From Sept.18-24, the simple act of eating out can help Washington-D.C.-based Share Our Strength fight childhood hunger. Share Our Strength’s Dine Out For No Kid Hungry is a week-long fundraising program in which thousands of consumers nationwide join with participating restaurants in support of Share Our Strength’s work to end childhood hunger in America.
To-date, more than 5,000 restaurants have signed on to support the fundraising initiative. Funds are raised in a variety of ways including donating a percentage of sales and offering deals on select menu items. A map of participating locations, searchable by zip code, is available at www.DineOutForNoKidHungry.org.
More than 16 million children in the U.S. live in households that have trouble consistently putting food on the table, according to the United States Department of Agriculture.
Through initiatives that include working with state and local partners, funding qualifying school nutrition programs, and educating parents and children on ways to maximize nutrition, Share Our Strength works to break the cycle of hunger.
Now in its 4th year, Dine Out For No Kid Hungry raised more than $1.5 million in 2010 — a number organizers intend to double this year. This year’s participating restaurants include independently run locations such as Denny’s, Joe’s Crab Shack, P.F. Chang’s, O’Charley’s, Papa John’s and McAlister’s Deli. Share Our Strength’s Dine Out For No Kid Hungry is nationally sponsored by Sysco, American Express, Ecolab, Open Table, Food Network, USA Today, and the National Restaurant Association.
Zaxby’s expanding into new markets; expanding breakfast items
Zaxby’s is planning to expand into new markets in the South and Midwest, and is exploring a new breakfast daypart as part of an overall growth strategy for the chicken chain.
The Athens, Ga.-based chain plans to open 31 new restaurants in 2011, and between 35 and 40 new units in 2012. New markets will be throughout Oklahoma, Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio, Virginia and West Virginia, as well as southeastern U.S. states where Zaxby’s already operates restaurants, said Tony Townley, Zaxby’s co-founder.
In 2010, Zaxby’s booked U.S. systemwide sales of $777.6 million, up 8.3 percent from the preceding year, according to NRN’s Top 200 study. The brand finished the fiscal year with 514 restaurants, comprised of 89 corporate locations and 425 franchised units. The total unit count rose 4 percent from the preceding year.
Zaxby’s estimated sales per unit of $1.5 million ranked third behind Chick-fil-A and Pollo Tropical in the chicken chain category, while in previous years its sales were flat, according to NRN’s data.
A key to the brand’s growth is its new and limited-time offer menu additions, which complement signature Zaxby’s offerings, such as chicken fingers and sauces that range in spiciness from “Wimpy” to “Insane.”
Zaxby’s is seeking to expand in non-traditional locations such as airports, which means complying with the airports’ guidelines of offering three meals a day, Townley said.
“Now it’s about the breakfast wars, but I don’t see it as a push against Chick-fil-A. These larger chains don’t see it as going after competitor A or competitor B. They see it as an opportunity to enhance unit economics,” said industry observer Dennis Lombardi from WD Partners, a restaurant and retail consultancy. “It’s an attractive, growing daypart.”
Bravo cooking up ‘Top Chef’ entrees
Bravo has made a marketing deal with ConAgra Foods in which the main course is the creation of a new line of frozen Top Chef entrées.
The new line, called Healthy Choice Top Chef Inspired Café Steamers, will begin appearing in grocery stores later this month.Marketing for ConAgra includes an original web series called Top Chef Healthy Showdown which will appear on BravoTV.com. The series premieres Sept. 14. There will also be integration in the upcoming season of Top Chef: Texas, with ConAgra products being part of an elimination challenge and the company providing prizes for the series and individual episodes. The companies expect that in the future, there will be more products inspired by Top Chef.
The Healthy Choice Top Chef Inspired Café Steamers will bring consumers frozen entrées with ingredients such as roasted garlic, asparagus and grilled eggplant.
Caramel is a hot item on restaurant menus this fall
Caramel is proving to be popular this fall, with numerous chains adding menu items featuring the cooked sugar, and independent restaurants responding to the colder weather with sticky, chewy desserts.
Dunkin’ Donuts is featuring a new caramel apple doughnut for the season. The cake doughnut is coated with cinnamon sugar and available for a suggested price of 89 cents across the mostly franchised system of more the 6,700 domestic units.
Dunkin’s announcement of that new item came shortly after frozen dessert chains TCBY and Dairy Queen launched new caramel items.TCBY added caramel frozen yogurt as a permanent item, and Dairy Queen reintroduced its Ooey Gooey Caramel Brownie Blizzard as September’s flavor of the month. The Blizzard is made with brownie pieces, caramel fudge topping and chocolate chunks, all blended in vanilla soft-serve ice cream.
On Red Robin’s upcoming drinks and dessert menu, which hits restaurants Sept. 13, the 431-unit casual-dining chain is selling apple pie bites with caramel dipping sauce, as well as a Nestle Toll House Cookie Sundae — a chocolate-chip cookie topped with vanilla ice cream and whipped cream and drizzled with caramel and hot fudge.
All of those items come after Applebee’s Neighborhood Grill & Bar, the nation’s largest casual-dining chain with 1,862 units added in August a $5.99 cinnamon apple turnover with caramel sauce and a side of vanilla ice cream.
Caramel has been growing in popularity for some time now, according to menu research firm Datassential. The number of times it’s mentioned in its database of 4,800 chain and independent restaurant menus has been growing steadily each quarter for the past two years. It’s now mentioned in more than a quarter of all restaurant menus, 26.7 percent, up from 21.5 percent in 2007.Salted caramel in particular is growing quickly, having more than doubled in frequency since 2007, albeit from just 2.1 percent to 4.9 percent.
Ban on E. Coli in ground beef extends to six more strains
The federal government will ban the sale of ground beef tainted with six toxic strains of E. coli bacteria that are increasingly showing up as the cause of severe illness from food. Officials have been under pressure from food safety advocates and some elected officials to do more to keep the potentially deadly bacteria out of meat, but the beef industry said the move was not needed and could force the price of ground beef to rise.
The new rule means that six relatively rare forms of E. coli will be treated the same as their notorious and more common cousin, a strain called E. coli O157:H7. That strain has caused deaths and illnesses and prompted the recall of millions of pounds of ground beef and other products.
It was banned from ground beef in 1994 after an outbreak killed four children and sickened hundreds of people.It is not illegal to sell fresh meat or poultry containing most toxic bacteria, like; they are frequently found on groceries’ meat, and thorough cooking typically kills the pathogens. But since the 1994 outbreak, which involved hamburgers served at Jack in the Box restaurants, regulators have treated E. coli in ground beef differently.