Draft Position Paper

New Menu Items for Burger Planet

Here at Burger Planet we are continuingly striving to become number one in the fast food industry. To attain this goal we continually poll our customers to see how we can improve. We here at Burger Planet are where we are at because of our customers. They have voiced their concerns over are existing menu and how there is no healthy options available. We will now be adding healthier menu options to our existing menu. Also we have a new spokesperson joining the Burger Planet team, Jayne Petersen, well known fitness guru.

According to focus group results are target customers often choose to not eat at Burger Planet because of our menu. One woman said when she hears the word Burger Planet she thinks of grease. Another woman polled said she doesn’t take her family there because of the unhealthy menu items. When she eats at Burger Planet she goes through the drive thru, and then gets rid of the evidence without her family knowing.

A demand has also been made by the government on the fast food industry to offer healthier menu options. (Insert data on lawsuits)

Position
-We still want to keep the already successful foods that Burger Planet has to offer, but feel we need to expand to some healthy options also, to meet the demands of the consumer. According to an article on streetdirectory.com, people now know that healthy options are available on the market even on the fast-food market. “Cities often provide restaurant guides in their telephone books that display full-page menus indicating what a particular restaurant or drive-thru offers. Many of these food vendors now include healthy alternatives to their usual fast-food selection.” “Some of these kinds of restaurants will create their own recipes for healthy food options. This provides the consumer with a totally new choice and encourages them to visit the restaurant again.” Customers now expect at least a few healthy options.
http://www.streetdirectory.com/travel_guide/24571/food_and_drink/can_fast_food_be_healthy.html

-We want to expand into a new target audience while keeping the loyal customers in our current market.

There are many examples of successful businesses that have a good loyal base with constant products, but they continue to change and refine their products to meet customer’s demands. Dairy Queen started in 1940, and was known for soft serve ice cream. They adapted to the market adding new things along the way. They were struggling in the 1970’s just before they came up with the idea of the blizzard which was a huge hit that started a trend that continues today, putting candy bars in ice cream. In an article about Dairy Queen and secrets of business success, it says, “You have to protect your reputation, have a good product at a good price, be flexible and have good employees,” Browne (Dairy Queen) says. “You can’t try to do everything. You should specialize in one area but adapt to what that market is asking for.” At Burger Planet we can take these principles and use them in our adapting process.
http://www.larsonallen.com/effect/fall03/secrets.pdf

According to the National Restaurant Association, Americans spent 44 percent of their food dollars outside the home in 1996, up from 25 percent in 1955 and according to the association's report, Tableservice Restaurant Trends--1995, more than half of consumers 35 and older and 2 out of 5 consumers 18 to 34 look for lower fat menu options when eating out. Also, restaurateurs report that their customers are increasingly requesting meatless dishes.

According to the Hoover's Fast Food and Quickservice Restaurant Report, the fast food restaurants industry includes 200,000 restaurants with combined annual revenue of about $120 billion. The industry is highly fragmented: the top 50 companies hold about 25 percent of industry sales. Among the major fast food chains, hamburger restaurant are 50 percent of the market.

According to the U.S Food and Drug Administration (FDA), about 64 percent of Americans are overweight and more than 30 percent are obese, a risk factor of heart disease. Higher rates of heart disease, increases in the incidence of cancer, record numbers of clinically obese people, and various other health scares have all drawn attention to the need for healthy lifestyle choices. Rising concerns for health and wellness are bad news for fast food which is generally perceived as fattening and unhealthy. Many quick service restaurants have responded to this negative press by adding new, healthier offerings to their menus. Since the beginning of the decade many companies have also responded by removing trans-fats and other unhealthy ingredients from their offerings. Despite these efforts, fast most food restaurants retain an unhealthy stigma.

Two-thirds of the adults in the United Sates are obese or overweight. Obesity has been linked to heart disease, high blood pressure, cancer, strokes, asthma, diabetes and reduced life expectancy. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, obesity is now the second only to smoking among the leading causes of preventable death.

Due to obesity in the U.S., the Food and Drug Administration recently issued a report on away-from-home foods, with recommendations on how restaurants and carry-out chains can help prevent obesity. Burger Planet has listened and applied these recommendations, including increasing the availability of lower calorie products, menu items and meals and providing customers with wellness activity ideas.