The cooks were busy in the Burger King kitchen in 2016. Every few months, they released a new item for the more adventurous fast-food customers to try out.
At the end of January 2016, Burger King introduced new Jalapeño Chicken Fries, Dr Pepper Shakes, and Oreo Irish Mint Shakes. All three items were available for a limited time. The Jalapeño Chicken Fries were a spicy twist on the original Chicken Fries, made with white chicken meat and breaded with jalapeño seasoning. The Dr Pepper Shake was a hand-spun, creamy treat with the flavor of Dr Pepper. The Oreo Irish Mint Shake was a new take on the Classic Oreo Shake but with a minty flavor. It was hand spun and featured Oreo cookie crumbles.
“Our guests can’t get enough of our spicy menu items, not to mention our Chicken Fries, so we’re giving them more of both with this new addition to our Chicken Fries lineup,” said Alex Macedo, President, North America, for the Burger King brand. “And if our Jalapeño Chicken Fries get a little too hot, our Dr Pepper Shake or Oreo Irish Mint Shake is the perfect way to cool off.”
Then in February, Burger King announced the addition of flame-grilled hot dogs to the menu at participating restaurants nationwide. The hot dogs, named Grilled Dogs, are made with 100 percent beef and are flame-grilled on the same grill and using the same techniques as the Whopper sandwich.
It is estimated that Americans eat over 20 billion hot dogs each year. With the additional of Grilled Dogs to the menu, Burger King will now serve hot dogs in more locations than any other restaurant chain in the United States.
“The introduction of Grilled Dogs just made sense to our guests and for our brand,” said Macedo. “We’re applying over 60 years of flame-grilling expertise with the Whopper sandwich to make Grilled Dogs the next great American icon.”
The Classic Grilled Dog is a flame-grilled hot dog topped with ketchup, mustard, chopped onions, and relish, served on a fluffy baked bun. The Chili Cheese Grilled Dog is a flame-grilled hot dog topped with warm chili and shredded cheddar cheese, and served on the same bun as the Classic. Both are available separately or as a combo meal.
March brought another limited-time offering: The Angriest Whopper sandwich. The Angry Whopper sandwich was a popular previous limited-time menu item. The Angriest Whopper took it to another level, featuring flame-grilled beef, thick-cut bacon, American cheese, iceberg lettuce, tomatoes, crispy onion petals, jalapeños, creamy mayonnaise, and spicy “angry sauce” all on a fiery red bun that had hot sauced baked in.
After giving their customers’ stomachs a few months to settle, Burger King was back at it again in June 2016. For a limited time, they offered Mac n’ Cheetos, a collaboration venture with Cheetos. The snack was a portable combination of creamy mac n’ cheese covered with crispy Cheetos flavor. It gave customers the unique experience of eating warm mac n’ cheese like they would a bag of chips.
“Mac n’ Cheetos are a doubly cheesy combination of warm mac n’ cheese covered with that crispy Cheetos flavor everyone loves,” said Axel Schwan, Executive Vice President and Global Chief Marketing Officer for the Burger King brand. “No one understands snacking better than Cheetos, and our expertise at Burger King restaurants is serving guests on the go, so it just made sense that we come together to reinvent this favorite food like it’s never been done before.”
Burger King was founded in 1954 and is now the second-largest fast food hamburger chain in the world.
The past few years Burger King has continued to add new products, including a plant based burger.
Sources: B. Mogan, “Burger King Restaurants and the Cheetos Brand Unleash Very Cheesy Collaboration for Summer ’16,” Burger King, June 27, 2016, accessed October 23, 2016, https://www.bk.com/news-press/burger-king-restaurants-and-cheetos-brand-unleash-very-cheesy-collaboration-summer-’16; B. Mogan, “Burger King Restaurants Introduce New Jalapeno Chicken Fries and Two New Shake Flavors,” Burger King, January 27, 2016, accessed October 23, 2016, https://www.bk.com/news-press/burger-king-restaurants-introduce-new-jalapeño-chicken-fries-and-two-new-shake-flavors; B. Mogan, “Burger King Restaurants to become Largest Restaurant Chain in U.S. to Serve Flame-Grilled Hot Dogs,” Burger King, February 11, 2016, accessed October 23, 2016, https://www.bk.com/news-press/burger-king-restaurants-become-largest-restaurant-chain-u-s-serve-flame-grilled-hot-dogs; B. Mogan, “New Angriest Whopper Sandwich with Red Bun Debuts at Burger King Restaurants,” Burger King, March 30, 2016, accessed October 23, 2016, https://www.bk.com/news-press/new-angriest-whopper-sandwich-red-bun-debuts-burger-king-restaurants.
Burger King Case Study Analysis Question
What type of segmentation strategy is Burger King using and is it effective? What recommendations do you have to change it or make it better?
Case study format
Purpose: The purpose of a case study is to learn how to take a real-life business situation and make recommendations by doing research and applying the terms and concepts covered in this class.
Brief Overview: You will provide an analysis of the case along with recommendations for addressing the case. Your framing, analysis and recommendations for the case will be supported by outside research and documented with in-text citations and a Works Cited or a Reference page.
Required Sections: Please label the sections of your case.
Framing the Case: Write a brief overview (no more than 150 words) of the case. Do not repeat the history (what is in the case).
Issues and Opportunities: Discuss the issues and opportunities present in the case.
Assumptions: state the assumptions you are making about the case. (for example: You assume that funding will be available for your recommendation or you assume that the economy will not be in recession as your recommendation is implemented.)
Addressing Issues and Opportunities: List the various ways that the issues and opportunities could be addressed, including a list of Pros and Cons for each item in the list.
Recommendation and Justification: State your recommendation for addressing the case, along with a justification for your recommendation.
Research and Citation: The assignment requires outside research, meaning you need to find and cite sources outside of the course textbook. A successful Case Study assignment will likely employ 3-4 sources for undergraduate case studies and 6-7 sources for graduate case studies. You should use business databases to find relevant sources. A few good examples would be: LexisNexis, Bloomberg, Statista, EBSCOhost, and D&B Hoovers. (Wikipedia is NOT a valid source) All citations should follow either MLA or APA citation style.
Additional Requirements and Helpful Tips
Do not include the answers to the questions in the case analysis unless they apply to what you are writing about.
Even if you do not think you need it, you should run your Case Study through a grammar checker and a spell checker in addition to proofreading carefully before submitting.
Make sure that all sources are cited in the text of your Case Study and in your Works Cited/Reference page. For guidance on finding and documenting sources, see owl.purdue.edu for both MLA and APA formatting guidelines.
I am including a sample Case Study in this week’s module. The purpose of providing this sample is to provide you with a sample of my expectations, but I expect you to NOT copy the sample. You are expected to produce your own original ideas for your case study assignments.
Note: Using someone else’s work, your own work from prior classes and even using someone else’s sentence structure and ideas count as plagiarism. When Turnitin is used for an assignment any plagiarism percent over 10 percent is too much. (Normally that 10 percent is restated headings and questions.)
Word Count
Graduate Students: 1000 word count minimum
Undergraduate Students: 750 word count minimum
Grading Rubric
A Grading Rubric for written assignments in this class is provided in this module.
