In the last month, Popeyes Chicken has introduced a new chicken sandwich. The sandwich is so similar to a Chick-fil-A sandwich that Chick-fil-A started a small feud on Twitter. That Twitter war got enough attention that people are flocking to Popeyes for these sandwiches in numbers large enough to create lines around their stores similar to what Chick-fil-A sees every day. Popeyes is also selling out of their sandwiches. I decided to visit my favorite Popeyes to try the new sandwich to see how it compares to Chick-fil-A. I also wanted to experience the cultural phenomenon of being at a store riding a wave of success.
When I arrived at the Popeyes that I normally go to, I noticed that the parking lot had more cars than usual. Still, I didn’t have any trouble finding a place to park. I pulled into the parking lot on the side of the building with the drive-thru window, so the building blocked my view. I couldn’t see that the line at the drive-thru was longer than usual. Inside, there was a much longer line than usual. The queue for the line was filled with people lined up into the eating area. On most normal days, this line would only have 4 customers at the most at that time of day. There was a carnival atmosphere to the crowd. Talk between people about how many sandwiches they had left and how many sandwiches they were going to buy. The area next to the drink station was filled with customers waiting on the food they had ordered.
The people in the crowd were different from the normal customer for this Popeyes. First, there were the people that appeared to be at this Popeyes because the one they normally go to was out of the chicken sandwich. They appeared to be regular Popeye’s customers wanting to try out the new thing. Each one appeared to have several sandwiches in their orders. The other type of person appeared to be someone that doesn’t normally eat at Popeyes and was there just to see what the hype was about the new sandwich. Several of them appeared to be in a group that worked at the same place and would regularly eat lunch together. They probably eat more often at Subway but probably avoid Chick-fil-A because of the lunchtime crowds. No one seemed annoyed by the crowd or the wait. The buzz about the new sandwich and the fact that this store had ANY of them seemed to make it worth the wait for everyone.
The staff at the store seemed overwhelmed by the crowds. There seemed to be more activity in the kitchen than normal. It appeared that all hands where on deck preparing sandwiches. The sandwiches seemed to be more labor intensive than the food they normally serve. It also looked like they weren’t selling as much regular chicken as normal. I only saw one person order something other than a sandwich while I was there.
I noticed that a couple of the screens for the video menus were out. I suspect that they were turned out because they were the ones running ads for the chicken sandwich. It could have also been that they were so busy that they couldn’t get all of them turned on.