Brand Relevance: Making Competitors Irrelevant - always yours

GAINING AND MAINTAINING RELEVANCE 307
not relevant. Consider the fast - food industry, which has seen the
development of the healthy subcategory, a shift that has challenged
such traditional brands as McDonald ’ s, Wendy ’ s, Burger
King, Pizza Hut, and KFC.
One response option for a fast - food brand is to change the
menu to make it more acceptable to those seeking healthy fast -
food fare, so that if there are three or four in a group selecting a
fast - food destination the brand will not get the dreaded veto.
McDonald ’ s, for example, developed a way to make their signature
fries with dramatically reduced “ bad ” fat. They also offer grilled
chicken sandwiches, a variety of salads, fruit smoothies, and a
choice of apples or fries in the kid ’ s Happy Meals. Burger King has
wraps plus the Garden Sensations Salads with Marzetti salad dressing
that are all natural. This does not make them destinations for
the healthy - eating segment, but it can reduce the veto effect.
McDonald ’ s had another relevance problem. The success of
Starbucks was a serious threat to its breakfast and other off - hours
business. It was also an opportunity. The advent of McCafe in
2007, with a line that included cappuccinos and lattes, changed
the competitive landscape. It created for many a point of parity
with Starbucks with respect to quality. The result was that
a segment of the Starbucks base started to include McDonald ’ s
in the consideration set — McDonald ’ s became relevant, a really
remarkable achievement that once would have been laughable.
There are three diffi culties with this strategy. First, those
attempting to gain parity, such as McDonald ’ s in regard to
healthy eating, lack brand credibility. McDonald ’ s, for example,
is associated with the signature items such as Big Mac, Egg
McMuffi n, and Happy Meals, which are all designed to delivery
eating pleasure rather than healthy eating. Second, it is not easy
to create home - run new products, without which gaining parity
can be diffi cult. In fact, a host of McDonald ’ s new products
from McPizza to McLean Deluxe to Salad Shakers (whose containers
were packed too tight to distribute the dressing) failed
to gain acceptance. 8 McDonald ’ s has had few big successes since