Adam Head-Case Study: Burger King

By Adam Head

My name is Adam Head and I am an advertising major in my senior at Texas State University in San Marcos, Texas. I am the first student in the MC4316F Ad Planning class to try to tackle a case study and present it to the class.

My company was BK (Burger King) and my advertising agency was CP+B (Crispin Porter + Bogusky). The ad planning took place in 2005. CP+B received an honorable mention that year for their work with BK. My work with CP+B and BK was very interesting and enjoyable (Believe it or not).

My 2005 case showed that BK was on their way toward a twentieth straight month of negative comp store sales, they had to change something if they were going to turn anything around. CP+B took the info available from BK and went from there; CP+B did some case studies and used indexing to help them find their target audience. It was a younger male and who was lower in socioeconomic status. Once CP+B discovered this they were able to work with BK’s previous HAVE IT YOUR WAY ads from the 70’s. The customization of a burger along with the concept of fire grilling is what CP+B knew BK had to use; these two equities would help to reestablish BK as a top player in the fast food hamburger restaurant category.

The implication of these two equities was going to be difficult though. The target audience sees thousands of ads a day from waking up in the morning to when they close their eyes at night. So they decided what they had to do was come up with a lot of ideas and then throw them all out there, hoping a few would stick with the consumers. The player was the WHOPPER and it already had a strong following.

I really thought right here the agency could have talked to more of the target audience and find out what they like to do and why they like a big, juicy burger. I mean why not? You know when you talk to people’s stomachs your getting the honest truth about how they feel about something.

This is an ad from the 06/2007 NFL season to advertise to their target market:

So at this point CP+B was working with BK to design different vehicles to present to their audience while staying on point in their briefing: to increase sales and traffic in BK restaurants nationally. Research showed CP+B TV was the best way to work into the wallets and stomachs of their target consumers. They invested much of their time into TV ads and Print ads where BK was seen on TV shows like “The Apprentice” and “Jimmy Kimmel Live” and in all types of Magazines. Other ad dollars went toward Social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook and sports ads like Ultimate Fighting Championship and College BCS games.

The ads worked!! BK showed a tripling increase in top-of-mind awareness, and has shown a 15 month consecutive comp store sales gain. In closing go and get yourself a flame broiled burger and eat at the King again.