KUDOS to QSR Brands (M) Holdings Bhd for listening to your customers. Hopefully, this is not a one-off experience but yours truly felt vindicated that KFC has finally lent an ear to the grouses of many of its loyal customers out there.
Somehow, the breast and rib portions of KFC’s Crunchy Tandoori 2-Piece Combo that yours truly savoured recently was bigger (much meaty) than usual, thus doing justice to the RM17.49 he forked out for his takeaway dinner.
For the record, yours truly and probably thousands of fried chicken lovers out there have been shying away from Malaysia’s pioneering American fast food chain as the size of its chicken servings has shrunk along with rising inflation and cost of living.
Especially in today’s pandemic-stricken economy when the populace has grown very conscious about every sen leaving their pockets, stinging by dishing out pint-sized chicken pieces has turned off a lot of loyal KFC customers.
Yours truly assumes that the brickbats levelled at the fast food operator on social media must have finally served as a rude wake-up call of the shape up or ship out (from the fast food industry) nature.
Still, yours truly feels that the management of QSR Brands has been slow to address the issue of reputation-tarnishing jokes that range from usage of malnourished spring chicken to the serving of drum sticks the size of one’s index finger (and countless other disparaging remarks) that have made their way on the social media for years.
Never undermine your competitor
In all fairness, nobody would have imagined that the entrance of Texas Chicken into the Malaysian shores – which culminated in the opening of its first outlet at AEON Bukit Tinggi, Klang in early 2013 – could have such a profound impact on KFC’s seemingly monopolistic grip of the fried chicken business.
But alas, KFC which made inroad into Malaysia with the opening of its maiden outlet at Jalan Tunku Abdul Rahman in 1973, made the same mistake as would many other business pioneers by allowing complacency to creep into its business direction.
Colonel Sanders’ 11 ‘mysterious’ herbs and spices – and let alone the 64-year-old finger-lickin’ good slogan – was not able to prevent loyal customers from deserting their favourite fried chicken joint to instead knock at the doors of Texas Chicken.
Texas Chicken aside, KFC – by virtue of not taking its customers’ dissatisfaction seriously – has also been losing its market share to McDonald’s, A&W, Marrybrown, Burger King, and even Korean fast food chains like Nene Chicken and 4Fingers, to name a few brands.
KFC underestimated the painful business reality that losing one customer – especially in the food & beverage industry – is a much bigger loss than winning 10 or even 100 new customers.
This is more so especially in today’s Internet age – simply imagine the devastation of product image should a disillusioned customer pen his disgruntlement on the social media.
Chicken size says it all
KFC Malaysia could boast about its quality assurance – nutrition & health assurance, supplier quality, restaurant quality, HACCP (Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point) programme, sanitation & hygiene or even pest control – but it forgets that to the lay consumer, the ultimate judge of its fried chicken is the SIZE of its servings.
Another oversight that yours truly wishes to add – which he is sure many would concur – is that KFC’s food taste and service quality has been disappointingly inconsistent with some outlets serving better food with well-mannered service staff than others.
At the end of the day, yours truly hopes that KFC Malaysia will take his constructive criticism with an open heart simply because he is speaking on behalf of all fried chicken lovers – yours truly included – who were once KFC’s loyal fans.
In wishing QSR Brands every success as Malaysians usher in 2021, yours truly hopes KFC Malaysia may be able to win back some of its lost customers by consistently dishing out value-for-money chicken sizes with assurance of a quality service by its counter staff.
It’s not yet too late for QSR Brands to re-gain customer trust and to re-position KFC as a formidable must-visit fast food restaurant.
The first step is probably to take ownership of the past mistake by trying to fix the problem with a solution (or New Year resolution) that would leave a positive impression, even if the customer eventually decides to jump ship.
Before bidding farewell to all fried chicken lovers out there, allow yours truly to lay bare three corporate facts about the QSR Brands:
- QSR Brands (M) Holdings Bhd dominates Malaysia’s rapidly expanding retail food industry. Headquartered in Petaling Jaya, the company operates over 750 KFC restaurants in Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei and Cambodia as well as over 450 Pizza Hut restaurants in Malaysia and Singapore.
- Johor Corporation has increased its stake in QSR Brands to 56% from just 27% in 2012. The remaining 44% of QSR Brands’ equity is held by CVC Capital Partners and the Employees Provident Fund (EPF).
- In April 2019, QSR Brands said the company and its shareholders have decided to re-time its initial public offering following discussions with its bankers. In the meantime, the company will continue to focus on delivering results through the execution of the various initiatives for KFC, Pizza Hut and Ayamas.
This comes after Reuters reported that QSR Brands has shelved plans for an IPO that could have raised as much as US$500 mil (RM2.05 bil) as potential investors balked at its valuations. – Dec 28, 2020
