Denny’s was once the chain restaurant king of breakfast, ’til McDonald’s came along and stole the crown.  Today, 1550 unit Denny’s  doesn’t even rank in the top 5 in the $83 billion breakfast market (McDonald’s, Starbucks, Dunkin’ Donuts, Burger King, and IHOP).

To make matters worse, franchise unit sales were down 7.2% last quarter – a time when its value positioning should be giving it a boost.

So Denny’s hatched a bold plan to get some attention. 

On Tuesday, February 3, they gave away a Grand Slam breakfast to anyone who showed up at all but two of its 1,550 restaurants nationwide. (The Grand Slam includes two eggs, two strips of bacon, two sausages and two pancakes and normally sells for $5.99.)

According to an article in USA Today, Denny’s invested about $5 million on the entire promotion, including food costs, labor costs and airing a :30 commercial on Sunday’s Super Bowl.

"We’re re-acquainting America with Denny’s," says CEO Nelson Marchioli. "We’ve never been thanked this much — and folks are saying they’ll come back."

The gambit earned Denny’s something that money alone can’t buy: positive public relations, and lots of it. By Denny’s estimates, it got $50 million in free news coverage, almost all of it positive. No injuries — or police issues — were reported at any locations, say Denny’s officials.

Marchioli implied that they made up quite a bit of their costs on high-margin beverages not included in the Grand Slam giveaway.  "…he concedes: If you factor in the profits from all of Tuesday’s drink orders — which are far more profitable than food orders — ‘we’ll do better than break even.’  And, yes, he just may do it again."

Mediapost’s Out to Launch reports that Canadian fast food restaurant New York Fries has launched a series of print ads featuring fries juxtaposed with fake boobs, hair and people to communicate to spread the word that their fries are preservative-free.

They are running their “Real Fries in a Fake World” ads throughout Canada in Chatelaine, Hello, Flare, Canadian Living, People, Style at Home and Canadian House & Home through May 2009. Zig created the campaign and Media Experts handled the media buy.

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Mediapost’s Out to Launch reports that Canadian fast food restaurant New York Fries has launched a series of print ads featuring fries juxtaposed with fake boobs, hair and people to communicate to spread the word that their fries are preservative-free.

They are running their “Real Fries in a Fake World” ads throughout Canada in Chatelaine, Hello, Flare, Canadian Living, People, Style at Home and Canadian House & Home through May 2009. Zig created the campaign and Media Experts handled the media buy.

WHAT DO YOU THINK? SHARE A COMMENT BELOW.

On 7-11 you can have a Slurpee on 7-Eleven. So, on July 11th, go into your nearby 7-Eleven, and slurp up a Free Slurpy*.

Where is the nearest 7-Eleven located, you may ask?

Look Here!

{I am accepting Slurpee deliveries between the hours of 7 and 11 only, at my office.}

*Are you a lifetime member of the 7-Eleven or Speedway Slurpee Club?

Defunct Weight Loss Centers May Have Broken Law MIAMI (CBS4) ― When one of the state’s biggest diet companies shut it’s doors after the beginning of the year, it left hundreds of South Florida customers not only wondering if they’d ever get their money back but also what happened to all the private medical information the centers kept on file. State prosecutors, wondering the same thing, have widened their investigation into LA Weight Loss Centers and Pure Weight Loss Centers to see if they broke any laws. “All girls want to look nice and I got a couple of pounds extra,” said Yaumary Rodriguez who originally signed up with an LA Weight Loss Center several years ago. Rodriguez said by staying on the plan she lost 24 pounds in the past year. “My goal was 30 pounds but when I got down to 24,” said Rodriguez, “I decided not to keep losing more” At the beginning of the year, Rodriguez said she decided she needed to go back on the LA Weight Loss Center plan to help her drop a couple of pounds she picked up over the holidays. When she went to her local LA Weight Loss Center in Cutler Bay on January 4th to pick up her next shipment of weight loss bars, she said she was stunned to find that it had changed it’s name to Pure Weight Loss. She received her second shock when she was informed that the store, which was still filled with LA Weight Loss products, was closing down. “The companies were closing,” Rodriguez said she was told, “it was the last date of work for the whole company. They just closed and they never sent a notice to the people they never say anything.” Read the entire article

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