Pollo Tropical hatches pig-themed pork campaign

Nation's Restaurant News, August 12, 1996 by Mark Hamstra

MIAMI -- Pollo Tropical wants people to think that "pollo" doesn't mean just "chicken" any more.

The 48-unit chain, which has developed a loyal following of Caribbean-style-poultry lovers in southern Florida, is hoping to attract fans of other marinated meats with the addition of "island pork" to its menu here and the testing of beef sandwiches in some markets.

The effort is the fourth aspect of a four-pronged marketing effort launched earlier this year, president Nick Castaldo said.

The other strategies, all of which have been implemented, include marketing separately to Hispanic consumers and the general market, offering lower-priced "value" meals on the everyday menu, and improving customer service by managers and other store-level personnel that interact with customers.

The results have been a measurable success, Castaldo said, as customer complaints have declined, compliments have increased and same-store sales have risen.

The pork launch, Castaldo said, also appears to have been a success.

"The reception to it has been tremendous," he said. "Plus there's been a good balance between sandwiches, platters and value meals. We feel it is a better product than what you can get at local independents."

Pollo Tropical added a total of seven pork dishes to the menu, all of which are prepared with roast pork marinated in a proprietary blend of tropical juices and then seasoned with additional Caribbean flavorings.

The two sandwiches, one with grilled onion and one with lettuce, tomato and raw onion, sell for $3.99; a value meal, with black beans and rice, also is priced at $3.99; a combo meal, with a choice of two side dishes, goes for $4.79; and three varieties of family meals, which offer larger portions of pork, side dishes and bread, are priced from $11.99 to $15.99.

Results from the third week of the pork launch, which began early last month, showed an 11-percent gain in weekly sales since the introduction, with pork dishes accounting for about 13 percent of total sales. Little or no cannibalization of chicken sales has occurred, the company said.

The systemwide introduction of pork was accompanied by a combination of traditional advertising and a wave of promotions that included porcine pinatas in every store and a 600-square-foot pink pig balloon that continues to hover over one of the chain's outlets here.

The overall marketing support for the product launch was a joint effort between agency FB&A Advertising and Jason Wilder Advertising of Miami Beach, which coordinated the media events and in-store promotions.

To introduce the dishes to the company's Hispanic consumers in South Florida, Coral Gables, Fla.-based FB&A added a segment to an ongoing commercial series about four Cuban grandmonthers who are so distressed that their families prefer Pollo Tropical's chicken to their own that they kidnap a Pollo employee to learn the chain's secrets.

"Just when they've figured out the secret and they get the recipe, here we come back with yet another threat," explained Rita Shaw, account manager at FB&A. "It really plays on the fear of these grandmas."

In the Anglo TV campaign, an oversized egg hatches to reveal one of the new pork dishes, followed by a sea of more than 1,300 eggs hatching at once, with the tag line, "The natural order of things will never be the same."

In a direct-mail piece, a chicken asks, "Is nothing sacred?"

"We never intend to move away from chicken as the star," Shaw said. "We just want to give our customers some more variety."

The marinated-steak sandwiches are in test outside the Miami area. Castaldo said the company is working on developing a flavorful product that can be sourced at a more consistent price before rolling it out.

Outside the South Florida area, the company earlier this year changed its name to TropiGrill both to reflect the expanded menu and to make itself more receptive to the general market.

"Outside the core market the name Pollo Tropical was kind of a barrier," Shaw explained. "We wanted to have a name people understood. Down here [in South Florida], if we open a store, it's a success from day one."

The effort comes at a time when the chain is struggling to boost traffic at its 10 outlets in Chicago; Tampa and Orlando, Fla.; and West Hempstead, N.Y.

"Our sales outside [the region] have been well below those of our core markets," the company's president said. "That's been a real business challenge for us."

In addition to changing the name to TropiGrill, the company redesigned its outlying units with a red-orange-and-gold color scheme "more representative of a quick-service restaurant," Castaldo said, replacing the cream-and-dark-green hues of its traditional, slightly more upscale units in South Florida.

The new pork dishes were accepted readily in the Miami area -- where that form of meat is more of a staple than it is in most of the United States -- and also have been well-received in the newer markets, the company said.