Fast Food Restaurants: Stop With The "Free" Promotions Already
Dear Quiznos, KFC, Arby's, and any other food chain that wants to offer freebies without first securing full buy-in from your franchisees: please stop it. Either the coupons are honored or they're not; there is no try.
Here's Adamatic550's recent experience with an Arby's promo:
Thought you might be interested to hear that KFC isn't the only chain with franchisees not honoring free food promotions. Today my brother told me about a deal where I could text 'roastburger' to ARBYS (27297). Despite my questions about what makes the Roastburgers 'burgers' rather than just roast beef sandwiches with lettuce and tomato on them, I decided to give it a shot because, hey, free sandwich. I text the number and get a text back that I'm supposed to show to my local Arby's for my free burger-like sandwich. Anyway, I head over to Arby's to be told that the manager has informed the employees that they can't accept the phone coupons.
You realize you're doing long-term damage to any trust consumers may have with you, right? Every time I hear about a "free" offer from a fast food chain now I dismiss it immediately, because I figure the offer will be more trouble than it's worth as I try to track down a participating location. Instead of getting excited about the offer, I squint my eyes and think the fast food chain is trying to secure some unearned publicity by extending an offer it has no intention of honoring—either among customers or its own franchisees.
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A friend of mine went to try and cash in his KFC coupons this weekend (with his family). They told him he will have to take a raincheck. So his wife wanted to eat there anyhow, since they were already at the register. So KFC made a $30 profit off of a "free" meal. I think I am beginning to see how these promotions work!
Hey... guess what? Every hot girl named Sally will give you a deep soul kiss if you say the word, "finger." Promise!
These offers are like the Mail-In rebate of Fast Food.
Difficult to do, a pain in the ass, and not really sure you are ever going to get that discount.
The second half of that message looks like it has been disemvoweled
@Saboth: That's just one of the many things I love about my girl - if we were in that situation, she'd probably be as pissed off and unlikely to stay as I would.
One more reason to like Chipotle. When they say free burritos, they mean it!
@Saboth:
El Pollo Loco took our KFC coupons yesterday with no issue at all. Nice to see a company that can do it right.
@ryan89: Here in Columbus there were near riots at free Chipotle just like at Free Papa Johns, Free KFC, and Free whatever else.
@Chris Walters: I'm surprised it took you this long to right them off. The only ones which seem to work are the ones for doing a survey about your last visit from the back of the receipt. And even those I got yelled at for using once at a Sonic :(
Add Einstein's Bagels to the list. It's hard enough to find one in downtown Chicago and then the one nearby is "owned by the hotel so doesn't take coupons"... was hungry enough to still buy some bagels but won't be going back. Don't send coupons unless all your locations honor them. This "participating stores" only is bs.
Chris, you're coming out AGAINST free food?!? True that SOME of the promotions have caused issues but Denny's pulled off a superb Free Grand Slam deal awhile back and locally we had NO problems getting the KFC deal. I am all for all the free food deals that fast food locations want to throw at us.
True that the offers may wear thin with some people but most of us have much thicker skins than that.
Even bad publicity can work in the retailers' favor - I don't know when the last time I had considered Dennys, KFC, Quiznos etc before their events. All of them are now considered.
Now I want a roast beef sandwich.
Feels like an Arby's night.
I like how the text says particip8ting. Does that mean only 8 locations are participating?
@ryan89: Same with the regional chain Boloco. You need to get an empty gift card and register it online, but I get 5-6 free burritos per year.
I'm ALWAYS thinkin' Arby's... free, expensive, whatever. My first born is THEIRS if they give me free food for life.
I love me some beef n cheddars with onion petals on top!
Thank GOD I read this right before dinner.....
Welcome to the world of living in a resort town, people. Back when I was a kid I'd watch every special offer on TV with narrowed eyes, knowing full well we'd never get it. You can't have specials when you're busy taking tourist cash, after all.
What's worse is that the resort was only open in winter, but we didn't even get promos in the summer.
I'll just stick to my Lean Cuisine, thank you very much.
It seams relatively trivial to run one of these well.
1) Reimburse the franchisee for the regular menu price of an item, or some mutually satisfactory percentage. Leave off things like "food cost" and per store caps.
2) After your sure your franchisees are on board and have had their chance to voice any concerns ahead of time inform them accepting the coupons is not optional.
3) Include all the reimbursement information on the coupon so the franchisee who was not paying attention still has access to the information.
If these procedures make free food offers financially unfeasible, don't make them.
@RobertW.TX: Wait, wait, get everyone on the same page and don't screw over your franchisees on the cost? You're talkin' crazy, maaaaaaan...
I was going to mention that it was totally unnecessary to add the '8' in participating rather than just use 'a' since they didn't even use the full '8' i.e. the letter a and the letter t
@ryan89:
And when they say "chicken" burrito they mean "chicken with cartilage" burrito. Every single time I've tried them, there have been 'un-chewable' pieces in the chicken.
Gross.
Just went to the Arby's near me in Austin and they honored the txt-coupon.
The Subway near us was notorious for rejecting almost any coupon that came their way and would bitch about requests for extra veggies. When I called Subway to complain, they said each franchise sets their own rules. I suspect that is what happened here. Honestly, if you were a minimum wage drone and someone brought you a text message, would you necessarily think it was okay to approve? And I don't know if franchises get reimbursed from these deals, but I would imagine dealing with paper coupons is a big of a pain as it is.
There is a KFC within a 3 minute walk from my apartment, and I also have a Wendy's, McDonald's and Arby's to choose from. I won't go to KFC ever again, because it's total bull that I printed my coupon, now I have to go in, fill out a form, go home, wait for my raincheck, then go BACK again to get the "free" meal. By the time I've done all that work it just isn't worth it. So now their "free" offer (their chance to get me into a KFC for the first time in 3 years) has instead turned into one more reason I won't eat at KFC.
Way to go KFC!
So, a question, HAS consumerist contacted the executive management at these fast food chains and ask them to justify offering something not honored by the franchises? Just get them to read you the party line, but at least get them to hide behind something.
When these promotions come out, I select which restaurant to try very carefully. Because I've found Quizno's stores to be VERY spotty on customer service, I went to their regional training center to redeem my coupon for a free sandwich and had no problem. Likewise, if a store is one I frequent, I go during a time that I know I usually get good service and not smack in the middle of lunch rush. Then I present the coupon before ordering. So far I've had pretty good luck, but I try to be first to the draw on these sorts of things so that they aren't burned out and maybe a little more willing to honor the first few.
@barb95: I'm sorry, but responses like this always annoy me, where someone "contributes" how they don't eat/drink/patronize the item or establishment in question, and more often than not in a backhanded way as to imply they are somehow better than those of us who do (here, where you're eating Lean Cuisine vs. KFC, often I see 'I just drink water since it's better for you' in a thread about soda/alcohol, etc.). It really doesn't contribute anything to the topic at hand. I'm sorry, but this is one of those things that really pushes my buttons.
I feel exactly the same way as the OP...I don't even bother anymore with these "free" promotions, as nine times out of ten they are not honored anyway. I'm even leery about promotions not necessarily involving a purchase-less free item, but even a sale or "...get one" deal, where often I will hear an ad on a local radio station only to be told "sorry, we're not participating in that". I think what did it for me was when Amazon was sending out free McDonald's chicken biscuit coupons, and I got exactly one to work after being given every conceivable excuse (not participating, only valid on certain days/times, have to buy something else even though it clearly says you don't, etc.).
Meh....these "free" offers are merely to get you to buy stuff anyway...I mean the mentality of the customer is"hey since I'm getting a free fries, or burger, I might as well spend money to get a soda and a shake...hell I'll get the apple pie too!" by the time they buy the stuff to go with their "free" meal, they've paid nearly double what the "free" item would have cost them.
I went to Arby's for a free fruit tea promotion they were running in Nashville. I went to 3 different locations and got free tea each time, once without any other purchase.
When I was a kid a friends uncle won a free meal everyday for life from Arby's. At first we all waited at the house for him to get home to see who would get the free sandwich.
By the end of the summer the fridge was stuffed with them and know one wanted them any more.
@Kensuke Nakamura: I also did that free fruit tea promotion in Wisconsin at the Arby's two blocks from my house. They honored it with no fuss at all. To be honest it was pretty good and I wouldn't have tried it otherwise.
I had planned on going back later this week to get the free roastburger but I think I'll go right after work tonight.
I don't see the problem. Like someone else mentioned: If the franchise won't honor the deal then go higher up the chain. Regional manager or higher probably.
Clearly California Tortilla must have good communication with their franchisees, I had no problems last month getting free food when they had their "social networking" promotions going on, and the cashiers told me they had quite a few people come in and collect.