Quasi-Fast

Fast food is not exclusive to drive-throughs, there is a growing market for restaurants like Chipolte, Qdoba, Noodles and Company, and Panera Bread. These restaurants are geared towards a slightly higher socioeconomic class because of the pricing of their goods. Do these restaurants break advertising stereotypes? Chipolte, possibly the tip of the spear in this growing industry, spends very little capital on advertising. In fact, Chipolte spends less on advertising annually than McDonalds spends in 48 hours (Burrito-Buzz 1). Chipolte relies mainly on word of mouth advertising, and their physical advertising consists mainly of billboards that depict the burrito without depicting any people. Qdoba follows in Chipolte’s footsteps with word of mouth advertising and also avoids gender stereotyping by removing people from the picture all together. Qdoba's recent advertising campaign is called the "Burrito Stimulus" (Fields 1). It appeals to people of both genders and all races, offering their burritos at a cheaper price. Noodles and Company spends comparable revenue on advertising. Noodles spends most of the capital it would spend on advertising on quality ingredients. Panera Bread’s advertising also avoids portraying either of the sexes and only portrays its product by itself. The correlation of the lack of advertising and therefore the lack of gender stereotyping shows that these successful companies do not need to rely on that marketing tactic. Instead, the product of these companies remains gender neutral, which maximizes the ability for capital.

Works Cited

Business Week. "Burrito Buzz—And So Few Ads". 12 March 2007. Accessed on 15 November 2010

Fields, Timothy. Brand Week. "In Tough Times, Qdoba Offers a 'Burrito Stimulus'". 8 July 2008. Accessed on 30 November 2010