Launching an international restaurant chain

The UK has a large number of quick service restaurants (QSR), with many well known brand names competing for their share of the market. Texas Chicken, already one of the world’s largest chicken QSR concepts, wanted to launch aggressively in the UK positioning itself as a rival to KFC.

Bright Star’s first step in undertaking work for Texas was to attend a franchisee day, which enabled the consultancy to get a feel for what the brand was about and what it was trying to achieve in the UK.

Bright Star developed key communication collateral for Texas’ franchisees and operations team. These materials were used to form the basis for responding to media enquiries about the brand and its launch in the UK.

To coincide with the launch of the first restaurants in the UK, Bright Star engaged with key journalists from the national and trade press, focusing on the brand's key attributes of freshly prepared food and the unique crunch and taste of the chicken. As all Texas Chicken restaurants in the UK serve Halal chicken, Bright Star incorporated the Asian media into the media relations campaign tailoring the release to this audience.

As well as media activity Bright Star developed tools for restaurant opening days, engaging with the local media and stakeholders, as well as producing the Texas Chicken local store marketing guide.

To date Texas Chicken has received a good spread of media coverage in a diverse range of media. Examples of the types of coverage Bright Star achieved for Texas Chicken can be accessed via these links:

National media http://lifeandhealth.guardian.co.uk/food/story/0,,2268045,00.html

Trade press http://www.caterersearch.com/Articles/2008/02/06/318799/texas-chicken-to-challenge-kfc-in-uk.html

Regional press                   http://www.thestar.co.uk/food/Texas-Chicken-opens-fire-on.3818589.jp

Asian media                            http://www.drdesi.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2094&Itemid=155&type=details