied with a new online presence. While highly successful, some of CP+B commercials have been derided for perceived sexism or cultural insensitivity. ORGANIZATIONS INVOLVED – Crispin Porter + Bogusky: Is an advertising agency that currently employs around 1,000 people. Sam Crispin founded it in1965. Crispin then became partners with Chuck Porter and Alex Bogusky.
As of 2011, Porter is the only member still working for CP+B. CP+B experienced rapid growth in the late 1990s and early 2000s, achieving notoriety on the strength of work for Burger King, BMW MINI, and anti-smoking campaign TheTruth. com. The agency’s current client list includes Coke Zero, Microsoft, Microsoft Windows Phone, American Express OPEN and Travel, Best Buy, Domino’s Pizza, Old Navy, Jell-O, Bolthouse Farms – Baby Carrots, Vail Resorts, Kraft Macaroni ; Cheese, MetLife, Vitaminwater, Milka, Molson Canadian, SAS, Philips, and Discovery Channel UK.
As an agency, they are known for using viral marketing techniques, including the Burger King Subservient Chicken and Whopper Sacrifice campaigns. In September 2008 the agency created a high profile television spot for Microsoft featuring Jerry Seinfeld and Bill Gates that received negative media attention. The ‘I’m a PC’ campaign that followed fought back against Apple’s Mac vs. PC campaign and contributed to Windows 7 becoming the fastest selling version of Windows to date. MAIN PROBLEM: After analyzing Burger King’s case study we can see that their main problem is that they are attracting new customers while alienating others.
Another problem may be that their advertising crosses the line and can be persieved as un-ethical advertising. A third problem is being the number two burger joint in the country. STRATEGIES: * A campaign focused around taste tests between the Whopper and McDonald’s Big Mac similar to Pepsi-Cola’s “Pepsi Challenge” against Coca-Cola. * In Facebook campaign after facebook banned their link they said: “Facebook has disabled Whopper Sacrifice after your love for the Whopper proved to be stronger than 233,906 friendships. * They need to focus on attracting new clients, but also they have to take care of the old clients. They can do this for example with a card that after buying a certain amount of times they have a free whooper. Questions 1. What do you think of Burger King’s advertising tactics? Is it OK to attract new customers while alienating others? Is Burger King’s advertising ethical? Explain. The tactics that is using the company nowadays is very important because they have increased their potential clients by having many advertising in all the media.
Sometimes the type of advertising is not so good because many people can be shocked by the containing. For example when Burger King hired the advertising agency Crispin Porter + Bogusky, they brought on some major brand changes for the fast food franchise. At the time, Burger King was viewed as a boring brand with very little personality and identity. Crispin Porter + Bogusky quickly took steps to give Burger King a new image, an image that would be fun and that people would want to be associated with. Over the last few years, Burger King’s new advertising campaigns have certainly caught people’s attention.
The images set off a major controversy, with many viewers claiming the images were demeaning to women and inappropriate for children. We think that is not ok attract new costumer while alienating the others because what they need is to have regular costumers that be loyal to the brand. They need to focus on attracting new clients, but also they have to take care of the old clients. We also think that the advertising that the company uses is ethical, but they need to take into account that the advertising is directed to all public and they need to moderate some of the things they express on their advertisements. . How did Burger King manage the negative publicity it received over the content of its Coq Roq Web site? Burger King launched a new website, www. coqroq. com, a site meant to appear as if a heavy metal band of the same name had created it. The site includes videos showing the fictional band members in chicken heads, downloadable ring tones and photo galleries with shots of young girls with handwritten captions like “Groupies love the Coq” and “groupies love Coq. ” After the site went live on Tuesday, the bawdy captions were erased. Yawn.
It was no doubt done to draw attention and unique visits to the site. The site is well done for what it is, though I can’t for the life of me understand why anyone of any age would want to spend much time taking in the “music” of a fake band and videos when the central theme of it all is chicken served at BK. The company could manage the negative publicity because many people was entering the site and they said that families didn’t have to feel bad with this type of advertising because what they were doing was only trying to develop and make the brand grow.
