Chick-fil-A

My role: design, strategy, research, speaker, copywriting

Problem

According to a survey on Statista, Chick-fil-A is the number one choice for many Americans when it comes to fast food restaurants. However, Chick-fil-A is less known overseas, and the company is trying to expand into the global market. Since China currently has the highest population compared to other countries, this makes China an ideal spot to expand advertising efforts for Chick-fil-A. While expanding would be a prime opportunity for Chick-fil-A, China has many different values compared to the United States. My team was challenged to find new creative ideas, concepts, and strategies to reach a new target audience in China as well as undertake a global marketing campaign.

Key Insight

As my team conducted a focus group which consisted of two college-aged Chinese women, we noted various cultural identities about China, which aligned with universally accepted cultural dimensions. According to Hofstede's study, power distance, individualism, masculinity, uncertainty avoidance, and long term orientation are all values that can affect advertisements between different countries. In addition, China has a high power distance and degree of gender differentiation, where males are seen as assertive and competitive. China is also collectivistic as well as strong in work ethics, and the population thinks more long term. All of these factors differ to those in America.

Solution

In my team's focus group, we presented three standardized and three localized creative concepts. Our results concluded the key to gaining top-of-mind awareness and sales for Chick-fil-a on a localized and standardized level is by focusing on two distinct print ad messages. On a standardized degree, the message should focus on the universal value, love. On a localized measure, the message should focus on a dual collectivistic and masculine approach based on Hofstede’s cultural dimensions. For the localized ads, Chick-fil-A should heavily consider its target audience to be middle-aged men and dads that have great influence on the family.