Rock Bottom chains plan food-based marketing push in '04

Nation's Restaurant News,  Dec 22, 2003  by Gregg Cebrzynski

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LOUISVILLE, COLO. -- Rock Bottom Restaurants Inc. in 2004 plans to put more emphasis on food at its Old Chicago and Rock Bottom Restaurant & Brewery concepts as the company increases marketing efforts to position the brands as "nonchain chains."

Old Chicago will roll out two new menus next year, the first time it has introduced more than one in a single year. Rock Bottom Restaurant also will focus more on pairing food with beer during four promotions.

"It's another selling point," said Ned Lidvail, Rock Bottom's chief executive. "You have more choices to use [the restaurant]. People read variety as value."

Both chains also plan to increase efforts to market their loyalty programs: the World Beer Tour Club at Old Chicago and the Mug Club at Rock Bottom.

Rock Bottom Inc. has 97 Old Chicago restaurants and 30 Rock Bottom restaurants in addition to four ChopHouse & Brewery restaurants and three SingSing bars. Systemwide sales this year for all of the company's brands are expected to total $250 million, Lidvall said. Through a combination of marketing efforts, sales in 2004 are expected to reach $260 million as Old Chicago adds a targeted 13 new units.

"We are rather aggressive marketers," Lidvall said. "We spend over 4 percent of sales on marketing efforts. We follow an 'unchained,' nonformula approach."

The graphic design of the new menus at Old Chicago will follow that approach, said Gary Foreman, the brand's executive vice president.

"We're trying to get closer and closer to that sort of non-chain chain look," he said. "That's always a little bit elusive. We want to make it look more like a neighborhood place."

The first menu rollout, in March, will include more than nine new items, including an Italian Melt sandwich, Lemon Pepper Chicken with Pasta and Chicken Manicotti.

The fall menu still is being tested, but "we'll have some dishes you'd expect in a local place, like fish and chips," Foreman said.

Old Chicago is upgrading the menus because "that's what the competitors are doing," he said. "One of the major strategies for Old Chicago is to expand the culinary component."

The chain's menu strategy amounts to a food blitz. After rolling out the first new menu in March, Old Chicago will promote three limited-time menus through the summer, leading into the fall introduction of the second menu.

Also in the fall, Old Chicago will "really work hard at our pizza heritage," Foreman said, in promoting the product for which the chain is known.

"We have to make sure our pizza practices are working everywhere and it's what people expect," he said.

In addition, the chain will increase marketing efforts for its World Beer Tour Club, a loyalty program in which members win rewards for sampling a specific number of the chain's 110 beers during beer "tours" and "mini-tours." The club has 500,000 members, Foreman said.

Rock Bottom Restaurant & Brewery, which has the same "food and beverage heritage" as Old Chicago, will focus its marketing on "trying to balance the two," Marilyn Davenport, director of marketing, said.

"One of the things we really want to try to do with the brand is bring the food and beer experience to the forefront," she said. "That's where our leverage point lies."

The chain learned through research that "people do come to us for the food," Davenport said. "It's a little better than brewery food or bar food. We hadn't spent a lot of time promoting it."

During last fall's "Rocktoberfest," Rock Bottom paired a pint of Rocktoberfest Bier with bratwurst. Overall sales increased 2 percent during the 17-day promotion.

In addition to limited-time offerings, Rock Bottom will roll out new menus in the spring and fall. Specific dishes have not yet been chosen, Davenport said.

Rock Bottom's Mug Club loyalty program, which has more than 100,000 members, will receive added marketing attention in 2004. The chain is looking at new software to increase the efficiency of communicating online with members.

This year Rock Bottom used a technique called "buzz marketing" to increase membership by 29 percent. Basically, the chain sent people into the restaurants to chat up other customers about the club.

"We ended up having a lot of Mug Clubbers become our buzz agents," Davenport said. "It really helped fire up the club."

Both Old Chicago and Rock Bottom use radio and, in some cases, cable TV to support promotions.

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