IHOP’s fake name ploy helped boost sales, traffic
Dine Brands Global CEO Steve Joyce says that IHOP burger sales have quadrupled since it briefly changed its name.
IHOP is laughing all the way to the bank after a fake name change revealed in early June fueled sales, the CEO of Dine Brands Global, the owner of the iconic franchise, told FOX Business on Wednesday.
“We quadrupled the number of burgers we were selling and that’s continuing. And both lunch and dinner part sales went up significantly. So for us it was great,” he told Liz Claman on “Countdown to the Closing Bell.”
Before using the publicity stunt to promote its burgers, the restaurant chain used consumer research to determine which burgers best fit its target demographic.
“We did a lot of consumer research on what is the best-tasting burger our customer wanted, … choose the burger based on that, which was this amazing Angus burger that we then have six flavor profiles, which were all consumer insight,” he said.
Joyce said that the ruse helped boost both sales and traffic during lunch and dinner hours.
“Food costs for our brands have been great over the last several years and while the field is crowded and we needed to have a great burger, but we introduced the burger at a $6.99 price point with a Coke and fries and that clearly resonated with our guests,” he said.
According to Dine Brands’ second-quarter earnings, sales at IHOP’s domestic locations open at least a year grew by 0.7%.
“Our shareholders are expecting big things from us…we’re quite the value still at this point, we’re an aggressive buyer of our own stock, we reported that again, so we think that it’s a great investment and we’re doing it ourselves,” he said.