Big Boy revamps menu and namesake character, gears up for ad push

Source: Nation’s Restaurant News
WARREN - Big Boy Restaurants International took its initial marketing steps under new ownership by revamping the menu and redesigning the Big Boy character to provide a consistent, friendlier icon throughout its promotional material.

Those early moves - plus an aggressive promotional schedule - are the preliminaries leading up to a print-and-broadcast campaign expected to break Oct. 1. Big Boy currently uses TV spots created during the last two years by Simons Michelson Zieve of Troy, Mich.

Meanwhile, the 355-unit chain is conducting what it called extensive market research “in order to get a very good feel about what people expect at Big Boy restaurants,” chief executive Tony Michaels said.

“We’re looking at this as a rebirth of Big Boy restaurants, and in order to do that, we have to do research in many forms,” he said.

The chain is counting on responses from customer surveys, focus-group sessions and in-store research to guide its direction this year under a company headed by Detroit broadcast mogul Robert L. Liggett Jr., who bought the chain last fall from the financially strapped Elias Brothers Corp.

Elias, which had accumulated nearly $8 million in debt, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection last October. That move came after it had closed more than 40 under-performing Big Boy restaurants to improve cash flow. The company’s financial plight resulted from the collapse of two deals to sell its Big Boy units and the rights as the chain’s franchisor.

When he bought the chain, Liggett said he wanted to stabilize Big Boy operations before embarking on major changes or expansion. With the start of new marketing efforts, the chain is laying the groundwork for competing effectively in the family-dining segment.

The menu revamp puts the focus on traditional products that long have been identified with the Big Boy brand, like the original double-decker burger, Slim Jim sandwich, onion rings, malts and strawberry pie.

“The old menu was getting too large,” Michaels said. “We wanted to scale back and bring the popular products to the forefront.”

The redesigned Big Boy icon, which mirrors the character found in the company’s 30-year-old comic book, adorns the cover of the new “America’s Classic Selections” menu. Michaels described the new look as “lively, more animated. We made him friendlier.”

The chain also plans to use the character in its corporate logo.

In addition to gearing up for the fall ad campaign, Big Boy is negotiating with several film studios to include the chain in movies. Michaels said Big Boy would be featured in a New Line Cinema movie, “I Am Sam,” as the restaurant where characters eat regularly. Big Boy played a prominent role two years ago in “Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me,” which New Line also produced.

As the chain moves to expand its marketing efforts, it also is exploring growth opportunities across the country and deciding how to redesign its stores.

“We hope that by winter of 2002, we should have a new prototype for Big Boy,” Michaels said. “It would be tested, and from that point on we could grow by franchising throughout the country.”

Michaels was the chain’s executive vice president of marketing and advertising before he was promoted to chief executive in December 1999. He said the most important issue he’s dealt with under the new ownership is enhancing services to franchisees. He’s also trying to “reboot the organization with talented people.” That includes searching for a new vice president to take over marketing duties.

“We have to be out there in an aggressive fashion, marketing something that’s very good,” he said. “The way we position the stores, they’ll have to deliver beyond customer expectations.”
Source: Nation’s Restaurant News