Bojangles' rapid growth pressing segment leaders Nation's Restaurant News, Jan 16, 1984 by Charles Forman ANNAPOLIS, Md.--As Bojangles opened its 200th unit beside a shopping mall here late fast fall, predictions that the Horn & Hardatt subsidiary would soon be the nation's No. 3 fast-food chicken chain flowed as freely as the champagne. With its million dollar average annual unit sales and all-day menu based on biscuits and spicy chicken, Charlotte, N.C.-based Bojangles is riding high in an aggressive drive to preemptively exploit the potential of the upscale fast-food chicken market. While new units are still opening along the East Coast, the company is turning its attention west to Texas, where 90 restaurants are planned in what seems an obvious assault on a confused and weekeend Chruch's. in addition, the company is emphasizing utilization of a new prototype building which should lower average per-unit investment costs, introducing increasingly automated cooking equipment to cut labor costs and problems and adding new products aimed at warding off the efforts of competitors. Planned development is shifting increasingly to the shoulders of franchisees. When uhit 200 opened its doors about 90 Bojangle's were company-owned and 110 franchised. Over the next year, said Jack Z. Fulk Jr., 40 company stores are planned along with 160 franchised ones. If Bojangle's can indeed have 400 restaurants open by year-end it should b neck-and-neck in units with New Orleans-based Popeye's Famous Fried Chicken, which operates or franchises about 365 restaurants with systemwide sales of around $230 million. Advertisement Privately owned Popeye's has been growing at a much slower rate than Bojangle's, but recently inked an agreement under which Marriott Corp. will open 31 Popeyes in the mid-Atlantic region as a franchisee. The expansion course Bojanglehs has set makes the Sooners rush into the Oklahoma Territory seem tame, but most industry observers believe the rewards for success extremely attractive. For one thing major segment operators, including KFC, have opened only about half as many units as the top three hamburger chains. At the same time, per capita consumption of chicken is growing at a faster rate than that of any other major protein--beef, pork, fish, favored by Americans. Chicken prices have been relatively stable, too. Production experts call chicken "the perfect protein conversion machine," noting chickens turn grain into meat with amazingly high efficiency. Perhaps more important at the moment is the fact that only Bojanglehs and a couple of others, like Texas-based Grandy's and Ohio-headquartered Mrs. Winners, have been successful with relatively broad menu, all-day concepts. This gives them the superior unit volumes that in turn mean attractive returns on invested capital. The toughest problem Bojangle's now faces, Fulk said, is recruitment of enough adequate management personnel to support planned expansion. Before he started Bojangle's in Charlotte five years ago, Fulk was a major Hardee's franchisee. He says he favored his own former executives when granting Bojanglehs franchises because he had a clear idea of their strengths as operators. Most of those he worked with who wanted franchises now have them, he said, making franchise recruitment, selection and training more difficult at the same time it becomes more critical. At the 200th unit opening celebration. Horn & Hardart chairman Barry Florescue presented an 18-carat gold chicken To Tony Triplette, president of Baltimore Food Systems, the six-unit franchisee that will operate the Saverna Park Mall unit. The Bojangle's push westward will be with a mix of both company-owned and franchised units, Fulk said. Stores are now open in Texarkana, Austin, Houston and St. Louis. One is about to open in the Dallas/Fort Worth area. Concentration of company units is planned for Dallas/Fort Worth and franchised stores for the Austin/Houston area. The new, midsized units will cover 2,650 sq. ft. and seat 50. Average investment cost should be $525,000 including land, building and equipment, Fulk said. Current costs, he added, run from $575,000 to $750,000. Latest Bojangle's product is a chicken filet biscuit, prepped in a Cajun's marinade and selling for about $1.69. Another recent introduction is the Egg Bo Biscuit, a buttermilk biscuit with egg, Canadian bacon and cheese. lol wait a sec, is this information from 1984????????????? How is this possible.
Mista Jaynguls didn't go to the Mouse City like Boss said. He went to create a multimillion dollar fried chicken franchise.
sorry... here is the link. http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m3190/is_v18/ai_3099225 A poster said once they saw Bojangles coming to Houston in the Chronicle, so Ive been searching for weeks now and I find this. Dont know what to take out it
Man I hate the world we live in.... Man can walk on the moon....we have cars that run on corn...we have drugs that can fight cancer. But we can't find a way to fry mother f***ing chicken without it killing you??? Come on, what the hell is going on? Where is all our science dollars going? You think I care about a new form of igneous rock they found in the Sahara? Hell no, find a way to fry up some chicken that is not going to kill me! For real man... I don't eat the stuff simply because of how bad it is for you. I get jealous when I see someone eating friend chicken and I have to eat grilled chicken breast. Where are the grants to research this? Everyone loves friend food. If you don't you are lying. Take 10 million dollars and find a way to do it so jalapeno poppers, curly fries, and hooters wings are not going to kill us anymore.
Sadly, my friend, some of it is worth dieing for! No seriously... I dont need their fried chicken, just their BUFFALO BITES!! oh yeah
