KFC: The Colonel strikes back – 6 years of taking on the Empire

KFC, a quick-service restaurant, took inspiration from Han Solo in Star Wars for its six-year campaign in the UK to rebuild the brand for the long-term, whilst also driving much-needed revenue in the short-term to fund the broader transformation of the business.

Summary

A long time ago, in a pitch room far, far away, KFC came to Mother with an iconic product, but a business in decline and a brand that was holding them back. This is the story of how our new strategic approach turned around 10 years of stagnation, took the fight to category behemoth McDonald's, and created a brand with a genuine role in British culture. To do it, we focused on solving the tangible challenges the brand faced in an unmistakably KFC way. Strategy was at the heart of the process, not only identifying the critical challenges but...

Not a subscriber?

Schedule your live demo with our team today

WARC helps you to plan, create and deliver more effective marketing

  • Prove your case and back-up your idea

  • Get expert guidance on strategic challenges

  • Tackle current and emerging marketing themes

We’re long-term subscribers to WARC and it’s a tool we use extensively. We use it to source case studies and best practice for the purposes of internal training, as well as for putting persuasive cases to clients. In compiling a recent case for long-term, sustained investment in brand, we were able to support key marketing principles with numerous case studies sourced from WARC. It helped bring what could have been a relatively dry deck to life with recognisable brand successes from across a broad number of categories. It’s incredibly efficient to have such a wealth of insight in one place.

Insights Team
Bray Leino

You’re in good company

We work with 80% of Forbes' most valuable brands* and 80% of the world's top top-of-the-class agencies.

* Top 10 brands