Captain D's Food Fight
Restaurant chain Captain D's built on the reaction to one ad campaign to create another, all aiming to generate interest in its revamped menu.
By Margaret Littman, Contributing Editor -- Chain Leader, 5/1/2009 12:00:00 AM
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It started out innocently enough. Late last year Nashville, Tenn.-based restaurant chain Captain D's launched a TV ad campaign touting its "sit-down food at fast-food prices," including a premium coconut shrimp entree and a crab-cake dish. The commercials took aim at its "fancy seafood" competitors.
Then the spots, created by Venice, Calif.-based Goodness Manufacturing, took things up a notch, with a spokesman asking customers leaving Red Lobster what they spent on their meal and then demonstrating what a similar meal would have cost at Captain D's. The execution may have been direct, but it was classic in its approach to positioning a brand as a value.
"We saw an almost immediate sales impact," says Sandy Clingan Smith, senior vice president of marketing for the concept. "In today's environment, who isn't looking for a great deal?"
The spots were designed so they could promote different menu items, both permanent additions and limited-time offers, without a lot of reworking, says Kristyn Dunlap, management supervisor at Goodness Manufacturing, the ad agency that has been working with Captain D's for the last year-and-a-half.
Legal Eagles
What happened next was fairly by the book as well. Red Lobster sent Captain D's a cease-and-desist order, asking that it stop using the Red Lobster name in its ads. Red Lobster believes the quality of its fish exceeds that of Captain D's.
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This where things took a turn: Until this year, Captain D's had concentrated most of its ad spending on TV spots, Smith says. But the chain responded to the letter, not by stopping, retooling its ad or even responding via TV at all. The chain launched a viral campaign with Web site and e-mail components.
"We are always struggling to find the TV message that really resonates with our brand. It has been 40 years since our inception, and we are always working on having the right message," Smith says.
So, "sit-down food at fast-food prices," had been working, but when Red Lobster sent the cease-and-desist order, Captain D's seized a different opportunity to raise awareness of the chain's new dishes and more-than-fried menu.
"The lawyers have their jobs, but from my perspective, it is a way to tell our story again. Ultimately, we are trying to reinforce our message and find a fun way of getting it out," says Smith.
The team launched a viral campaign with e-mail, online videos and use of social-networking sites. Customers were encouraged to head to the Captain D's Web site and write their own cease-and-desist letter, enticed by an offer for a free T-shirt for everyone who participated. The T-shirts were gone before lunch the first day. The letters make demands on Red Lobster, such as eliminating table service (and the tips that go with it), lobster tanks and table linens.
Red Lobster is not the only competitor in the category, of course, but Smith says Red Lobster stood in as a proxy for all of Captain D's competitors. "We have respect for Red Lobster. They are the gold standard and [the name] means good seafood. That's why they are a good proxy," she says.
Fighting Back
At the end of March the team launched another drive to encourage its customers to cease and desist again. And, again, the T-shirts were in hot demand just hours after the announcement was e-mailed to customers and the press, and posted on social-networking sites like Facebook. The T-shirts read: "Cease and desist THIS Red Lobster" and were shown on a two-and-half-minute video created specifically for the Web site. Customers had the added incentive of competing for $25 Captain D's gift certificates if their letters were chosen to be posted online.
Smith says it is difficult to track where customers who are ordering the new, nonfried fish dishes are learning about them, but says sales are up significantly, as are subscriptions to the chain's e-mail announcements.
"It obviously struck a chord with people," says Bob Cianfrone, a partner and creative director at Goodness Manufacturing. "In this day and age, people are struck by a brand positioning itself with the truth."
Menu Message
Some may think this is an unnecessarily antagonistic approach, but the marketing team thinks it helps Captain D's underscore that the chain is not just a place to get fried fish, but a place that has "a dramatically revamped menu," with premium shrimp skewers, wild Alaskan salmon, and crab-and-cheese shrimp.
While the cease-and-desist video ads barely mention the chain, nevermind the specific menu items, Smith says that they work to reinforce the new menu because they are Web-only, and consumers are surrounded by a number of other brand messages around the online video. "They are shown in the context of significant branding."
Adds Smith: "Captain D's is so tied in people's mind to battered fish, we needed to make people aware, to get people to notice that there is something new."
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