Golden Corral kicked off Monday an offer of breakfast all day, for a limited time, with a new ad campaign featuring comedian Jeff Foxworthy, who recently became the spokesman for the 500-unit buffet chain.
“He’s a great fit for our brand,” said Chris Kuehn, chief marketing officer of Raleigh, N.C-based Golden Corral. “He’s excited to be part of our chain, and we’re excited to have him. He was great to work with. He’s a great fit, a clean comedian. His values fit Golden Corral’s values.”
The “Breakfast for Lunch and Dinner” promotion will be available through the summer. The offer makes Golden Corral’s weekend brunch menu available all day throughout the week. The menu, which includes items like pancakes, sausage, bacon, waffles and omelets, is in addition to Golden Corral’s 150-item buffet menu. The chain successfully tested the menu in some locations last year.
“Guests didn’t want it to go away,” Kuehn said. “It’s always a good thing when operators say, ‘Can I keep this going?’”
Most consumers say they want breakfast offered all day. According to the National Restaurant Association, seven in 10 consumers want restaurants to serve breakfast items throughout the day. Younger consumers were more likely to say so.
Breakfast is an increasingly popular daypart. According to the market research firm Mintel, restaurants expect to generate more than $52 billion in sales during breakfast hours this year.
Golden Corral has offered breakfast buffets on weekends, and some locations in tourist areas serve breakfast all week, but the chain has never offered breakfast all day. Kuehn said that if the offer is successful, it could be made permanent.
“If anything has the potential to be a concept idea, this will be one,” he said. “This definitely meets the needs for summer. Beyond that, we’ll evaluate it.”
The ad promoting the offer is part of Golden Corral’s new “Golden Bill of Rights” promotion, which features Foxworthy talking about consumers’ “Right to eat out of order.”
“You want breakfast for dinner? It’s brinner!” Foxworthy says in the ad. “You want dessert as an appetizer? It’s dessertitizer!”
Golden Corral recently signed with new ad agency The VIA Agency, based in Portland, Maine, which came up with the idea for a celebrity spokesman.
Foxworthy will be featured in a series of ads promoting various “bills of rights” that the Golden Corral buffet fulfills. They include: “The right to choose freely;” “The right to family happiness;” “The right to food made fresh;” “The right to eat out of order;” and “The right to get more for less.”
“We think buffet dining is a great way to dine, it represents fundamental values,” Kuehn said. “Freedom is the idea here. We’re playing up that Americana: The freedoms you have at Golden Corral. It’s just fun.”
The right to “family happiness,” for instance, plays on buffet strengths: Its menu variety offers something everybody wants, and customers can dictate their time because the food is all prepared.
“No plate is the same, it’s always customizable and you’re getting more for less,” Kuehn said. “We like to say that we were fast casual before there was fast casual. It’s about speed, convenience and customization. We think we’re very relevant with what’s important to consumers right now.”
He also said the campaign aims to emphasize the company’s fresh offerings.
“We do an awful lot of scratch cooking,” Kuehn said. “We have hand-cut beef, a made-from-scratch bakery.”
Contact Jonathan Maze at [email protected].
Follow him on Twitter: @jonathanmaze