LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Where
have all the restaurant mascots gone? You might not have noticed, but many of
the brand mascots that used to populate fast food world have slowly
disappeared, CNBC reports.
The latest mascot to hit
the skids is KFC’s the Colonel, who appears to be on the brink of retirement.
This week, KFC rolled out a new concept called KFC eleven that has no image of
the Colonel at all.
Analyst point to the loss
of these fast food icons as debris of a larger QSR trend toward more healthy
and upscale products and images. While Ronald McDonald still appears in
connection with McDonald’s, his role has been downsized a lot, and the other
characters that used to be with him — the Hamburglar and Grimace, for example —
are long gone. Taco Bell put its Chihuahua spokesdog out to pasture more than a
decade ago, while Burger King axed its king character in 2011.
Part of the reason why
mascots have lost their cool factor has to do with the increasingly popular
fast-casual chains like Baja Fresh and Panera Bread that don’t rely on
characters to sell food. “People seem to like that better now,” said Kathy
Hayden, who analyzes foodservice trends at Mintel. “People are more serious
about food,” and that’s the area marketers focus on.
However, not every
fast-food restaurant chain is ditching its mascot. Recently, Wendy’s overhauled
the redhead, pig-tailed girl and is still using that image as part of its
brand.