Welcome to a special fast-food edition of Brands Making a Splash.
From saucy nuggs to $1 Honey Buddy biscuits, we’re harnessing the power of Harris QuestBrand to survey what’s moving in this affordably delicious world.
Let’s pull up to the data drive-through and see what value we can serve up.
Gen Z can be a fickle consumer base, driven by trends that move at the speed of TikTok. So how can a fast-food chain founded in 1969 stay relevant with this cohort?
Wendy’s has been leaning into Gen Z’s love of a good bargain, and their apparent “obsession” with chicken.
On the pricing front, everyone is concerned with shrinkflation, and rising costs for stuff that used to be fairly affordable or downright cheap. Don’t even get us started on the customers filming poor Chipotle workers to make sure they weren’t getting shortchanged on portion sizes.
That means a lot of fast-food brands have been trying out new, bargain-bin incentives to drive foot traffic. See Taco Bell’s $3-and-under Cravings Value Menu or $5 Taco Discovery Box, for example.
In the case of Wendy’s, that looks like a $3 breakfast meal—or a promo, launched in July, that offered the chain’s Honey Buddy chicken biscuit for $1 on Mondays, with any in-app purchase.
In June, of course, we had what future historians will doubtlessly dub the Great Nuggs War of 2024.
June 10th marked the drop of Wendy’s new “saucy” nuggets, available in seven flavors.
Oddly enough, this was the very same day that KFC launched their own line of saucy nuggets. Everyone suddenly became a chicken critic. Some TikTok videos about the saucy little nuggets received millions of views.
Why nuggs, why now? I’m 43, so my finger is decidedly not on the pulse of Gen Z and its current culinary habits. But I asked ChatGPT to research “brat summer” culture and determine if saucy nuggs were, perhaps, brat.
“Saucy chicken nuggets can definitely be considered ‘brat’ if they’re presented with a playful, over-the-top attitude—like being dipped in vibrant sauces or marketed with a cheeky, rebellious twist,” the AI mused. “It’s all about that fun, carefree energy.” There you go.
“Wendy’s chicken nugget fandom is truly unrivaled, so it was only natural for us to level up our iconic Nuggs with even more flavor for our fans.” – Lindsay Radkoski, Wendy’s Chief Marketing Officer.
Wendy’s had proceeded their saucy nugget launch with a 50-piece chicken nugget “party pack” that became available in May, launching a website that allows customers to locate where they can snag the closest box.
Fun fact: This was created by the same developer responsible for mcbroken.com, a website that tracks whether the nearest McDonald’s ice cream machine is working.
Alright, so we’ve got a slew of cost-conscious menu items and the big reveal of some saucy chicken nuggets.
Did any of this actually change how Gen Z was thinking about Wendy’s, or was it simply fodder for a few viral TikToks?
We powered up QuestBrand to generate some consumer insights, allowing us to compare attitudes toward the brand among the general population VS Gen Z specifically.
Even a cursory look at the resulting data shows a saucy rise in positive brand momentum this summer among Gen Z adults, with trend lines really soaring in the midst of the July 10th nugg drop.
FYI, momentum is a component of brand equity, and it reflects a brand’s perceived market position and ability to beat out competitors. The other factors that feed into brand equity are familiarity, quality, and consideration.
Wendy’s is probably doing a victory lap (or flap, if we want to stick with the chicken metaphor).
Poultry-based items and wallet-conscious menu spotlights appear to have led to an uptick in how Gen Z views Wendy’s brand momentum.
But the fast-food icon shouldn’t rest on its laurels. Remember when the brand got a lot of heat for their plan to launch dynamic pricing as early as 2025?
Turns out consumers aren’t fans of this model, since they feel that it could result in fast-food “surge pricing” (in which case your $5 meal could theoretically cost $6.50 during especially busy dining hours).
According to a recent survey conducted by The Harris Poll on behalf of NerdWallet, 22% of consumers (and 15% of Gen Z) say that they would not spend money at a business that uses dynamic pricing.
In other words: Saucy, yes; surge, no.
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