the Kentucky Fried Thread

[GeneChing]

The KFC China story: how Taiwanese businessman Tony Wang Tatung introduced a nation to fast food, and why there are no Chinese franchises overseas
When KFC opened in Beijing in 1987, it was the first US fast food outlet in any communist country
Tony Wang, who led the project, introduced new concepts, including hygiene and the art of queuing
PUBLISHED : Tuesday, 18 December, 2018, 8:17pm
UPDATED : Wednesday, 19 December, 2018, 8:55pm
Elaine Yau
https://www.facebook.com/elaine.yau.3152
https://www.weibo.com/u/6450432252



It was a chilly November day in 1987 when an animated crowd gathered outside a new shopping centre a stone’s throw from Beijing’s Tiananmen Square.

Members of the international press corps and curious locals braved the blistering cold to witness a historic moment that would have had Chairman Mao Zedong spinning in his nearby mausoleum – the opening of a three-storey Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant.

Will KFC plastics move catch on at all Hong Kong fast-food chains?
That was three years before McDonald’s entered the country. It was four years before the fall of the Berlin Wall and the dissolution of the Soviet Union, and the American fast-food joint – with its white-haired Colonel Sanders sign and racks of golden fried chicken – was a first not only for China but for the whole communist bloc.

“On the opening day, 20 to 30 reporters followed me around wherever I went,” says Tony Wang Tatung, who led the venture.


The 1987 opening of the first KFC in Beijing. It was also the first US fast-food outlet in China and any communist country.

The restaurant sent ripples through the country’s catering industry, says Wang, who bears an uncanny resemblance to the colonel when he smiles.

“The Beijing Evening News ran an article saying the toilet … was cleaner than the pond in a Chinese restaurant,” he says from his home in the Taiwanese city of Taichung.

“The opening of that first KFC in China affected food safety and hygiene in the country’s catering operations, and introduced more civilised concepts such as queuing for food.”

The restaurant was an immediate hit, with a two kilometre queue outside in the days after it opened, Wang says.


Today, KFC is the most popular US fast-food franchise in China. Photo: Alamy

“They came to KFC not so much for the chicken, but to experience a bit of Americana. People were curious about the American lifestyle. The shop did brisk business and KFC recouped its investment within a year of opening.”

The appeal has been enduring: today, KFC is the most popular American fast-food operation in China, with more than 5,000 outlets. Since 2016 the licensee of KFC in China has been Yum China, a listed company in which Ant Financial Services, an affiliate of Alibaba, owner of the South China Morning Post, is a minority investor.

Born in China’s Sichuan province, Wang’s family relocated to Taiwan in 1949, when he was five years old, following the Chinese civil war. He graduated from Taiwan Chung Yuan Christian University in 1968 with a civil engineering degree, and completed a master’s degree in management science at Stevens Institute of Technology in New Jersey in 1973.

After a short stint working in pharmaceuticals marketing in New Jersey, Wang was headhunted by KFC in 1975 to work as a business analyst at its headquarters in Louisville, Kentucky.


Wang has made his money by opening franchises, expanding them and then selling them. Photo: Elaine Yau

With dreams of becoming an entrepreneur, he left KFC in 1980, and the following year met then Tianjin city mayor Li Ruihuan – who was later elevated to China’s powerful Politburo Standing Committee – when he was visiting San Francisco with a delegation.

“He asked me to teach them how to start a fast-food business in China. I went to Tianjin and saw there was good potential, [but] it was a risky decision because it was uncharted waters,” he says.

In 1982, with Singaporean and Chinese partners, Wang opened Orchid Food in the city, serving hamburgers and sandwiches.

“Me and my Singaporean partner put in US$300,000 for the venture. The decor was very basic. We opened a second Orchid at Tianjin Water Park 10 months later,” he says.


Wang opened Orchid Food in Tianjin in 1982. It sold burgers and sandwiches.

Its interest piqued by Wang’s success with Orchid, KFC came knocking on his door again in 1986, offering him the position of vice-president for Southeast Asia and China operations. Wang took the bait and sold his share in Orchid.

KFC had already established a foothold in Southeast Asia in the early 1980s, with chains in Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand, as well as in Hong Kong. But the company was stumped when it came to communist China.

“Richard Mayer, who was then KFC’s board chairman, was eager to enter the China market. They had a China division based in Hong Kong, and hired a South African head of China development. They worked on [expanding into China] for many years to no avail. The South African couldn’t even get a visa for China,” Wang says.

At the time, the Hong Kong and Singapore KFC chains were run by franchisees. The company bought back half of the franchise in Singapore – where residents had a better grasp of Mandarin than Hongkongers at the time – and Wang led the China drive from the Singapore office.

continued next post

[GeneChing]

Tony Wang at a press conference in Beijing in 1987 to announce the opening of the first KFC in China.

The first Beijing branch was a joint venture between KFC and the ministries of tourism and animal husbandry – the latter supplying the chicken.

Wang says he encountered his first problem while renovating the branch. The floors had to be tiled three times because the builders were not skilled enough to produce an even floor.

“Eventually we had to hire builders from Guangzhou, which had a more advanced construction industry due to its proximity to Hong Kong. The staff from Guangzhou came with rucksacks filled with instant noodles, because there were none in Beijing then, and southerners didn’t like northern Chinese food,” he says.

A stumbling block was KFC’s stipulation that only chilled chicken could be used.


Beijing’s vice mayor Sun Fuling, (centre) and Wang (right), at the opening in 1987.

“China didn’t have the expensive transport system needed for chilled chicken. I flew back and forth between China and the US several times to persuade KFC to let us use frozen chicken for its Beijing outlet,” Wang says.

They had a China division based in Hong Kong, and hired a South African head of China development ... The South African couldn’t even get a visa for China TONY WANG

Salt was another stumbling block, because “KFC uses fine-grained salt, but China’s was coarse-grained. We need to apply [to the Chinese government] to import salt. Opening a franchised restaurant is very technical because you have to follow all the specifications along the whole assembly line.”

Wang then had his work cut out training the frontline staff.

“We took videos of preparations for the opening of two or three Singaporean stores, showing Chinese staff how customers came in, queued and ordered, and how staff served them at the counters. The staff even had to be taught how to count money. The training was very tedious,” he says.

By the time Wang left KFC in 1990, it had opened five outlets, in Beijing and Shanghai. “My mission was accomplished and I was bored,” he says.

It was not the end of Wang’s forays into the restaurant business, though. In 1991, he introduced US steakhouse chain Sizzlers to Taiwan, then sold the franchise in 1994. In the decade that followed, before retiring from the industry in 2003, he took a string of other Western restaurant franchises, including Jack in the Box, Kenny Rogers and Le Jazz, into countries around the world.


KFC had tried unsuccessfully to get in to China for years before Wang rejoined them in 1986. Photo: Shutterstock

“That’s how I made my money – opening and expanding a franchise, then selling it,” says Wang, who now teaches franchise management at Tunghai University in Taichung, and Beijing Normal University’s campus in the southern Chinese city of Zhuhai.

Ninety-five per cent of Taiwanese dining franchises and 85 per cent of Chinese ones are run the wrong way. That’s why you don’t see any Chinese dining brands finding success overseas, even 40 years after China opened up to the world TONY WANG

Although big Western franchises are household names in China today, there is still a glaring lack of home-grown Chinese brands in overseas markets.

“China has schools and exams for chefs, but not for restaurant management, because it’s the cuisine they respect,” Wang explains. “The dining-out concept in the West is experience-oriented … Chinese only care about the food and having a full stomach. That’s why China does not have a sophisticated restaurant industry which can be exported overseas.”

There is also a fundamental difference between how Chinese and Westerners regard franchise management, he says.

“In the West, franchisee and franchiser see each other as partners and develop the brand together. Chinese see franchises as a money-spinner; they don’t grow the brand.

“Ninety-five per cent of Taiwanese dining franchises and 85 per cent of Chinese ones are run the wrong way. That’s why you don’t see any Chinese dining brands finding success overseas, even 40 years after China opened up to the world.”

Famed Beijing roast duck chain Da Dong opened an outlet in New York in December 2017 to huge fanfare, but it was a lame duck. Critics from The New York Times and New York Magazine both gave it zero stars.

Another noted Beijing roast duck chain, Quanjude, opened outlets in Canada and Australia. Having approached Quanjude before for its overseas expansion, Wang thinks he knows why it was not well received.

“Opening a successful franchise is all about standardisation. Western food is easier to standardise. Chinese cuisine is complex, and Chinese chefs have lots of discretion over the food procurement and cooking processes,” Wang says.

He says Quanjude’s management agreed to collaborate with him, but their concepts clashed and nothing came of it.

“They don’t have any marketing sense,” he says. “They wanted their overseas outlets to have the whole [Beijing] menu … I thought it only needed the trademark roast duck dish, because other dishes would have to be tailored to Western tastes.”

This article appeared in the South China Morning Post print edition as: The great chicken co up

Fascinating read. I remember KFC in China when I first went there in 91.

[GeneChing]

I can no longer wrap my head around this thread. I'd call this out as an April Fool's thing, but the news piece came out over the weekend.

Absolutely Not
Rob Arcand // March 30, 2019


CREDIT: Screenshot via Twitter

This year’s Ultra Music Festival has been a mess. Friday night, hundreds of attendees walked across the bridge between Virginia Key and Miami after having difficulty getting a ride back on one of the festival’s 200 buses. Chaos erupted after a tree caught on fire, with some even calling it “Fyre Festival 2.” But earlier that afternoon, a new DJ took the stage before acts like Marshmello and Tiësto. With an air of familiarity, the masked DJ caused more than a little commotion in the Miami heat, in no small part due to the associations with his attire. His name was Colonel Sanders, and his set was the most egregious corporate stunt in recent memory.

Dressed in a string tie T-shirt and enormous bobble-headed costume, the DJ introduced his set with prerecorded banter designed to get the crowd moving. “Any of y’all hungry for some beats?” a voice shouted through the speakers. The audience seemed less than enthused.

The promotional stunt understandably garnered a few negative reactions on Twitter. Louis the Child called Ultra “a joke with corporate promotional nonsense,” while others like Alex Metric joked about the fact that the festival was basically selling its main stage as an advertising platform. “Ultra selling ad space on the EDM Main stage at one of the most commercial festivals feels like some horrendous logical conclusion to the direction that part of dance music has been heading in,” he wrote on Twitter. “It’s not exactly Ronald McDonald at Berghain is it.”

Most directly implicated by the stunt was Marshmello, who in a since-deleted tweet, called the whole thing “lame.” “I can think of a lot of other artists that actually deserve to be on that stage instead,” he wrote on Twitter.

These days, almost every music festival is a crowded assortment of Mountain Dew stages and Sour Patch spare rooms, so it’s hard to really feel any genuine outrage about the incident. Whether they’re performing on the main stage or covertly footing the bills on tour, brands are not your friends.

Embedded video

Festive Owl
@TheFestiveOwl
.@KFC bought Colonel Sanders a slot on the @Ultra main stage, and this happened. 🐔🥚😂 | 📹: @1001TLtv

8,084
4:37 PM - Mar 29, 2019
3,564 people are talking about this
Twitter Ads info and privacy

This @kfc colonel sanders Djing at @ultra is lame. I can think of a lot of other artists that actually deserve to be on that stage instead.— marshmello (@marshmellomusic) March 29, 2019

Given the platform you have as a major electronic festival, it would be nice if you used it to showcase what electronic music is about and not make it seem like a joke with corporate promotional nonsense @ultra— louis (@LouisTheChild) March 30, 2019

[GeneChing]

'I ate a lot of Kentucky Fried Chicken and Twinkies': Woman celebrates 105th birthday
HTV National Desk Published 11:55 am PDT, Thursday, May 2, 2019



An Oklahoma woman is getting the birthday celebration she deserves.

Lois Wooten, of Del City, turns 105 on Sunday. She received a proclamation Wednesday at the Oklahoma State Capitol.

Wooten still lives by herself, sends homemade birthday cards and loves to text on her iPhone. She roared through the roaring '20s, learned to drive on a model T and has lived in Del City since 1950.

Wooten was honored by the state House of Representatives days ahead of her 105th birthday.

"I ate a lot of Kentucky Fried Chicken and Twinkies," Wooten said.

Wooten drove until she was 98.

"I don't like to cook much. I eat a lot of frozen dinners. But who cares?" Wooten said.

For someone who spent the vast majority of her life without a computer, Wooten now loves technology, including her iPhone.

Wooten spent 20 years as the cafeteria manager at Kerr Junior High. Her late husband was a firefighter at Tinker Air Force Base.

THREADS
Give it up to the elderly!!!!!
the Kentucky Fried Thread

[GeneChing]

KFC first fast-food restaurant to introduce veggie burger in China
Inside is a palm-sized deepfried mushroom patty filled with melted cheese. Yay or nay?
by Natalie Ma July 4, 2019 in Food



KFC has just introduced its new mushroom burger on Wednesday, making it the first ever fast food chain store in China to provide a vegetarian choice.

The new burger comes with tomato and lettuce and a mushroom patty instead of meat. It does come with cheese though, so if you’re strictly vegan, this might still not be the burger for you.

Response has been divided online. Some said it is overpriced as a veggie bun while others said the cheese alone is worth the price.

Here is what it looks like in real life, according to a Weibo user who gave it a thumbs-down:



Shanghaiist went to sink our teeth into the burger, and here’s what we found:

The burger itself comes in a decent crusty bun, with a deep-fried mushroom patty that is covered in orange breadcrumbs. The crispy lettuce balances the taste nicely, but the ketchup and mayo sauce prevails. The patty itself doesn’t deliver much taste besides the cheese stuffed in it. The mushroom is kinda rubbery so we were left with more half-eaten mushroom than the bun towards the end. We give it 3 out of 5 burger buns for taste, but be warned: the texture of the unchewable mushroom might lead to a truly messy meal.

THREADS
Vegetarian
the Kentucky Fried Thread

[GeneChing]

So many Kung Fu Tea joints make the news feeds that I don't bother to post them all on our Kung Fu Restaurants & Bars thread, but this one also has fried chicken so I can double post it on our Kentucky Fried Thread and y'all know how much I love these double posts. It's literally two for the price of one.

A Taiwanese Fried Chicken Chain Arrives in Quincy
It’s TKK Fried Chicken’s second American location
by Terrence B. Doyle Aug 23, 2019, 8:30am EDT


Quincy has a new spot for fried chicken (the New York City location is pictured here) Robert Sietsema/Eater

Taiwanese fried chicken chain TKK Fried Chicken celebrates the grand opening of its Quincy location (1 Beale St.) today, August 23, and throughout the weekend. It’s the second United States location for TKK, which operates 66 locations in Taiwan and two locations in Shanghai. Its other U.S. location is in New York City’s Flatiron District.

The brand new Quincy location, which once housed a Papa Gino’s, is a combined TKK Fried Chicken and Kung Fu Tea shop, a bubble tea chain that already has about a dozen Boston-area locations.

TKK Fried Chicken has its roots in the Wanhua District of Taipei, Taiwan, where it opened its first shop in 1974. The Quincy location isn’t the only American expansion in the works, per the TKK website — shops are apparently also planned for Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Cherry Hill, New Jersey; and Richardson, Texas.

TKK Fried Chicken specializes in — you guessed it — fried chicken, offering diners a choice between tenders, wings, breasts, thighs, drumsticks, and fried chicken sandwiches. Sides include mashed potatoes, coleslaw, curly fries, crunchy cheese curds, and shi****o peppers. Unlike the location in New York, the Quincy location doesn’t have a liquor license.

The chicken comes in three different styles — original, crispy mild, and crispy hot. After a visit to the New York outpost, Eater NY critic Robert Sietsema wrote, “For god’s sake, get the crispy spicy!” He also noted that TKK has a “very good biscuit” and a “really, really good” kwa kwa bao, “an invention that’s become a signature of the chain.” The kwa kwa bao is a ball of sticky rice packed with mushrooms that is sealed in chicken skin and then fried.

TKK joins a whole host of other chicken-focused restaurants opening in the Boston area in the coming months (or recently opened). The folks behind Watertown’s Branch Line just opened Shy Bird, which focusses on rotisserie chicken but also features an excellent fried chicken sandwich on its menu, in Cambridge’s Kendall Square; the Oyster Club at the Heritage owner and longtime Greater Boston chef Chris Parsons is opening a pressure-fried chicken spot called Lily P’s in Cambridge later this year; the Moody’s Delicatessen team is on the verge of opening Pollo Club, which will serve fried chicken and vegan food, in the Waltham space once occupied by their taqueria El Rincon De Moody’s; and a team with members associated with Sportello, Charleys Philly Steaks, and Eventide Fenway will open a Nashville hot fried chicken restaurant called Hot Chix sometime in 2020. (Hot Chix is currently popping up around town with some frequency; keep an eye out for upcoming events at Bow Market’s Create Gallery & Cocktail Lounge and beyond.)

Head to Quincy today and see how TKK’s fried chicken sandwich stacks up to the others in the ongoing fried chicken sandwich wars.

[GeneChing]

wth? no srsly...WTH?!?!

China’s KFC Forsakes All Things Righteous, Creates Durian Chicken Nuggets
Having debuted its new durian chicken nuggets, China's KFC has squarely aligned itself with the forces of chaos. Somewhere, the Colonel weeps.
By ADAN KOHNHORST September 6, 2019

China’s KFC has been doing some soul-searching.

Much like a wayward youth, hurled asunder on the tumultuous waves of fate and uncertain in its concept of self, China’s KFC has been making some questionable life decisions.

A couple months back, they decided American-style fried chicken wasn’t really a core component of the KFC brand, and started selling Chinese street food. Still, it wasn’t too surprising coming from those behind the infamous “chizza“, a pizza with a crust made of chicken (and by “pizza”, we mean melted cheese with kernels of corn in it).

And yet, in terms of sheer scale, KFC’s latest experiment might be its greatest affront to God yet: Durian chicken nuggets.

In the press image, sulphuric, fecal-scented liquids ooze from the shell of an innocent chicken nugget, like contents from the corpse of a man whose colon has been sliced open by an enemy katana and left untended on the battlefield for three or four days in the sweltering wet heat of July.

And we pray.

RADII team member and durian fan Calvin Kung steeled his nerves and his spirit in order to confront this great sin:

“It was your average chicken nugget with a sliver of durian sludge,” he explains. “Classic overpromise, underdeliver. Outside flavoring of nugget is so strong, not even the mighty durian can win this battle for your ‘buds. The durian taste is so faint, you wonder if they just killed a chicken that happened to eat durian. There’s a reason durians don’t grow in Kentucky.”

“My mom and I bonded over freshly cut durian,” he added. “This KFC nugget would appall her.”

There you have it, folks. The durian nugget, foe to all, friend to none.

Related:

[GeneChing]

KFC is serving fried chicken sandwiched between 2 glazed doughnuts at dozens of locations, and people are freaking out
Kate Taylor Sep 17, 2019, 8:00 AM


KFC's "Kentucky Fried Chicken and Donuts" sandwich. KFC
YUM Yum Brands
117.23 1.92 (+1.70 %)

KFC is adding doughnuts to the menu alongside fried chicken at more than 40 locations in Norfolk and Richmond, Virginia, and Pittsburgh.
Customers can order a combination of fried chicken and doughnuts, as well as a sandwich that wedges fried chicken between two glazed doughnuts.
The sandwich is already polarizing people on social media.
Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.
KFC is now serving doughnuts at dozens of locations.
On Tuesday, the fried-chicken chain announced that it was testing its "Chicken and Donuts" menu items for a limited time at more than 40 locations in Norfolk and Richmond, Virginia, and Pittsburgh.
The options are a basket that pairs chicken on the bone or chicken tenders with one or two doughnuts, and a sandwich with a chicken fillet between two glazed doughnuts.


KFC's basket with fried chicken and doughnuts. KFC

The chicken-and-doughnut meal will cost $5.50 for one doughnut and $7.50 for two doughnuts. The sandwich is priced at $6, or as a combo meal for $8. KFC said customers can also add a doughnut — served hot — to any meal for $1.
KFC said in a press release that it was using the test to evaluate whether customers are craving chicken and doughnuts on a national scale.
According to a representative, the doughnuts will arrive at stores already cooked, and when a customer orders them, the doughnuts will be dipped in the fryers and glazed with a vanilla icing to ensure they are hot and fresh.

The fried-chicken/doughnut mashup is already polarizing people on social media.

Some saw the menu item as a dangerous option for KFC to offer.

—Steve Marmel (@Marmel) September 17, 2019

Blair Guild
✔
@BlairGuild
KFC wants us to die so badly https://twitter.com/Kate_H_Taylor/st...50116291653633 …

Kate Taylor
✔
@Kate_H_Taylor
KFC will test Chicken & Donuts for a limited time only in Norfolk/Richmond, VA and Pittsburgh

View image on Twitter
42
7:21 AM - Sep 17, 2019
Twitter Ads info and privacy
19 people are talking about this

RANsquawk
✔
@RANsquawk
I'm not one to bang the drum with "clean eating" but this sounds absolutely horrendous https://twitter.com/Kate_H_Taylor/st...50116291653633 …

Kate Taylor
✔
@Kate_H_Taylor
KFC will test Chicken & Donuts for a limited time only in Norfolk/Richmond, VA and Pittsburgh

View image on Twitter
21
7:18 AM - Sep 17, 2019
Twitter Ads info and privacy
23 people are talking about this

Some people were intrigued.

Travis
✔
@travislylesnews
Road trip, anyone? https://twitter.com/Kate_H_Taylor/st...50116291653633 …

Kate Taylor
✔
@Kate_H_Taylor
KFC will test Chicken & Donuts for a limited time only in Norfolk/Richmond, VA and Pittsburgh

View image on Twitter
13
7:06 AM - Sep 17, 2019
Twitter Ads info and privacy
See Travis's other Tweets

Kathryn Watson
✔
@kathrynw5
Who wants to go on a road trip with me? https://twitter.com/Kate_H_Taylor/st...50116291653633 …

Kate Taylor
✔
@Kate_H_Taylor
KFC will test Chicken & Donuts for a limited time only in Norfolk/Richmond, VA and Pittsburgh

View image on Twitter
22
7:05 AM - Sep 17, 2019
Twitter Ads info and privacy
See Kathryn Watson's other Tweets

Sarah Cooper
✔
@sarahcpr
This looks disgusting when can I try it https://twitter.com/Kate_H_Taylor/st...50116291653633 …

Kate Taylor

✔
@Kate_H_Taylor
KFC will test Chicken & Donuts for a limited time only in Norfolk/Richmond, VA and Pittsburgh

View image on Twitter
69
7:22 AM - Sep 17, 2019
Twitter Ads info and privacy
32 people are talking about this

Some blamed KFC's new test on Popeyes' recent super-successful chicken sandwich.

Connor O'Brien
✔
@connorobrienNH
This chicken sandwich obsession has gone too far. https://twitter.com/Kate_H_Taylor/st...50116291653633 …

Kate Taylor
✔
@Kate_H_Taylor
KFC will test Chicken & Donuts for a limited time only in Norfolk/Richmond, VA and Pittsburgh

View image on Twitter
10
7:09 AM - Sep 17, 2019
Twitter Ads info and privacy
See Connor O'Brien's other Tweets

Addisu Demissie
✔
@ASDem
.@PopeyesChicken what have you done https://twitter.com/Kate_H_Taylor/st...50116291653633 …

Kate Taylor
✔
@Kate_H_Taylor
KFC will test Chicken & Donuts for a limited time only in Norfolk/Richmond, VA and Pittsburgh

View image on Twitter
23
7:10 AM - Sep 17, 2019
Twitter Ads info and privacy
See Addisu Demissie's other Tweets

Michael Sheetz
✔
@thesheetztweetz
Your move @ChickfilA, @PopeyesChicken https://twitter.com/Kate_H_Taylor/st...50116291653633 …

Kate Taylor
✔
@Kate_H_Taylor
KFC will test Chicken & Donuts for a limited time only in Norfolk/Richmond, VA and Pittsburgh

View image on Twitter
6
6:49 AM - Sep 17, 2019
Twitter Ads info and privacy
See Michael Sheetz's other Tweets

While many people were shocked by KFC's chicken-and-doughnut sandwich, the concept isn't entirely new. Do-Rite Donuts and Chicken, a chain in Chicago, serves a similar menu item, as does Sam's Fried Chicken & Donuts in Houston.

KFC said in the press release that chicken and doughnuts have recently been trendy in areas including Philadelphia, San Diego, and Portland, Oregon.

whole lotta nope for me. anyone else?

[GeneChing]

[GeneChing]

KFC rolls out first plant-based fried 'chicken' with Beyond Meat – but we have no idea yet if it will come to South Africa
Kate Taylor , Business Insider US
Aug 26, 2019, 08:13 PM


KFC is getting into the alternative-meat game.
KFC

KFC is testing fried "chicken" made with faux meat, the chain announced on Monday.

The chain teamed up with Beyond Meat to make Beyond Fried Chicken.

The plant-based fried "chicken" will be available at a single KFC in the USA starting on Tuesday.

Whether it will ever come to South Africa is not yet clear.

KFC is getting into the alternative-meat game.

On Monday, the chicken chain announced it was testing Beyond Fried Chicken, in partnership with Beyond Meat. The plant-based fried "chicken" will be available at a single KFC location in Atlanta in the USA starting on Tuesday.

KFC said it would consider customer feedback as it decides whether to test the menu item at more locations or launch it nationally in the United States.

KFC in South Africa could not on Monday say if and when the experiment may come to SA.

In May, Kevin Hochman, the president of KFC's US business, told Business Insider he was meeting with the makers of plant-based "meat" because of the rise of interest in meat alternatives.

"If you would have asked me six months ago, I would have said no, to be completely honest with you," Hochman said. "Because we're about fried chicken."

However, if the buzz around companies like Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat translates into long-term customer demand, KFC will need to test a plant-based meat substitute in the US, Hochman said. The chain has already been testing vegetarian fried "chicken" in the UK.

Beyond Meat has recently announced deals with chains including Subway, Dunkin', and Del Taco.

"It's not that interesting to me that really rich people eat super healthy food. It's not moving the needle," Beyond Meat CEO Ethan Brown told Business Insider of the company's recent work with restaurant chains.

THREADS
the Kentucky Fried Thread
Vegetarian

[GeneChing]

KFC marketing continues to amaze me.

The KFC Yule log is back, but you absolutely should not buy it


What better scent for your home to have other than a fried chicken establishment?What better scent for your home to have other than a fried chicken establishment?IMAGE: KFC
BY DYLAN HAAS
MASHABLE SHOPPING
5 HOURS AGO

The holiday season is now upon us, and KFC has swooped in to stress us the hell out with the return of their "herbs and spices" fire log. That's right, for the low cost of $18.99, you can have your home smelling just like the fried chicken restaurant that is definitely not as good as that other fried chicken restaurant.

KFC's limited-edition, cursed piece of firewood is made from 100% recycled materials — a kind gesture — but that's where the positives stop. The main downside? It makes everything around it smell like musty meat. To quote Mashable culture reporter Chole Bryan, who's had first-hand experience with this seasoning-scented monstrosity: “Meat out of context is not a good smell.”

Walmart's description of the item states that it's a "great gift idea for family and friends," among other things — which we agree with, assuming you dislike both your family and your friends. If that's the case, then by all means, treat them to three hours of fast-food-centric aromas and the menacing presence of Colonel Sanders himself. While the weather outside is frightful, why not give your home a scent to match, right? (Seriously, do not do this.)

Surprisingly, the user reviews for the log are glowing: "Salivating over this smell," (are you?) one reads, "interesting concept," (is it?) says another. No matter the case, we think you're better off getting an actual chicken combo from the popular food chain proper while an actual Yule log burns away in the background. But, if you really want to hurt someone's feelings or are looking for a great gag gift, you can grab one at Walmart (just don't say we didn't warn you).


The KFC Yule log is back, but you absolutely should not buy it
KFC Limited-Edition Herbs & Spices Firelog — $18.99

[GeneChing]

JANUARY 21, 2020 / 1:58 AM / 2 DAYS AGO
KFC apologizes for 'sexist' Australian ad
3 MIN READ

(Reuters) - KFC on Tuesday apologized for an advertisement in Australia that shows two boys ogling a woman’s breasts, after calls from a local campaign group to boycott the fast-food giant over the ad it called “sexist”.


FILE PHOTO: KFC logo is seen in a restaurant located in a communist-era building in Warsaw, Poland October 2, 2017. REUTERS/Kacper Pempel

The 15-second ad, which has been running on television for the past three weeks and is also posted on KFC Australia’s YouTube channel, shows a woman dressed in a short playsuit check her bottom and adjust her breasts as she looks at her reflection in the window of a parked car.

The car’s window then rolls down to show two young boys staring at the woman’s breasts, before she smiles and says, “Did someone say KFC?”

The Zinger Popcorn box ad has so far garnered over 60,000 views with over 160 dislikes and 700 likes on YouTube.

“We apologize if anyone was offended by our latest commercial. Our intention was not to stereotype women and young boys in a negative light,” a spokesperson for Yum Brands-owned (YUM.N) KFC’s South Pacific unit said.

While many viewers did not approve of the ad, some took to Twitter to label the ad “funny” and said there was no need for the company to apologize.

Collective Shout, a group which campaigns against the objectification of women, condemned the ad and said here it was a "regression to tired and archaic stereotypes where young women are sexually objectified for male pleasure."

“Ads like this reinforce the false idea that we can’t expect better from boys. It is another manifestation of the ‘boys will be boys’ trope, hampering our ability to challenge sexist ideas which contribute to harmful behavior towards women and girls,” the group’s spokeswoman, Melinda Liszewski, said.

Last month, exercise bike maker Peloton Interactive Inc (PTON.O) faced heavy criticism for its Christmas advertisement, in which a woman receiving the company’s bike as a gift from her husband was called “sexist” and “dystopian” on social media.

Some said the husband was “controlling” and “manipulative” as buying his wife an exercise bike suggested that she needed to lose weight.

Both ads were criticized nearly a month after they were first published on online media and television.

Reporting by Shubham Kalia and Nivedita Balu in Bengaluru; Editing by Kirsten Donovan, Shinjini Ganguli and Saumyadeb Chakrabarty

I wanna see this ad now...

[GeneChing]

More on this here.

END TIMES 12:21 P.M.
KFC Gives America Just Four Days to Prepare For the End
By Chris Crowley


“Which way I fly is Hell; myself am Hell.” Photo: Courtesy of KFC/YouTube

We’ve all been waiting for the next great mass-extinction event, and now we know what form it will take: KFC is preparing to spread its nightmarish vision of the future across America, from sea to boiling sea, on February 24. That’s when the chain will introduce its doughnuts to participating restaurants nationwide, following initial experiments on the innocent civilians of Virginia and Pittsburgh last year. Should you wish to participate in the doom, you can have a fried-chicken fillet sandwiched between two glazed doughnuts or, if you’re sane, a basket of chicken with doughnuts. They’ll be sold through March 16 or while supplies last, but we’ll probably all be dead before then, with any remaining people roving the wastelands in search of chicken scraps. Good night, and good luck.

[GeneChing]

I'll still try this if it comes to my area.

KFC's New Plant-Based 'Vegan' Fried Chicken: Everything You Need To Know
Apparently it's still finger-lickin' good.
BY KORIN MILLER
FEB 27, 2020

MOSES ROBINSONGETTY IMAGES

Plant-based meat has officially infiltrated pretty much every fast food restaurant in the game. Burger King has the Impossible Whopper, White Castle has Impossible Sliders, Dunkin’ has the Beyond Sausage Sandwich, and, now, even KFC (a fast food chain that's literally all about chicken) has hopped on the bandwagon.

Recently, KFC started testing out plant-based chicken nuggets and wings—which they call Beyond Fried Chicken (a.k.a. fried chicken made with Beyond meat)—in certain parts of the U.S.

kfc
Verified
•


kfc's profile picture
kfc
Verified
Who knew plants could taste like fried chicken? I did. Introducing KFC’s new @beyondmeat Fried Chicken. It looks like delicious fried chicken and tastes like delicious fried chicken, but it’s made from plants. Get KFC’s Beyond Fried Chicken in Charlotte or Nashville before you miss out.

It was a BFD. One Atlanta restaurant sold out of Beyond Fried Chicken in less than five hours. People lined up before the restaurant even opened, and the drive-thru line wrapped around the parking low twice.

Now, KFC has expanded their Beyond Fried Chicken test to more than 70 spots in Charlotte, North Carolina, and Nashville, Tennessee, throughout February, according to a press release.

"We've really pushed the limits to develop plant-based chicken that I think will have KFC and plant-based protein fans saying, 'That's finger lickin' good,’” Andrea Zahumensky, chief marketing officer at KFC U.S., said in the release.

How exactly does this whole chicken-less fried chicken thing work, though? Here's everything you need to know about KFC’s new Beyond Fried Chicken.

What’s KFC’s Beyond Fried Chicken made of?

KFC shared online that Beyond Fried Chicken primarily gets its protein from soy, wheat, and pea proteins.

Want more specifics? Here’s the full ingredients list:

Water, Enriched wheat flour (Wheat Flour, Niacin, Reduced Iron, Thiamine Mononitrate, Riboflavin, Folic Acid), Soy Protein Isolate, Expeller Pressed Canola Oil, Enriched bleached wheat flour (Bleached Wheat Flour, Niacin, Reduced Iron, Thiamine Mononitrate, Riboflavin, Folic Acid), Wheat Gluten, Natural Flavor, Yeast Extract, and less than 2 percent of: Breadcrumbs (Wheat Flour, Distilled Vinegar, Sea Salt, Leavening (Sodium Bicarbonate), Inactive Yeast, Spice Extractives), Chili Pepper, Citric Acid, Garlic Powder, Leavening (Sodium Bicarbonate, Sodium Aluminum Phosphate, Monocalcium Phosphate), Modified Wheat Starch, Onion Powder, Pea Extract, Rice Flour, Salt, Spice, Titanium Dioxide (for color).

Yeah, it's long—but, plant-based or not, this is fast food, after all.

Is Beyond Fried Chicken vegan?

Here's the kicker: According to KFC, their Beyond Fried Chicken is 100 percent plant-based, but it's prepped in the same fryers as KFC’s actual chicken. So, it could get contaminated with residue or fat from that real chicken, and therefore isn't technically even vegetarian, let alone vegan.

Is Beyond Fried Chicken gluten-free?

KFC says they bread their Beyond Fried Chicken in a mixture similar to their popcorn nugget breading, meaning that the plant-based option is not gluten-free.

Real Talk: Is Beyond Fried Chicken healthy?

“When we talk about eating more plant-based foods, this isn’t what we mean,” says New York City-based dietitian Samantha Cassetty, RD. “Just like regular fast food, this isn't an everyday food.”

Jessica Cording, RD, nutritionist and author of The Little Book of Game-Changers, agrees: “Fried chicken is still fried chicken. Just because something is plant-based doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s healthy.”

“There’s some difference in nutrients, but it’s still fried protein at the end of the day,” says Cording. “If a regular part of your diet, fried foods—whether plant- or animal-based—can have a negative effect on your health.”

Plant-based faux meats are also often made with heavily processed ingredients and contain excessive amounts of sodium—neither of which are great for you, adds Cassetty.

Still, you’re not going to torpedo your healthy eating goals by treating yourself once in a while. “If you’re curious about plant-based foods and you want to give these a try, they can fit in a healthful diet,” Cassetty says. As long as 75 percent of your eats come from minimally-processed plant foods, such as beans, nuts, seeds, whole grains, and avocados, you're good.

Does KFC offer other plant-based options?

As of right now, KFC doesn't have any other plant-based meal options on the menu.

However, certain KFC side orders, like green beans, coleslaw, mashed potatoes, corn on the cob, and sweet kernel corn, fit the bill.

KORIN MILLER
Korin Miller is a freelance writer specializing in general wellness, sexual health and relationships, and lifestyle trends, with work appearing in Men’s Health, Women’s Health, Self, Glamour, and more.

THREADS
Vegetarian
the Kentucky Fried Thread

[GeneChing]

This thread is such an odd barometer for U.S. franchises in Asia. Odd yet telling.

KFC operator Yum China expected to raise US$2.2 billion in secondary listing in Hong Kong
The operator of KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell in mainland China is the latest US-listed firm to raise capital in Hong Kong
Yum China priced its offering at HK$412 a share
Chad Bray
Published: 12:06pm, 4 Sep, 2020


Yum China, the operator of KFC and Pizza Hut in the mainland, is hoping investors in Asia will have a better grasp of consumer trends in its home market. Photo: Bloomberg

Yum China Holdings is set to raise at least HK$17.3 billion (US$2.2 billion) in its secondary offering in Hong Kong pricing its new shares at HK$412, the company said on Friday.
The operator of KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell in the mainland previously said it planned to sell 41.9 million shares. The transaction would represent a sharp 4.9 per cent discount to its closing price of US$55.92 in New York on Thursday. By comparison, NetEase priced its secondary listing in Hong Kong in June at a tight 2 per cent discount to its closing price in the US, while JD.com’s Hong Kong listing was at a 3.9 per cent discount.
In a statement on Friday, Yum China said it granted the underwriters of its international offering an overallotment option to purchase up to an additional 6.3 million shares at the offer price. If the overallotment is fully exercised, the company would raise HK$19.9 billion.
The offering consists of a sale of about 40.2 million shares to international investors and 1.7 million shares to Hong Kong retail investors.

The deal would be the third-largest fundraising on the Hong Kong bourse this year, after blockbuster secondary listings by JD.com and NetEase as part of a “homecoming” trend among US-listed Chinese companies, according to data from Refinitiv. It also ranks ahead of China Bohai Bank’s US$1.78 billion initial public offering, the biggest debut on the Hong Kong stock exchange this year.

Yum China, which operates about 10,000 restaurants in 1,400 cities and towns in the mainland, spun off from Yum! Brands four years ago.
Shanghai-based Yum China’s Hong Kong listing came as US stock indices broadly declined on Thursday. Yum China’s US-listed shares fell 3.5 per cent on Thursday.

Yum China’s shares recently traded at 37 times its expected earnings, outpacing McDonald’s and Restaurant Brands International, the owner of Burger King, Popeye’s and Tim Horton’s. Wendy’s Company is one of the few quick-service restaurant operators trading in the US at a higher price-to-earnings ratio of 45.8 times.
The company is hoping that investors in Asia will have a better grasp of consumer trends in its home market as it seeks to diversify its shareholder base. The company’s shares will trade on the Hong Kong stock exchange under the symbol 9987 beginning on September 10.
Yum China said it expects to use the proceeds from the offering to expand its restaurant network and increase its digitalisation efforts, including in its supply chain.

The Hong Kong listing follows a challenging period that saw the company forced to close just over one-third of its restaurants in February as parts of the mainland were locked down in response to the coronavirus pandemic. Yum China reported a first-quarter profit of US$62 million, its worst quarterly result since a net loss of US$107 million in the fourth quarter of 2017.
To navigate slower foot traffic, the company relied on a digital infrastructure it has been building for years – from ordering apps to facial recognition for payments. It also instituted contactless delivery and contactless takeaway procedures to reassure customers.
In the second quarter, 86 per cent of its orders at KFC restaurants were made via the digital channel, including mobile orders and in-store kiosks, the company said.
More than 99 per cent of its stores reopened by the end of June, but the pace of the recovery was uneven as sales softened in June following improvements in April and in May, the company said.
Yum China’s profit in the second quarter fell 26 per cent to US$132 million, but was an improvement over the first quarter. Same-store sales dropped 11 per cent in the second quarter, with double-digit declines at both of its KFC and Pizza Hut locations.

Consumption remained restrained in China this summer, even as other parts of the world’s second-largest economy picked up as lockdowns eased.
China’s industrial production, a measurement of manufacturing and mining output, grew for the fourth-straight month in July, but retail sales contracted by 1.1 per cent, worse than expected, according to the most recent data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NAB). Imports also fell by 1.4 per cent in July.
R.J. Hottovy, a sector strategist at Morningstar, said 2021 is likely to be a “strong recovery year” at Yum China, with low-double-digit growth in same-store sales and restaurant margins returning to the mid-teens despite planned investments in technology and its supply chain.
“Despite uneven results the past several years, we still have conviction in the longer-term unit growth story for Yum China,” Hottovy said in a research report.
At the same time, rising tensions between Washington and Beijing and regulatory changes in Hong Kong have prompted US-listed Chinese firms to consider secondary listings closer to home, as well as take-private deals.

A group of top US regulators recommended in August that Chinese companies and other foreign issuers who fail to provide access to their audit working papers for oversight be delisted from American bourses by January 2022. The US State Department also asked American colleges and universities to divest their holdings in Chinese companies, warning of the potential for “wholesale delisting”.
Hong Kong has benefited from the uncertain geopolitical environment, attracting a number of high-profile secondary listings from returning Chinese firms, as well as a dual IPO of Ant Group, the operator of Alipay, in the city and Shanghai.
Ant is an affiliate of Alibaba Group Holding, which itself raised US$12.9 billion in a secondary listing in Hong Kong in November. Alibaba is the parent company of the South China Morning Post.
“The fact that US is tightening the rules for Chinese companies to be listed in the US, triggered the massive phenomenon of requests for secondary listings in the Hong Kong market,” Jean-Louis Nakamura, chief investment officer for Asia-Pacific at Swiss private bank Lombard Odier and head of its Hong Kong office. “It has helped the Hong Kong exchange to see its capitalisation to grow by a size that would not be reached without this kind of rhetoric and escalation of the skirmish between the two countries.”
Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, CMB International and UBS are serving as joint global coordinators on the offering.
Additional reporting by Ji Siqi

This article appeared in the South China Morning Post print edition as: Yum set to raise at least HK$17.3b in new share sale



Chad Bray

Chad is a senior business reporter focused on finance. He has previously written for The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones Newswires.