How Chili’s used creativity, culture and customer experience to create one of the greatest turnaround success stories - George Felix

Summary

Uncensored CMO – Episode Summary

"How Chili’s Used Creativity, Culture and Customer Experience to Create One of the Greatest Turnaround Success Stories"

Guest: George Felix, CMO of Chili’s
Host: Jon Evans
Date: June 3, 2026

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Episode Overview

This lively, insightful episode documents Chili’s dramatic transformation from a struggling casual dining chain to a brand at the forefront of American culture—thanks to creative marketing, a relentless focus on customer experience, internal culture, and smart brand management. George Felix, Chili’s CMO, shares the not-so-hidden recipe: brand focus, operational improvements, and leaning into nostalgia and culture while creating standout creative work with agency partners.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Setting the Scene – The Chili’s Experience

• Timestamps: [01:44–06:32]
  • The episode opens at a Chili’s tile-topped table with chips, salsa, and signature ranch (“Pro move—you dip the chips in the ranch” – George Felix, [02:09]).
  • Introduction of Chili’s as both a nostalgic and contemporary brand, bringing back iconic tile tables.
  • The famous Margarita: Chili’s sells nearly 30 million per year, positioning itself as the #1 margarita and tequila seller in the U.S.

2. Brand Focus and Turnaround

• Timestamps: [06:32–10:52]
  • The “Core Four” focus: Burgers, Chicken Crispers, Fajitas, and Margaritas (“Those are the four things we really want to be known for.” – George Felix, [06:43]).
  • Astonishing turnaround stats: 19 consecutive quarters of growth, sales jump from $3.8B to $5.4B, and almost 4x marketing investment ([08:06]).
  • Marketing transformation: From zero national ad spend post-COVID to becoming a top advertiser ([08:36]).
  • The importance of rebuilding the team and bringing in trusted, skilled colleagues ([10:58]).

3. Learning from Past Successes

• Timestamps: [12:26–18:03]
  • Reflecting on the Old Spice “The Man Your Man Could Smell Like” campaign—insight: target both men and (the 60% of) women who buy men’s body wash ([12:45]).
  • The value of direct customer feedback—“We just bought people drinks… and watched them watch the commercial.” ([15:03])
  • Lesson: surprise and delight, with emotional resonance, reach both target audiences.

4. Brand Building: Sales Overnight, Brand Over Time

• Timestamps: [18:03–21:17]
  • The “Sales overnight, brand over time” mantra—balancing short- and long-term goals ([18:30]).
  • Instilling confidence with stakeholders by being clear: marketing must drive traffic and sales, but also change brand perception over time.

5. Digging in the Attic – The Power of Nostalgia

• Timestamps: [21:17–25:58]
  • Reviving “heritage brands” by finding “attic treasures”—iconic visual elements, recipes, and stories.
  • Host’s comparison: Lucozade’s archives gave rise to a modern positioning, drawing a direct link to the Chili’s playbook (“This exercise: digging through the attic…” – George Felix, [23:20]).
  • Using nostalgia and latent brand equity to connect emotionally with audiences.

6. Creative Partnership & Advertising Breakthroughs

• Timestamps: [25:59–38:33]
  • Telling the story behind the “Three for Me” Brian McKnight ad, which originated from George’s own idea ([26:17]).
    • “I just kind of kept using that as like—we need to find that idea—and then I called… Mischief… and I gave them this idea. Not saying this was the idea, but just like… and, God, they were like: I think that’s just the idea.” – George Felix, [27:16].
  • Results: High emotional scoring, clear brand recognition, and making price (“3 for $10.99”) an emotional draw, not just rational.
  • The secret to creative agency success: deep trust, long-term relationships, letting the agency do its thing: “You kind of suffocate the creativity with an agency… with too many mandatories” ([33:11]).
  • Bringing creative partners into the business’s internal culture, e.g., Chili’s GM conferences (“We want them to feel the culture, interact…” – George Felix, [36:38]).

7. Culture, Social Swings, and TikTok Cheese Pulls

• Timestamps: [38:33–48:48]
  • The critical role of operations: “Marketing brings the guests in and operations brings the guests back.” ([41:41]).
  • Simpler menus, better staffing, and team empowerment drove operational improvement.
  • Social media’s impact: the viral “cheese pull” with mozzarella sticks—be willing to follow what resonates with guests (“The Triple Dipper makes up… 17% of our total sales” – [44:27]).
  • Empowering teams to take creative “swings” and set budgets aside for cultural moments (“We set aside money for what we call culture pops…” – [45:57]).

8. Distinctive Partnerships and Activating Brand Assets

• Timestamps: [48:48–51:22]
  • Tapping into culture by collaborating with Tacovas for “Booth Boots”—cowboy boots made from Chili’s booth material; sold out in under two minutes ([50:53]).

9. Owning the Product and Experience

• Timestamps: [51:22–55:16]
  • George controls product and pricing alongside promotion: weekly culinary/bartender innovation sessions.
  • Collaboration across functions ensures execution matches brand promise.

10. Pricing, Value, and Barbell Strategy

• Timestamps: [55:16–59:39]
  • Addressing “sticker shock” as prices rise across categories: “We think fast food’s kind of broken their promise… we believe value is more than just a price point.” ([55:16])
  • Barbell pricing: Great value (entry price point) and premium options, “something for everyone” ([57:52]).

11. The Famous Jingle & Doubling Down

• Timestamps: [59:39–60:29]
  • Leaning into cultural assets like the “I Want My Baby Back Ribs” jingle—new creative in the pipeline (“That’s one of those things we found in the attic we definitely cannot get rid of…” – [60:00]).

12. What Makes a Great CMO?

• Timestamps: [60:29–63:09]
  • “Curiosity, never settling, and always pushing forward…”—provocative leadership, deep customer empathy, and momentum creation ([60:37]).
  • Host’s research: curiosity is the #1 cited CMO trait (“The ability to always stay curious, recognize you don’t know everything…” – [61:47]).

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Notable Quotes

• “We wanted to be known for burgers, crispers, fajitas, and margaritas. That was the four things.” — George Felix, [06:43]
• “The secret sauce of this whole turnaround… has been operations led.” — George Felix, [39:52]
• “Marketing brings the guests in and operations brings the guests back.” — George Felix, [41:41]
• “Sometimes you need to know when to get yourself out of the way, you know, and just give creative freedom.” — Jon Evans, [33:41]
• “Sometimes the thing that you’re talking about… your guests will tell you they actually love something else.” — George Felix, [44:27]
• “Set aside money for… culture pops… and just take a lot of swings.” — George Felix, [45:57]
• “Curiosity is very important… and as the CMO, you have a responsibility to push things forward…” — George Felix, [60:37]

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Memorable Moments

• Opening Margarita & Ranch Chips: The first Uncensored CMO episode started with a shared margarita and snack ([03:39]).
• Ad Inspiration Origin Story: George pitching a 90s R&B song spoof to Mischief and seeing it become a successful campaign ([26:17]).
• TikTok Cheese Pulls: The massive, unexpected popularity of mozzarella stick “cheese-pulls” among younger customers ([44:27]).
• Tacovas “Booth Boots” Sellout: Cowboy boots made from Chili's booths, selling out instantly ([50:53]).

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Key Timestamps

| Timestamp | Segment/Topic | |------------|----------------------------------------------------| | 01:44–06:32 | Introducing Chili’s experience—chips, ranch, margarita | | 06:43 | “Core four” brand focus defined | | 08:36 | The context at George’s arrival; pandemic pullback | | 12:45–16:00 | Old Spice’s reinvention—insight and execution | | 18:30 | “Sales overnight, brand over time” explained | | 23:20 | Reviving heritage: “digging through the attic” | | 26:17 | George pitches Brian McKnight ad to Mischief | | 33:11 | The creative partnership philosophy | | 38:33 | Operational focus: surprise and experience | | 41:41 | “Marketing brings the guests in and operations brings the guests back.” | | 44:27 | Mozzarella cheese pulls & Triple Dipper sales impact| | 45:57 | Culture pops: budgeting for swings | | 50:53 | Tacovas “Booth Boots” collaboration story | | 51:22 | CMO’s scope: owning innovation, product, price | | 55:16 | Pricing, sticker shock, barbell pricing | | 60:37 | What makes a great CMO? Curiosity, push, empathy |

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Conclusion

Chili’s turnaround was not luck—it was a blueprint of creative focus, operational discipline, cultural relevance, and deep consumer empathy.
From operational improvements to viral social moments and successful brand collaborations, George Felix demonstrates how modern CMOs must not only drive sales and creative campaigns, but also shape the product, experience, and internal culture, all while remaining deeply curious and responsive to both team and guest feedback.

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Related Resources:

• Uncensored CMO Podcast
• Chili’s latest campaigns & creative work
• System1: Emotional impact in advertising research

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Transcript

[A]

Hey, everyone. Just before we get into the show, I just wanted to give a really big shout out to my founding sponsor, System One. As many of you know, I worked at System One, and before that I was actually a client of theirs. Now, the thing I love about System One is when I need to make a big decision, they have been there to help me. Because what System One does is use the power of emotion to help predict the likely impact of my innovation or advertising. So when I've been stuck in the boardroom needing to justify why we're going to pick one creative route over another or launch this innovation over that one, it has been indispensable. It's also really simple to use. Very actionable and incredibly good value, too. So if you want to find out more about System One's Test yout Add or Test yout Innovation, simply go over to systemonegroup.com and find out more. Okay, without further ado, let's get on with the show. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the uncensored cmo. Now, my next brand is one that half the audience will know all about. And the other half, the audience are probably wondering, who on earth are they? Chiliz have just undergone one of corporate America's most incredible brand turnarounds. And I'm joined in this episode by their cmo, George Felix, to find out exactly how they achieved it and why. Customer experience is the most important ingredient when it comes to turning your brand around. It's an amazing episode, and I have to say, it's also the first one I've had a margarita on as well. And the chips, let's just say, are pretty impressive too. This is one of the reasons why they're being so successful. Enjoy. George Felix, welcome to the show.

[B]

Thank you for having me, John. It's awesome. Thank you for coming to Chili's, mate.

[A]

It's my pleasure. Now, what I should do, I think half the audience are going to go, oh, my word. You talk about Chili's, this is like the best thing ever. Half the audience is going to be going, chili's will. What are they? You know, sort of thing. So I thought we should start by talking about what Chili's is. And no better way than we've got. Yeah, some chips. I say chips. This is. This is the exception. This is the British guy calling the chips. Well, I mean, cheer Crisps.

[B]

So, like, we're at a. We're at a tradition. I know, I know. We got a lot of people outside of the US that watch your show, and I'm a big Fan myself. And so we're sitting at a tile table top. So these, these tile tables are something that, you know. Chili's, a 51 year old brand. They used to be in our restaurants. We are actually about to bring them back in. So this is kind of nostalgia here. But you can't start a Chili's experience without chips and salsa. So these are signature chips and salsa. Now, a pro move that I'm gonna introduce you to is that we've also got Chili's signature Ranch here. So the chips and sauce are amazing. What is also a nice move is to dip the chips in the ranch.

[A]

So this has to happen.

[B]

We should probably get into it. Let's get into it. Lead the way here. You know, you get a little bit there. And here we go.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

Oh, yeah.

[A]

Let's bring this in.

[B]

Here we go. There it is.

[A]

Everyone listening and watching has now got massive envy.

[B]

That's right. That's right. And then you can let me know what you think about the chip and ranch too. Mmm.

[A]

It's quite light, isn't it?

[B]

Right. Thin chips, really crispy. Salsa also just hits the spot. Great way to start the meal.

[A]

Now, my youngest daughter in particular is a massive fan of Ranch. Whenever we order anything, it has to have ranch.

[B]

Smart girl.

[A]

So, yep, she is all over this. Let's give her the right.

[B]

Well, you'll have to tell her what you think of the Chili's Ranch.

[A]

Uh huh.

[B]

What do you think?

[A]

That is very, very tasty.

[B]

Okay, now there's one thing, one other thing that you have to have at a Chili's meal to wash all this delicious stuff down is a margarita. Chili's sells more margaritas than anyone in the United States. We sold over 25 million last margaritas last year. So our signature margarita is the Presidente. So we've got some Presidente.

[A]

Here we go, ladies and gentlemen.

[B]

Thank you, Andrea. Amazing. So they all come in this signature blue shaker right to the table. And you know you're going to get to keep filling this up. So we are going to. Here you go. We're going to shake this guy.

[A]

Talk us through this.

[B]

So, so you can see the Presidente logo here. We're going to. You're going to want to shake this guy. Yep. Right. There you go. Make sure, make sure he's good. Good and shaking. And then you go, you just take that top off. Okay. And then you can just pour it.

[A]

Here we go.

[B]

Right in.

[A]

Beautiful.

[B]

And then if you want, you know, the, the rims already salted. Which is, which is Important. Got a lime here, so I'd recommend squeezing the lime in.

[A]

Give this a go.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

And. Oops.

[B]

Okay. Okay.

[A]

Plenty of lime.

[B]

And cheers. Cheers.

[A]

There we go.

[B]

All right. Welcome to Dallas, George.

[A]

Good to be here, mate. Good to be here.

[B]

Oh, yeah.

[A]

This is officially the first uncensored CMO podcast that has started with a margarita or any margarita.

[B]

Well, I hope it's not the last. I hope. This is a new tradition.

[A]

Couldn't it?

[B]

Yeah, yeah.

[A]

So the margarita stat is wild. So how many margaritas do you make a year?

[B]

We've sold almost 30 million last year, so we are the number one seller of margaritas and tequila, and it's something we want to be known for. Margaritas are, you know, the number one cocktail in the United States, and tequila is one of the fastest growing spirits. And so if you go back to when Chili started, you know, the menu was quite small. In fact, there's a. There's a picture of one on the wall behind you there. That little yellow piece of paper over there was the. You know, it was about this big. And. And so the guys that started Chili's, they just wanted to have a place that served great food, cold drinks, cold beer, cold margaritas. And so over the years, the presidente, obviously, has been our flagship margarita for a very long time, but we've since expanded now. So every day of the year at Chili's, we have what you call a margarita of the month, and it rotates every single month. It's a fun new flavor, but it's a $6 margarita. So every day of the year, you can come get a $6 margarita at Chili's. But. Which is great, so. Helps you nudge you if you weren't sure if you were gonna get that Marg. But we also have great premium margaritas. We have patron frozen margaritas. We have Casamigos margaritas, Don Julio. So you can get kind of whatever you want at Chili's. And we really think it's important that we, you know, of course you can get other drinks at Chili's, but we want to be known as a margarita bar. And so it just fits in with the vibe of the brand and really the DNA of our brand.

[A]

I love the fact you've zeroed in on making one thing a signature as well, because I think lots of restaurant chains try and do a lot of things, don't they? You've kind of made that the famous thing that you do.

[B]

Yeah, it's a great point. Right? Like, you know, of course we're going to have something on our menu for everyone. And that's important. But I think we also, like, when we came in, you know, four years ago, it was about getting to some focus and identifying and defining what Chili's is and what Chili's is all about. And so at the time we defined what we call our core four, it was we wanted to be known for burgers, crispers, which are chicken tenders, fajitas, which we kind of introduced America to, and margaritas. That was the four things. It's like, of course you're going to be able to get other things on a Chili's menu, but those are the four things that we really want to be known for. And that's where we started this journey. And I think like you said, a lot of times, brands get stuck trying to be everything to everybody. And for us, creating that focus really, you know, now you see it, if you come in and look at a Chili's menu, you can tell those are the things we, you know, we're really proud of. And that's the stuff we want to be known for. And, and now we're expanding beyond those. But, but I agree that focus is pretty important now.

[A]

I want to give listeners a bit of context as well here. So you joined, was it four or five years ago?

[B]

I think I'm right about four years ago. Yeah.

[A]

And just for context, I mean, if you look at the data, this is one of the biggest turnarounds in corporate American history. So 19 consecutive quarters of store. And so growth last year, quarter four sales up 23.7%. I think that's store for store as well, isn't it?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Comparison turnover from 2022 to 2025, 3.8 billion to 5 point, almost 5.4 billion. Margins up from 11.9 to 17.6. And this will delight the marketing audience here. Marketing investment went up almost four times, 32 million to 137 million, resulting in you being the number two casual dining restaurant chain in the U.S. that is quite result.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

What was the context prior to you joining?

[B]

Yeah, so, you know, when, when I, when I came in four years ago, our CEO Kevin Hockman had come in just, you know, a couple months prior to me joining. And it was, it was clear. It was, you know, we were stepping into a turnaround. And so Kevin and I have worked together on several brands in our past. We worked together back at P and G on Old Spice and then, and then at Yum Brands on several brands there. And so we weren't new to turnarounds, but I Think each one's a little bit different. And so in this case, really understanding we're in a new segment, casual dining, really trying to understand that. And so when we came in from just. I'll focus on the marketing side. Chili's hadn't been marketing nationally for several years, like three or four years prior to me getting here. And some of that was obviously driven by Covid. You know, a lot of people, you know, a lot of brands pulled back at that time, and some of it was just strategic. The. The brand at that time was focused on maybe some other areas, other ways to promote using discounting or talking to our database of my Chili's rewards members versus kind of a national advertising presence. So really coming in, it was, wow, we need to really redefine what marketing at Chili's means. And that's across the board. So that's the team. Do we have the skillset if we want to go become a national advertiser again, do we have the skillset to go do that? Do we have the agency partners that can help us do that? And then obviously, do we have the budget? How are we going to divert funds from other places strategically, that we've been focused as a brand to now putting that into advertising. So it's interesting, obviously, when you talk about the increase in advertising spend. I think when you're not really a national advertiser and you have ambitions to become one, that's where you get those big jumps. But it didn't all happen at once. We kind of stairstepped it and we really had to prove it out because that's a big. That's a big decision. It's a big investment. It really is. So that's kind of what I stepped into four years ago. And it takes time. You're not gonna do it overnight. But now looking back at it, I think we now have what I would call a world class marketing team here. And that's world class partners as well, from an agency perspective. And it's been a fun ride.

[A]

It's interesting that Kevin brought you in and you'd worked together before. How important is it to bring in people that, you know, can do the job?

[B]

I think it's critically important. Obviously, I've followed Kevin to several stops, and I think there's. There's a reason for that one. He's just a phenomenal leader and a mentor to me and somebody that I trust. And so that's. That's hugely important to me. But also, like, understanding, you know, their philosophy on how they want to build A brand or build a business. And so I think that's super important. And so for me, I, I think it's important as well. And it's a big part of how I built my team. And so there are three key people that are, I knew when I looked at the team and said, hey, there are skill sets we don't have right now because Chili's hadn't been innovating from a food and beverage standpoint, we hadn't been advertising. There are a lot of things that just we weren't doing. And so I brought three key people from my past. Jesse Johnson, who I knew from the agency side, he worked at Wieden and Kennedy. Steve Kelly and Mary Ellen Scott, I worked with at Yum. And each of them brought a skill set that I knew we didn't have that we needed. And then from there we were blessed to have a great team that was already here. And there were people that were willing to like, they bought into what we were trying to do. And then we brought in some new people since then. And so it's a great mix. I think in any of the stops I've been, I think, having that history, you know, there's a shorthand there, you know, when you've worked with someone and you've been in the trenches with them that I really appreciate. But also blending, you know, the people I've worked with with new talent that I, you know, that I'm just getting to know has been a real recipe for our success.

[A]

Now, a little sidebar because you kind of mentioned it earlier, you did the turnaround on Old Spice, didn't you? Back in your. Back in your career. Now I think everyone listening will know this incredibly well known campaign. The man you wish your man smelled like.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Which was Usaji. Just quickly explain the insight behind that and how that performed.

[B]

It was, it was unbelievable. So, you know, I was an assistant brand manager, so I just come out of business school. I had interned on Old Spice the previous summer. So coming in, and I was the ABM working on Body Wash, which was not doing well. And so huge competitive launch coming in from Unilever. It was Dove for Men. So this massively successful women's brand was going to be launching a men's brand. And so we were basically trying to come up with a campaign, P and G calls it profence, a proactive defense, a campaign to counteract this competitive launch. And so the insight, we thought, you know, this is where having great agency partners is important. The brand guys thought, oh, we know it like if you have to say it's for men, it's not for men. That's gotta be the angle, right? We're gonna deposition this women's brand coming into the men's category. Our agency, much smarter than us, they looked at the brief, and they latched onto one stat that could have been a throwaway on the brief, but it was that 60% of men's body wash is purchased by a woman that could be a mom, a wife, a girlfriend. And so their insight was, okay, if this is your enemy, this is who you're going against. That's already a lot of those 60%. You know, a lot of those women are probably already buying Dove for themselves. They're going to make it very easy for them to buy Dove for their guys. We, for the first time, as Old Spice, need to talk to both men and women. And that unlocked an entirely different direction for that. That particular commercial. And so, if you recall, in that commercial, the first line that he says is, hello, ladies. Right. Which is completely different. Old Spice has never talked to women before. And so, you know, the man, your man could smell like. So it was intentionally talking to women. But also, he was a guy that guys thought was cool.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

And so it.

[A]

The casting was very good in that sense.

[B]

And, yeah, Isaiah Mustafa is incredible. He's, you know, had an amazing career since then. But threading that needle of both a guy that women would love and a guy that guys also loved, and the humor and all of that stuff, it was just incredible work from Wyden and Kennedy, and it was just fun to be a part of this.

[A]

Great example of the element of surprise. It was totally unexpected for Old Spice to do that. Very, very funny. And it landed the point brilliantly for both audiences in a very clever way. You didn't have to choose between the audience. Men loved it. Women loved it.

[B]

Well, and it's funny. Hindsight's always 20 20, so if you show that ad to people now, they're like, oh, my gosh, you must have known right away that thing was going to be amazing. Quite the opposite. We got the rough cut, and it was like crickets in the room. Oh, we'll say, yeah, like, you know, our agency, they were in Portland and we were in Cincinnati, and, like, they had to, like, come back on the phone and be like, hey, is everything okay? We're like, oh, hang on, hang on. And we didn't know. Like, you know, he was talking really fast, and there's all this stuff going on. And we were like, I don't Know if this is like, can we slow it down? Can we do all these other things? And we actually went. My brand manager is a guy named James Moorhead. He took me and the other ABMs out to a bar that night and we split into. Two of us went to one corner, two of us went to the other, and we just bought people drinks. And one group was men, one group was women. And we said we were from a market research firm and we just watched them. We bought them a beer if they watched the commercial. And we were watching them watch the commercial. Love that.

[A]

What a brilliant thing to do.

[B]

And then we reconvened at the end of the night and we were like. The guys all loved it. They were laughing at this part. They loved this line. The women loved him. They couldn't stop talking about. And so then it gave us the confidence to say, okay, we weren't crazy. Like, you know, let's not overthink this. We got something here. And go.

[A]

I think. I think the moment I thought, wow, that has got into the kind of hall of fame was. I don't know if you remember the Tide ad on the Super Bowl a few years ago. Yeah, where they ripped you off, didn't they?

[B]

They sure did. Now that's another P and G brand. So they had the advantage, I'm sure of.

[A]

Oh, is that right?

[B]

Spice on that? But. But yeah, I mean, that was. And that was in the early days. I mean, this. This really dates me. But we had just launched our Facebook page, like the Old Spice Facebook page, like months before that. I think we launched the YouTube channel with that ad. So, like, it was at a time when, like, virality was very different than what we know it to be now. And it was one of the first, I think, ads that truly did go viral in the social media age and that pass around because even to this day, I think people. It gets covered in advertising publications as one of the best super bowl ads. It actually never ran on the super bowl because we didn't. We really couldn't afford it. You know, Oldspice is a pretty small brand and so. But it got passed around so much that weekend on Facebook and other platforms that by Monday morning, people, when they were talking about what ads they loved, it just kind of seeped into.

[A]

That's genius.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So you won the super bowl without even being on the Super Bowl?

[B]

Yeah, yeah, that's right.

[A]

That's amazing. I love the fact you went down the pub and got people to kind of rate it. I think that's a really good Example of the importance of being close to customers?

[B]

I think so. Like, you know, I think sometimes we as marketers like you, forget that essentially what we're trying to do, we're trying to evoke a response, an emotion and there's going to be all these ways to measure things and test things and say, should I show the product for this many seconds here or when should I put it in? But at the end of the day, you need people to actually stop and take notice of it. And so that's kind of the rawest way to measure that.

[A]

Now, I heard you say a phrase the other day, which I really like, which was sales overnight, brand over time. And you talked about how you kind of raised the investment for Chili's. How do you sell that into the organisation? How do you get the organization alongside? So I think one thing that almost everyone listening to this will know to be true is that every year marketers are having to cut the budgets back. They're going to do more with less. You know, people look on with envy at what you've managed to achieve here. What's the secret to building a good case for brand investment?

[B]

Well, I think starting that, that framework and it's something I learned in my previous previously when I was working at yum, our CEO Greg Creed talked about that all the time, that that's a marketer's job and you have to be doing both. Right? I think that's the, that's the trick, right? You can't really say, you know, don't worry, the sales are going to come in a couple years, right? Like that that's not gonna work. But you also can't be so short, short minded, you know, or so focused on short term sales that you jeopardize the brand in the long term. So I think, you know, using that as a starting point was helpful for the organization to know that we are going to be doing a mix of things. And some of these things absolutely have to be driving short, you know, sales overnight. And in our business, that is foot traffic into our restaurants and that is top line sales. Right? And we control the menu merchandising too. So it's like once we get them in the restaurant, how do we show them all the stuff we're most proud of and the stuff that we know they're going to have a great experience on? So that is like full stop. That is our job, right? And I think sometimes marketers complicate or muddy the conversation by not starting there. Right? If you start with some of the other softer marketing metrics or things like that, the conversation tends to go sideways. And so I think just being very clear and owning that is our job. At the end of the day, we are responsible for that. Really inspires accountability and confidence with my cross functions, whether it's my cfo, my CEO, you know, CEO, whoever it is. But I think also then explaining like, hey, we are also going to be investing in things because if we can build this brand and we can change the way people feel about Chili's in the long term, that is going to be a multiplier effect on top of that. And, and thankfully, we, you know, I have a leadership team that I sit on that is very supportive of that. And a lot of them have long histories at Chili's. And so they remember when Chili's was that brand. Right. They remember the heyday of this brand. And so, you know, they know the power. When we are a brand that's in the cultural zeitgeist and we are a brand that is beloved like that, they know what happens. And so, like, we're not going to get. We're not going to get back to that by just Talking about a 1099 price point all the time. We're going to have to do things that. That might not show you a sales return tomorrow, but it changes the way people think about our brand. And so that was really the starting point of it. And both our leadership team and our board were very supportive. Now, again, like I said, we had to take one. We didn't go from 30 million to 100 million overnight. We did one campaign to show, can we drive people into our restaurants? Can we drive the sales lifts? And as we saw that, then we got the confidence say, okay, let's continue this investment.

[A]

You just touched on something that I think most marketers forget, which is the power of not necessarily nostalgia, but using what the brand was in the past to help shape what it will be in the future. Yeah. Because so many, so many brand managers want to change everything.

[B]

Right? For sure.

[A]

Yeah. But actually, I quite respect how you're using the things that you're famous for in the past.

[B]

Yeah. And honestly, it's somewhat a function of my career path. I just, I didn't like, intended to be this way, but I've worked on a bunch of heritage brands, right. Old Spice, kfc, Pizza Hut, Chili's. And so I think, you know, now, having done this several times, like, this idea of reviving legacy brands is really fascinating to me. I think it's really interesting. And as a marketer, when you think about what brands mean to people. I think legacy brands are a really fun challenge because, like, that's the whole thing, right? Like, the whole, like, idea of a brand is like, something that gives you irrational, like, loyalty to it or love for. For something. Right. I used to. I remember, you know, I mentioned it before. Greg Creed, our CEO, yum. He was like, you know, why are brands important? He's like, who has a watch in the room? And everyone raised their hand and he's like, well, you know, why do you. Why do you have the watch you have? And, you know, because you can get a watch that tells the time, you know, for 10 bucks, right? But why did you pay $100 for yours or $200 for yours or whatever? It's because of a brand, right? Like, the function of that thing is telling time, but the brand aspect of it and the feeling you have when you wear it or the look or whatever it is makes you feel differently. And so I think I call this exercise digging through the attic. That first part, when you get on a brand like this and digging through the attic to find what are all those things that are absolutely core to this brand that when it was at its best, made it special, made it unique, and finding those things and like. Like my attic at home, there are things in there that I would, like, never want to part ways with. And there are other things. I'm like, oh, my gosh, like, why? Why did I hang on to this?

[A]

Right?

[B]

And we can leave those behind, but, you know, I'm kind of old school in the sense of P and G trained, that, like, you have to start with your brand on a page and you have to define that. And I think finding those things, things that made the brand special in the past, are part of the distinctive elements that you want to bring forward now. The trick is, how do you bring them forward in a way that isn't just looking backwards, but it's relevant today.

[A]

I totally agree. I worked on a brand called Lucas Aid in the uk which is the equivalent of Gatorade. So you imagine Gatorade, it'd be the equivalent. And we had this big brand relaunch to go through because of Sugar Tax. And we went back in the archives at 80 years, and we discovered that the. The reason the brand existed was that doctors were noticing that kids were dying in surgery. They didn't have enough energy to recover.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

And they invented this glucose mix to give to the. Give to the kids, to basically get the body to kind of, you know, recover more quickly and they saw this massive increase in, you know, kids surviving surgery. I mean, I was like, what a story is that?

[B]

You know, I didn't. I did not think you were going there.

[A]

No, I know, exactly. Neither did I. We just went to the archives and we end up this positioning. Energy beats everything.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

In that actually energy is the sour of what you overcome any challenge in your life. And it was just like, wow, we've just uncovered this amazing insight. But it required us going through the archives in the factory, in a dusty room that everyone had forgotten about sort of thing.

[B]

Totally.

[A]

So I'm with you on this, I think, because the turnover of marketers and we just lose that legacy, don't we, that brands have.

[B]

I also think we run into the trap of, like, well, if we're trying to appeal to a younger audience, then we can't go back to. We can't go back to the past. It has to be new or we have to chase a new trend. And I think there's. There's, like, with. With brands that have histories like that, there's always something that. That is timeless. I just believe that otherwise the brands wouldn't be what they were. Right. And it's really like that, to me is the fun part of, like, how do you find that thing and then, you know, spin it and reposition it so that, you know, in 2026, it's just as true as it was in the 90s.

[A]

And also you're tapping into some latent awareness of the brand and latent emotion that's already there. You're just uncovering it as well.

[B]

Yeah. Walking away from that. Exactly. Now you gotta build everything from scratch or you can actually tap into it. Totally agree.

[A]

And one of my colleagues, actually, Orlando, who wrote a book on advertising and how it works, actually, nostalgia and tapping into things from the past are one of the amazing, most emotive. He would call them. Right. Brain features that you can possibly use as a brand. Yeah. So you're crazy not to use them if you got them.

[B]

Totally agree.

[A]

Now, talking about advertising, I need to check something with you because I think I heard this right, that you managed to pitch an idea to Mischief, your creative agency, and they bought it, which I just thought was amazing. Is this true? Did you pitch an idea to Mischief and they made the ad for you?

[B]

Okay. This is true. I just want to also be clear. That's the only time this has ever happened. So I don't want anyone to get any misconceptions that I'm like a big idea guy or creative so this was, this was right really early when I started here. It was in that process of how are we going to get back on to be an advertiser? How are we going to go talk about this brand? And we have this thing called the three. For me, you basically get a bottomless drink, our bottomless chips and salsa, you know, a nearly half pound burger and fries for $10.99. But there's other options. You can, you can kind of pick, you can get different starters, you can get different entrees. And so part of it, we're going to. We were going to go on with very kind of traditional food focused advertising that kind of explains what the offer is and all of that. But we also, in the sense wanted to do a bit more brand building and start coming back with a brand voice that we thought had been missing from Chili's. And so at Chili's, we take our food very seriously. We don't take ourselves very seriously. So it's like, how do we start to bring some of that sense of humor and, and voice back to the brand? And so I was talking to my team and, you know, I'm a kid that, you know, I love 90, you know, 90s music, you know, something that, you know, a lot of nostalgia for me. And I was trying to, like, figure out, like, how do we explain this meal? Because it's a little complex. You got to make some choices, you know, and all that. One night I, like, woke up and I for some reason thought of the old Brian McKnight song. And he counts, he counts like 1, 2, 3. He goes all the way to 5. But I was like thinking like, wow, it's kind of like we need to figure out something like that, where it's like, we need to tell people there's steps to this thing. You got to pick. You got to pick your drink, you got to pick your appetizer, you got to pick your entree, and all these, all these things. And so I just kind of like, I was using it with my team as like, hey, this might not be the right idea, but it's like, hey, what if we had Brian McKnight come back and sing his song? But we changed the words, so he was explaining how to order a three for me. And I just kind of kept using that as like, we need to find that idea. And then I called, I called up Mischief, who I'd worked with at Tinder when I was the CMO at Tinder prior. So I knew, you know, Greg and Carrie and the whole team there And I was like, hey, I think, you know, I think we're ready to, like, actually start doing something again if you guys are, you know, game to jump in with us on this. And I gave them this idea. Not saying this was the idea, but just like, this is kind of like a, you know, we want something like that. And, God, they were like, you know what? I think that's just the idea. I think we just try and do that. And so it's like the one time in my career that I love that story. I can claim that. And those guys are so good, Gravely. They took a very shell of an idea, and they made it so fun, and it was a great first step for us in this journey to get Chili's back into the advertising game.

[A]

Well, I dug out the scores on this one, actually on the system on database as well, which you'll be very, very, very pleased to hear. So star rating out of 5.4.8. So very. So very, very emotional. It creates a lot of happiness, a lot of surprise as well as you expect. What I think is textbook as well was that within the first two seconds, 80% of the audience knew exactly who they were watching. They knew it was a Chili's advert as well. And that's very hard to do. So the fact that you opened in the restaurant as well was brilliant. And I dug into the qualitative feedback as well, and this, I thought was really helpful, given what you said. The number one reason that people gave for the emotion they felt was the 3 for 10. And I was thinking, we tend to think of price as a rational thing, but actually, you made the deal an emotional thing. That's why they responded, because they're like, oh, wow, I can't believe it's three for ten. 1099, I should say. And then it does a lot of things that I think we often forget. So it's, you know, the humor's there, the music's there, the celebrities there. All those things are brilliant ways of kind of creating emotion.

[B]

Yeah, I love the Note on the 3 for 1099 being, you know, driving the emotional connection. I think that's what we've tried to do is take things that are very functional and also find, like, the insight that helps drive more of an emotional connection. So very fun. But the Mischief, the Mischief team, well,

[A]

huge credit to Mischief for not binning the idea on. On, you know, on first.

[B]

They are great. Jeff, you know, the Strat, Jeff McCrory, is like, the best, you know, on the strategy side. So I'll take The one. But they've got, you know, so many more. So many more.

[A]

Well, sticking with Mischief, I had dinner with Greg on Monday, and he just made a little comment. He said, I wish every client was like George, which I thought was lovely. You obviously have a great connection. You work together at Tinder, I think, didn't you, as well?

[B]

We did, yeah. I worked with Mischief. I brought them on at Tinder, and then they also do work for us here. Yeah.

[A]

So what's been the secret to establishing such a good working relationship?

[B]

I will say, like, I've been very fortunate. If you go all the way back to when I was an intern at Old Spice or an ABM there, I got to work with Wyden and Kennedy in Portland, and I was kind of spoiled, to be honest with you, like, for that to be your first, like, exposure to an ad agency. I realize now, at the time, I didn't know any different, but I realize now was pretty rare. And I credit a lot of it to the people I worked with there that taught. You know, Wieden worked with Old Spice very differently than the other creative agencies at Procter and Gamble, worked with their brands. And. And what I appreciated about it is that they. They had a very. When you work with a great creative agency, they. They should have a very strong opinion on things. And they. They wanted to understand our business at a deeper level. But what it taught me was that when you're. When you're working with. With agencies like that, you have to let them do their thing. Like. Like you're the expert at certain things and you're bringing them on because you want their outside perspective on how to solve your business problems. And I think what I've seen too often happen is that you kind of suffocate the creativity with an agency, right. And you. You put on too many mandatories or you tweak an idea to death. That started off great, but you kind of water it down. And I think with. I just learned, and it wasn't me, I was an assistant brand manager. But just watching the way that, you know, my brand manager worked with them or, you know, even at that point, Kevin was our marketing director. You could see there's a certain point where you pull back. There are certain things you have to push for, but you also need to pull back and be willing to give and take some chances with them to get to bigger ideas. And so that experience kind of gave me belief that creativity could solve business problems. And if you work with the right people and you work with Great creative agencies and you let them do their thing, more often than not, you're going to get better output. And so I've tried to carry that through my career. And it's no different now with Mischief. We work with another group called In. It's Advertising Time. And I think we have an inherent trust of here's what we need to accomplish here, the mandatories that we're going to hold very dear to us. But we're going to leave you enough room to have that creative freedom to do what we think is breakthrough work. And I think sometimes. I've seen it a lot. I think sometimes clients can't help themselves, but kind of get in the way.

[A]

Totally agree. Your trust point is so spot on. And you sometimes need to know when to get yourself out of the way, you know.

[B]

Sure.

[A]

And just give them the freedom. I think some. The best work I've ever been involved in has had the least input from me. And the work where I've been intimately involved because it's politically sensitive or like there's a lot riding on it. And then you end up being safe.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And the work suffers. The other interesting thing actually is the. You're the tenure of your relationship as well. We did some work actually when I was at System One called the compound creativity. And it was all about how creativity compounds over time. So difference between campaigns that run long time versus short time, the difference gets bigger. But there was an insight in there as well, which was that those that change their agency regularly effectively reset the creative, and those that had a consistent relationship with their agency over time saw this big gap emerge, but between them and everyone else. So there's something about the compounding effect of relationships that you have with people as well as the work.

[B]

Yeah. And I mean, I would agree with that from my personal experience, without having the data, but Wieden and Kennedy I think, still works on Old Spice. But I mean, when you looked at whether I was there or any of my other brands, I think that, like, there's, there's a lot that you build up. One is just knowledge of, of the people. Right. You build a trust amongst the people. And, you know, certainly people, you know, kind of, there are some people that come in and out, but when the core players are together for a longer period of time, you build some trust there. I think the, the understanding of the business is very important. And the best agencies that I've worked with are very curious. They want to. They want to know the sales number. They want to go spend time in a restaurant or talk to a franchisee or whatever it is, right? So I think anytime, you know, if you. If you change, then you're resetting all of that and you're starting from zero again. You got to relearn. So I think a lot of that makes sense. But. And then. And then I think the biggest thing, I think is when you get into a groove with an agency or agencies that really understands the voice, the tone, and creative, like, man, that is, like, you save so much time and you start to get. The conversations you have are very different. It's less about, you know, like, you're not. You're not debating the same things that you are in those newer relationships. You're. You're more just like building on each other and figuring out how do we make this thing bigger? And I feel like we're really fortunate, you know, those two groups, it's advertising time and mischief have been on Chili's basically the entire time I've been here. And the shorthand we have now is really good. And I think the work shows in the work.

[A]

I love that. And almost when you're in that situation, the ideas just come exactly. You don't have to wait for a brief.

[B]

That's exactly right.

[A]

You've got an idea.

[B]

That's exactly right.

[A]

You just know.

[B]

Yeah, it's like they know. They're like, you know, I mean, they come. One of the things I love is all of our agency partners come. Every year we do a general managers conference. So every restaurant has a general manager that runs that restaurant. So we have over 1100 restaurants in the United States. And so once a year, we get all 1100 of them together for a week. And we come together and it's a huge celebration. Big culture driver. We celebrate the work they're doing, all of those things, and we bring our agencies to that because we want them to feel, one, we want them to feel they're a part of our team. But two, we want them to feel the culture. We want them to hear and. And interact with our general managers. And coming out of that, now, our agencies are getting involved in actually putting that conference on. They're like, we have creative ideas for that's cool. No end consumers ever gonna see it. But they're like, if that gets our general managers fired up, let's go do it. Right? And so, like, we're, you know, and there have been ideas that come from that of like, okay, now we understand this better, you know, and now we design all of our team member uniforms and all of those, like, The T shirts and all that stuff. And so, like, the definition of marketing, I think is expanded here a bit more than where I've been in the past. And I think it's because the people that are working on it, whether it's my team internally or agencies, are completely bought in.

[A]

I like the idea of applying the same creative craft to your internal audience as you do the external audience. Because imagine if you fire up the internal audience to the same extent.

[B]

Right, right.

[A]

That's going to pay back many times.

[B]

Well, and it's something I've learned in this role is, you know, we talk, you know, and I've heard you talk to many CMOs about, you know, effectiveness and what are the things we can do to drive better effectiveness. And I think there's all these things we can do. Right. The marketing sciences. I'm a big fan of that and I try to apply that. But honestly, the thing that's driven the best marketing ROI I've ever seen is a great experience. Right. In our restaurants. There's nothing like that could have a bigger impact on that.

[A]

Oh, that you touched on something. So I've, I'm just doing some new research for can this year. Okay. Which is all about the startling power of surprise.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

So we did, Adam Morgan and I did the extraordinary cost of died a couple years ago, and we're coming back with the answer now. So, you know, if, if the problem is advertising's too dull, what's the answer? And we've really like locked in on the power of surprise. But what's really interesting about it is that surprise is based on your. It's called this reward prediction error. But basically our brains are prediction machines. So we anticipate an experience and surprise is the variance to what anticipated experience, 100%.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

So advertising builds an expectation of an experience. The difference to the expectation and the in outlook experience is where the surprise comes. And going back to system one database, we looked at every reason on the database that any consumer's given for being surprised. And the outliers by far are the experience of the brand compared to the promise, both negative and positive. So if you have a really high expectation of a brand it under delivers, you get this extremely negative surprise and the reverse happens. So you just think tying together consumer experience, customer experience rather with the brand promise is where the biggest surprise can happen.

[B]

I love that. And I think it's been really, the secret sauce of this whole turnaround is I think some people think it's been marketing led and I think marketing's been A big part of it. But honestly, I would say it's really been operations led. And it starts with our CEO and our COO and all of us on the leadership team. We get into restaurants like we are in restaurants. We do listening sessions with our team members all the time. And before we turned on advertising, we were on a mission to how do we better staff our restaurants? How do we better maintain our restaurants? How do we make it simpler? You know, if I own the menu and I want someone to deliver. We call ourselves Chili Heads here. If I want them to deliver. Chili Head hospitality, right, which is, like, exceed your expectations when you come into a Chili's. But our menu's so complex that, you know, you're worried about, you know, all these different things that you don't make all the time. And I've got you doing all these processes that aren't adding value to the guests. It's not really fair for me to ask you to do that. So we've cut 25% of our menu over the last four years. We've simplified all these things in our. We call it our heart of house. Our kitchens where, you know, processes that weren't really value adds for the team member or the guest. You know, our technology works better. We've done all these things, and we're staffing our restaurants more. So now, hopefully when you go to Chili's, there's someone at the door that opens the door for you and says, hi, welcome to Chili's, and hands you, you know, gets you to your table really fast, and the chips hit your table fast, and. And you got a cold margarita really soon, and all of these things. And. And now our team members can focus on taking care of the guests, which is what they show up to work, you know, wanting to do anyway. And so we've invested far more money, you know, a lot more money in that side of the world than we have in marketing. And I'm completely supportive of it because, you know, you know, as a leadership team, when we talk about where we want to invest, sure, I want to increase our marketing spend year over year. But there's a certain point where I'm saying, you know, I think we're okay with this much because I'd rather put the investment in if we can get more bussers that are cleaning tables faster and we can get more people into Chili's, or more bartenders so we can get more drinks out faster. So I think, like, this idea of, you know, really understanding the full. The full business and the impact that the Operations and the experience can have to make your marketing better is huge. We have this mantra here that marketing brings the guests in and operations brings the guests back. Love it. And like that to me, you know, is a. It shows the partnership we have of like the job we have to do. Once we get them in the door, we pass the baton to our team members and they're doing an amazing job of serving great food and it's fun atmosphere, it's lively and they have a good time. And that's really, you know, because I think we've all had examples probably where we had, you know, what we thought was good marketing. You drive trial. The, you know, the experience. It's that negative surprise. Like you said, you're not coming back. Right.

[A]

Well, I've got some good feedback for you. So producer James and I were at Chile's gate by the gate D15 in Miami Airport today. So I thought we, you know, we're on our way to see you.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

We're going to test everything.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And big shout out to Jesse, our server.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Did a great job.

[B]

Good job, Jesse.

[A]

But what was. Yeah, but what was interesting is that the menu is even tighter at the airport.

[B]

It is now.

[A]

Rather than that be a disappointment. What did Jesse say to us? He said, we care so much that you don't miss your plane, that we want to make sure that everything is on the table in 10 minutes.

[B]

That's great.

[A]

So he'd taken a negative, which was, oh, we can't get the quesadillas or whatever and turned it into a positive to say we only do what we can make in 10 minutes so we don't make you late and leave you disappointed.

[B]

There you go.

[A]

Which is a great example of that.

[B]

There you go. Yeah.

[A]

Love it. Having life.

[B]

Love it. All right, well, I hope it was a good experience. And we'll have to get you to one of our non airport locations soon, hopefully. And yeah, it's great.

[A]

Well, James got me doing the tick tock craze, which is the mozzarella stick.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Would you call it.

[B]

Yeah, yeah. The cheese pull.

[A]

The cheese pull.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I failed the cheese, but James did

[B]

a much better job. Okay.

[A]

I think he's going to go and give you. He's bringing the evidence.

[B]

Let's see.

[A]

You need to be the judge of this.

[B]

Promising start.

[A]

It fails about and then. Yeah, unfortunately, not bad.

[B]

I'm gonna give that one like, let's see, out of 10, a scale of one to 10, I'm gonna give that one a six. Okay.

[A]

I'll take that.

[B]

Not bad, not bad.

[A]

That's my first time.

[B]

I'm not gonna anticipate a million views on TikTok from this, but, but, but have you found pretty good.

[A]

Have you counted. Have you counted how many views there are of cheese balls? Is that a metric you have?

[B]

I don't have the current count. It's literally like hundreds of millions, though. It's insane. If you would have told me, like, four years ago that the Triple Dipper or fried mozzarella was going to be a key to, like, you know, this brand turnaround, I would have told you you're crazy. But I think it's another good lesson for marketers. Like, sometimes the thing that you're talking about and you're like, hey, I want you to go buy this. Your guests sometimes will tell you they actually love something else and they find something else really fun about your brand. And I think if you're willing to go with that and then try and figure out how you can bring that more to light, then there's a huge opportunity there. So that was something that really started organically from our fans. And now, a few years later, the Triple Dipper makes up, I think, 17% of our total sales. But it's an item that's been on our menu for decades. Right. None of it was new. It was just. I think it really resonates with TikTok culture. It resonates with how younger people want to eat, with variety and dipping and just the experiential nature of that item. And it's kind of just taken on a life of its own.

[A]

I wonder if there's a world record for this.

[B]

We need to. You know, it's a good idea. We need to probably formalize this and determine who has

[A]

evidence that. How far you've pulled the cheese. That's amazing. Well, this is a really important point, isn't. In terms of cultural relevance. So what are the top ways a brand can create cultural relevance?

[B]

I mean, I'll say just from my experience on the brands I've worked on, I think it first starts with setting the conditions and the environment on your teams that this is something you're going to do and you're going to prioritize and you're going to make improvements important. Because what I hear from a lot of friends and colleagues in the industry or people is that it's too much of an uphill battle. And so when that moment comes and they want to move fast, they don't have that alignment and that agreement that this is something that's important. And so what I try to do with my team is one, just stress the importance that that is a goal of ours. We want to be a brand and culture. We want to be a brand that is in the cultural zeitgeist and talked about and popping up on SNL or Late Night or people saying, did you see what Chili's just did? And in order to do that, you have to make it a safe place for people to take swings and do that. You have to set aside budget. That's the reality of it, too, right? If you don't set aside any money for it, but you say, I want to be a brand in culture, well, how's that going to work? So we set aside money for what we call culture pops. We don't really know what they're going to be. Some of them going into the year, we have some rough ideas, but a lot of them are kind of still to be determined. And then some of them are low spend and, you know, they're just social swings. Others might be bigger spend. We might get a celebrity or something like that. But the other thing I would say is, is you got to take a lot of swings. I think sometimes brands that try to do this and they're like, this is the one thing we're going to do this year. Well, guess what? Like, there's so much pressure on it, like we were talking about before, like, I'm probably going to get too involved. I'm probably going to water down the idea and, you know, we're going to kind of suffocate that one and it's not going to. It's not going to go. Whereas I think if you take a ton of swings, you're going to miss a bunch, which is fine. Again, that has to be okay, too, right? You have to, like, create that environment where if you try something and nothing happens, that's okay. You're going to learn from it and move on. But the more swings you take, the odds of hitting a big one are going to be much higher. And so I think, like, to me, a lot of this, at least from my seat, is creating a culture and an environment that enables the teams and agencies to actually go do that. And then you leave it to the experts to go.

[A]

It's such a good point that with social media, isn't it? Because, like, you'll work really hard on an idea that's super polished and then nothing happens. And then something that you spent no time at all is very rough suddenly takes off. You just don't know it's very unpredictable, isn't it?

[B]

Totally. Like you really there's. I mean, I could go on and on about ideas that I thought were amazing, that I was like, ah, this is going to be a big one. And then something like the cheese pull, which I would have never guessed, has now turned into this crazy thing. So I think you just gotta be willing to kind of go with it. And when something takes off, like, how fast can you move? And does your team feel empowered to go move that fast?

[A]

Now, one idea I saw that I absolutely loved because it really involves your distinctive assets and it's a good partnership. Is what you did with TO covers.

[B]

Oh, yeah.

[A]

And for anyone who doesn't know what they are, because I didn't know what they are as well, we're talking cowboy boots.

[B]

Cowboy boots. They are a.

[A]

But not just any cowboy boots.

[B]

I mean, they are a. Like Tacova is just an amazing brand. They are a western lifestyle brand, I think. Western lifestyle, cowboy boots, cowboy hats, all of that culture. I mean, we live here in Dallas, so it's. We're closer to it, but it's becoming a bigger thing. I think you saw it with Beyonce and her, you know, her whole tour and all that. And so To Covis is a, like a rocket ship brand. They are going to be just absolutely huge. And so as we. This is another idea from Mischief. They brought us and we do these big briefs. We call it branded everything briefs, where it's open, you know, just, you know, hey, celebrate things about Chili's. Like, no product tied to it. Just bring us a ton of ideas. And one of the ideas they brought us was called Booth boots. And so Chili, part of an iconic Chili's experience is sitting in a booth. It's kind of this like, maroonish colored, you know, you know, kind of leathery booth. And so the idea was to take the material from Achilles Booth and make, you know, amazingly great handcrafted cowboy boots. And so we reached out to Tokovas. They were, they're amazing partners. Totally game. And so we took, we took some old. They took our material. They have very high standards. They're like, well, we're not going to make boots that don't meet our standards. So thankfully, our booth materials are apparently very high quality. So pass the test with Tacova.

[A]

That's good.

[B]

Yeah. And so. And then we used this design that we saw from an old picture at Chili's that our founder. It was like a kind of a chili pepper vine design that was on one of his shirts from like the Archives and they created this incredible design. So we made boots and a belt all out of the Chili's booth material. They sold out in I think under two minutes.

[A]

That's insane.

[B]

It was remarkable.

[A]

Can you reverse the collab and get to covers to brand your booth?

[B]

That's a pretty good idea. Okay, after this, I'm going to call, I'm going to call Krista. See, see, see what she says.

[A]

But that'd be great. I mean like it's an up and coming brand. It's premium. It's.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Great. Signaling would be great.

[B]

Yeah. But it was, it was, it was awesome. And like I said for, for a brand like to Cova's, I think they saw the value. We're both Texas brands. They saw the value of appealing to the Chili's audience the same way we did with them. That they were absolutely awesome.

[A]

Amazing. I did a CMO survey recently which was not surprising, but it might surprise some people. And I discovered that 91% of CMOs only control the 1P promotion.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

And they don't even have much influence over the others. But what's interesting about your role is that you do have an influence over pricing, you do have an influence over products. How do you influence, I guess the product part of the mix?

[B]

Yeah, it's a really fun part of my job. The structure here is that all of the culinary and beverage and drink innovation sits under marketing. We have a whole part of my team that is just focused on innovation, the innovation pipeline. And then we have the culinary and beverage teams. Every week we spend time in our test kitchen, we're behind the bar and, and so, you know, we're really responsible for defining what's the three year roadmap on innovation. And so having having that integrated into marketing is I think a huge advantage in that like we really control from the very beginning of the idea all the way through the go to market. And that can be the promotion of it, the advertising of it, it can be the way it shows up on our menu and our merchandising, like every part of that. And so it's different parts of my team that hand it off through the process. But to me it's been a really powerful thing for us. And I think it's not that marketing runs that whole thing. It is a cross functional effort. And so every step of the way, supply chain, operations, finance it are all brought in because we just launched a brand new chicken sandwich, the Big Crispy to launch that. I mean we've been working on that for two years, right? And it's, we have six different sandwiches. But it's all the things you don't think about. Right. Like, you know, how hard could it be to launch a chicken sandwich? Well, you got to think about, okay, what's the capacity in the kitchen, in the fries, you know, in the area where the fryers are. If we're going to sell a ton of chicken sandwiches that we're not currently selling operationally, how's it going to work? What's the procedure to build it? You know, does the tech work in the restaurant? All the, like, all those things that you don't think about. And so it's a, it's a huge cross functional effort. But the fact that marketing is really leading that through from the beginning to the end, I think gives us a pretty big advantage.

[A]

I think that's huge. I mean, one bit of us I'd give to any senior marketer is think, act like you do own everything.

[B]

Correct.

[A]

Effectively as marketing, we are, we create the vision, we create the strategy, we understand the customer, we represent the customer when decisions get made. So our job is to kind of organize all the resources and help us, us realize the vision. And I think that's something that marketers tend to get frustrated about. Go, oh, I, you know, I'm just the last bit in the chain.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Think yourself, think about yourself as the first bit in the chain and Absolutely.

[B]

Even if, even if that's not the remit of, of your, your role, I mean, I take it a step further. I'd say like some of the things I've done that have made me a better marketer here, but also given me more kind of credibility with my peers in other functions is just understanding, like getting your hands dirty in the restaurant and understanding the operations more and spending time with our team members or spending time in the kitchens and all of that. And so like thinking of, thinking of marketing outside of what you would traditionally call marketing, but really taking an interest in those other functions and understanding how marketing can play a role there and then educating them as far as, you know, what, what you're doing, I think will just build more of that trust, even if the scope isn't technically yours.

[A]

Now we talked about three for me, didn't we, earlier? Yeah. And that's kind of touching on pricing. I think I've even heard you use this phrase before, actually about the sticker shock you get, particularly by the way, if you're British and you come to America. That sticker shock has just got even bigger. By the way. It's so Expensive, isn't it? Have prices gone up or is it just perception of things being more expensive?

[B]

Well, I'll tell you, a lot of what we've been talking about for the last few years has been driven by just what we've seen from people on social media. And particularly we've gone pretty hard at fast food. And it's because we see people basically every single day in drive throughs, holding up receipts like, how did I just spend $50? Or how did, like, I can't believe I'm getting this bag of food and I had to pay this much money. And so, you know, I do think prices have gone up. I think there's also, you know, there's shrinkflation is something you hear a lot about right now. And really like what we're doing is we're using fast food as a foil to talk about how great our value is, right. And we're really proud about the food we serve, how much food you get, the price point that you get it at. And I think when you start to see this like, groundswell of people talking about how frustrated they are with the other options out there and their prices have now come to a point where they're actually comparable, which we wouldn't have guessed, you know, several years ago that we'd be comparing price points at fast food to a full sit down experience at Chili's, all of a sudden that gives a very helpful frame of reference for people and for us to talk about our value. So I do think prices in general have risen, but also there's a lot of pressure right now in the economy. Right. Whether it's gas prices or just all the things people are having to make choices. And so our big thing is value. We think fast food's kind of broken their promise of being the best value and all of that. But we believe value is more than just a price point. It's what you get. You know, what you, what you get for what you pay. And so for 10.99, I'd put our, our meal up against anybody's because very, very competitive. Yeah, because you're. And, and it, and it goes beyond the food. We think the food's amazing, but it's because of the Chili Head hospitality and it's the music in the restaurant. And you're in a, you're in a fun place and like, you're not eating in your car and all those things. And so for us, value goes well beyond. I think sometimes, especially in the United States, you got a lot of restaurant brands and fast Food brands that are throwing out $1, $2, $3. Well, what are you getting? What are you getting for a dollar? It's great that I only paid a dollar, but if it's not something I'm excited about, then that, to me, doesn't actually mean value.

[A]

And I can confirm the portion sizes are very generous as well. Well, again, I'm glad James and I are pros, but even we didn't quite finish yesterday when we had one.

[B]

So glad to hear.

[A]

Yeah, there's. Yeah, no one's going to go hungry, that's for sure. You got this thing called barbell pricing, haven't you, as well, which is quite an interesting. I've not heard of that concept before.

[B]

Yeah. So, again, I think that's part of, like, you know, us, we want to. We want to be known for. For everyday value. Like. Like, no matter when, you know, we're open 363 days a year. And so any day you come into a Chili's, you don't have to have a coupon. It doesn't have to be at a certain time or day of the week. You don't have to use the app to get the offer. Just come into Chili's, and we're going to have something that at an entry price point, if that's all the money you have to spend, you're going to get a great meal, you're going to get a great margarita, no questions asked. Now, for those that might have more to spend and want more variety or more options, we're going to have things that are maybe at a higher price point, still an amazing value. Right. Like our baby back ribs. You know, the full rack of ribs hangs off the plate. They're so big right now, they might be at a price point that's somewhere in the 20, you know, $25 plus range. But for what you're getting, it's still an amazing. It's an amazing deal. And, you know, I talked about our premium margaritas, you know, whether, you know, a Don Julio or Casamigos margarita, if you go to a independent bar and get a margarita like that, you're going to pay, I don't know, 20, 25 bucks. At Chili's, it might be 13, 14, $15. Right. So we want to have something for everybody. But that barbell is we're always going to have that opening price point that if that's all you, if that's the, you know, what you can afford, you are going to have a great meal. But we always want to give a variety of Options.

[A]

Well, going back to the element of surprise, actually, when we were ordering our drinks, we were surprised that the quality of tequila were being offered. It's like, oh, you've got those sort of things. So that exact thing playing out. So you get the surprise at the bottom end. That's how you get the surprise at the top end.

[B]

That's right. And even, you know, our $6 margaritas, we use great spirits. A Lunazul tequila, which is. Which is a great tequila. But yeah, we, you know, we. If we're going to be the number one margarita seller, we got to have. We got to have a good range of tequilas.

[A]

Talking about baby back ribs as well. That. That was a fantastic ad as well, with boys to them. So anyone. Anyone listening? Check that out. That's very, very funny. In fact, it was the highest scoring on the System 1 database I could find.

[B]

So a lot of fun.

[A]

That was very funny. The takeout of that one was the surprise that everyone had when she just took the order for baby rat ribs and walked off and ignored them.

[B]

That's right. That's one of those things we found in the attic that we definitely cannot get rid of. Everyone loves that song. So we've got some fun stuff coming up with, you know, more things with that jingle coming up here in the next few weeks, but it's. It's just synonymous with Chili's.

[A]

Well, that's another lesson you've touched on a few times in this conversation, is doubling down on the things that work, you know, not being too proud to admit that, you know, that's working. It might be a cheese pull or. Or baby back ribs and run with it and put some money behind it.

[B]

Absolutely.

[A]

Maybe to round off what would be the most important attributes of a successful cmo, would you say?

[B]

I think being curious is very important. So the way I would play that out is being curious, you know, when you're talking about your business and learning, you know, other aspects outside of marketing that we talked a little bit about asking questions of your agency and your team to understand different perspectives, your consumer, your team members. I would also say just like never settling, I guess, or, you know, like. Like always kind of like trying to push forward for what's, you know, what's next. And. And I think as the CMO in an organization, you have a responsibility to kind of push. Push things forward and kind of be. Be provocative and push the organization forward, obviously, in a way that feels on brand and all that, but kind of instigates different thinking and growth. And I Think that's something that again, as a cmo, if you can play that role in your organization and deliver that, I think you start to gain the respect and credibility amongst the rest of the organization.

[A]

I love that. That's really good. I did a study last year called Confessions of a CMO where we did this, but off the record, because often the best conversations happen before the camera starts.

[B]

You know what I mean?

[A]

So we. We phoned up and we ended up concluding that actually there's not. Not much marketing that happens in the CMO role. And what we kind of came up with six. Six alternatives to the marketing, but one was Mutiny, creating Chief Mutiny Officer. The other one was Chief Momentum Officer. So back to your point is you have to create that tension in the organization to get it to move to the next level, but then you have to create the momentum that makes that change, kind of follow through. Both those things are really important. And your first point actually on curiosity, I would say is the single most cited reason from every CMO conversation I've had really is. Yeah, the ability to always stay curious, recognize you don't know everything, always reflect the customer insight when decisions are being made, and always ask questions of other people to get everyone else thinking. Remaining curious. So that. That plays out totally. Totally.

[B]

I think the. And it's something I think I can continue to do a better job of is like that empathy for our guest or our consumer and making sure that, like, they're represented early enough in the process is something that I think there are times I've done it and other times where I could have done a

[A]

better job on that all the time. I always remind myself of that because whenever you do that, decisions become simple. There's nothing complicated when you. In the restaurant, seeing how it works. Well, of course that's the answer.

[B]

Yeah. We can't let this go.

[A]

Exactly. It's really obvious. Absolutely amazing. George, thank you so much, mate.

[B]

This is great pleasure. This is awesome. Big fan of your show. Appreciate what you do for the industry too.

[A]

Thank you. And really appreciate the tequila as well.

[B]

Anytime, anytime. It's never too early for a margarita.

[A]

First time and hopefully won't be the last.

[B]

Yeah, Absolutely awesome.

[A]

Thanks, man.

[B]

Thank you.

[A]

So I hope you enjoyed that episode of Uncensored CMO as much as I enjoyed making it. Now, by the way, I've got a new, new newsletter, so if you'd like to get my thoughts on the one thing that I take out from each episode every week, then do subscribe to the one thing newsletter I'd really appreciate it. Also, I have another podcast just launched, Uncensored Renegades, with the fabulous Corey Marchisoto. She is one of the world's best CMOS. She's an absolute rock star. Every week we pick one topic, spend 20 minutes trying to fix it. So check out that it's in your feed. Uncensored Renegades.

[B]

And free.

[A]

Finally, I want to give a huge thank you to my sponsor, System One. They generously provide so much support for this podcast, it would not happen without them. So big thanks and lots of love to System One. I'll see you next time.