Brand Tactics: Bennigan’s New Game Plan
Bennigan’s leaps into the crowded sports-bar marketplace to defend against shrinking sales.
By David Farkas, Senior Editor -- Chain Leader, 8/1/2007
 Bennigan’s officials spent $400,000 to convert a Bennigan’s Grill & Tavern in Addison, Texas, to a sleek sports bar that includes 20 beers on tap.
|
To smoke, or not to smoke? That was one question for Clay Dover as he pondered a site last year for Bennigan’s Sport, a brand extension of Bennigan’s Grill & Tavern that opened May 20 after the conversion of one of the chain’s oldest units in Addison, Texas, a suburb of Dallas.
Flagging sales at the 27-year-old unit were also an important consideration. “The restaurant was in the bottom quartile [of the 20 units in Greater Dallas,” says the executive vice president and chief concept officer for Metromedia Restaurant Group.
The sports-bar segment is an increasingly competitive field, spurred partly by the rapid growth of 442-unit Buffalo Wild Wings, which rings up an average of $2.7 million per unit."The local and corporate-run sport-theme bars are doing well," says Rick Pastorek, a Baton Rouge, La.-based Bennigan’s franchisee who is thinking about opening a Bennigan’s Sport in Louisiana. "From what I have heard, [Bennigan’s Sport is] doubling the sales in that unit," he adds.
Dover won’t disclose Bennigan’s Sport’s weekly sales. He allows the company initially set a sales goal of $2 million, or $62,500 a week, for the eight months it would be open in 2007, but now believes the sports-bar concept will finish 2007 ahead of budget. Bennigan’s units average about $3 million in annual sales. "We feel we have a winner on our hands," Dover says.
Sales Dip
Bennigan’s could use one. Same-store sales are flat to slightly down over the prior year among the 160 company units. Franchisees here and abroad operate the remaining 150.
MRG spent $400,000 to convert the aging unit, which hadn’t had a facelift in seven-plus years. Dover predicts franchisee conversions should cost less and expects the company or a franchisee to open another Bennigan’s Sport later this year.
The sum the company spent includes about $60,000 worth of technology including 26 large-screen high-definition TVs, a new sound system and satellite hook up that broadcast European soccer and rugby games.
Dover says keeping "core values" but creating something that "wowed" guests was a challenge.
A new signature dish, Irish Ale Queso, $4.99, is a best seller. Ten-inch pizzas, $9.99, baked in a new wood-fired grill are also popular, Dover claims. Several original items remain on the menu, including the popular Monte Cristo sandwich, $8.49.
On Tap
Bennigan’s Sport offers 20 tap beers instead of three. Beer accounts for 50 percent of beverage sales; spirits make up 40 percent. Beverages account for roughly 40 percent of total sales, Dover says, about 20 points higher than Bennigan’s.
Still, former MRG executive Frank Steed, now a consultant in Dallas, contends it’s going to be hard to create a point of difference in a marketplace crowded with sports bars: "No matter how well they execute, I’m not sure this is a great answer."
CEO Vince Runco concedes Dallas is a crowded sports-bar market. "But there are plenty of other markets for Bennigan’s Sport that have no sports bars at all," he says.
Talkback
Related Content
Related Content
View All Blogs
