Dive Brief:

• Wendy’s has rolled out a Biggie Deals menu with three combos of $4 Biggie Bites, a $6 Biggie Bag and an $8 Biggie Bundle, the company said Wednesday. 
• The fast food chain originally launched its Biggie Bag in 2019. The new menu “doubles down on quality and choice” and includes hamburgers, chicken sandwiches, fries, chicken nuggets and drinks. 
• Wendy’s is the latest QSR chain to update its value menu. Earlier this week, Taco Bell released its Luxe Value Menu, which offers a selection of five new items and five items from its previous Cravings Value Menu.

Dive Insight:

The new value menu comes just months after Wendy’s shared its Project Fresh strategy, which focuses on brand revitalization, operational excellence, system optimization and capital allocation. Wendy’s is also investing $20 million toward boosting its average unit volumes. 

As part of Project Fresh, the chain is turning toward better marketing that can bring customers, drive frequency, and improve the guest experience, Ken Cook, Wendy’s CFO and interim CEO, said in a November earnings call. This will help increase “AUVs, improves restaurant profitability and creates value for franchisees, the company and shareholders,” he said. 

An updated value menu should help drive frequency, as previously launched value meals have seen success. Last year, Wendy’s added an $8 Meal Deal that included two Jr. Bacon Cheeseburgers, fries and a drink that Cook said performed well in the third quarter. While the meal deal performed well, a closer look at data revealed that it didn’t attract new customers as much as management had hoped, he said. 

“That tells me we have an opportunity to tell our value story in a different way by focusing on both price and the quality of the ingredients we get,” Cook said. “We have strong equity in the Biggie Bag from a value perspective.”

Expanding the Biggie Bag also plays into customers’ desire for more customization while maintaining that value proposition, Wendy’s CMO Lindsay Radkoski said in a statement. 

Boosting frequency could help improve the company’s same-store sales, which were down 4.7% during the third quarter. Wendy’s is also performing a strategic review of its system and could close hundreds of locations.