Source : THE AGE NEWS
Chris Green, the chief executive of Hungry Jack’s, was once a sceptic of the grand claim made by the Australian burger chain he now leads. “I did think it was a slogan before I started at Hungry Jacks,” he said. “What was very, very clear to me [was] … the product is actually far superior.”
Modern stores and an updated menu are key to growing Hungry Jack’s, its CEO believes. Credit: Hungry Jack’s/Supplied
Even if the claim was justified (and many would say it isn’t), selling a decent product is only part of the job: the fast food executive has been driving a back-to-basics approach that aims to place Hungry Jack’s second to none on the frontiers of good service, modern, clean stores, and menu offerings.
“You can’t stay the same; people expect you to change and evolve,” Green said. “[Hungry Jack’s is] probably in the best position that it’s ever been.”
The 53-year-old Australian burger chain is known as the local rival to global juggernaut McDonald’s, which has twice as many stores (over 1000) as Hungry Jack’s (460). Cost of living pressures have hit middle-of-the-road restaurants particularly hard, pushing customers towards more affordable alternatives of casual dining and fast food. Competition is fierce, with recent ASX entrant Guzman y Gomez signalling aggressive expansion plans.
Hungry Jack’s CEO Chris Green had exited the fast food industry – but then met founder Jack Cowin.
Citing an industry report, Green says the burrito maker and Hungry Jack’s are the two fastest-growing quick-service restaurant chains in the country. Green declined to provide figures on the company’s exact revenue but said it was “close to $2 billion” and said sales at Hungry Jack’s grew 10 to15 per cent in the 2024 financial year.
He estimates about a fifth of Guzman y Gomez’s growth is coming from new stores. “The hardest growth sometimes, is growing your existing restaurants, and that’s what we’re doing.”
Fast food preferences have shifted over time: the dominance of beef burgers has given way to chicken, driven by price as well as changing demographics. “We were probably a little bit slow to get into the chicken market,” said Green. The menu has since expanded to include a range of fried chicken options as well as “tropical bursties” – sugary popping balls that can be added to frozen drinks as a topping – that tap into the popularity of bubble tea. Hungry Jack’s also joins the list of food outlets doubling down on breakfast offerings in a bid to net more customers throughout the day.
Moving with trends and generating viral moments have become decisive for sales: a partnership with Belgian biscuit company Lotus Biscoff created such high demand for the caramel-laden soft serve sundae that the item had to be paused temporarily to air freight more sauce into the country.
“That social media stuff – it can do either a lot worse than you expected, or a lot better,” Green said. The Biscoff Storm was relaunched in early November. “The same thing happened. Really popular, ran out.”
Store refurbishments have been a key focus as digital self-serve menus become the norm for fast food outlets. Over $70 million a year is being funnelled into new restaurants as well as renovating existing ones to keep pace with its main rival.
“There’s a lot of money that’s going into [McDonald’s] restaurants, so we’re trying to catch up,” he said. “Where we’re really trying to differentiate ourselves is service.”
To incentivise this, Hungry Jack’s rewards some high-performing employees with better wages. “Our goal is to pay our restaurant managers two to three times the industry to be the best restaurant operators in the industry,” said Green.
A typical restaurant manager will earn anywhere between $60-80,000. “Most of them [are earning] above $100 [thousand] and some we’ve got some people earning around $200,000 a year.” Late last year, four restaurant managers who broke sales records were taken out to dinner by eponymous founder Jack Cowin himself at an upscale Italian restaurant.
“It’s really about them running really, really good restaurants, looking after their people, looking after the guest. And then if the top line grows and the bottom line grows, they get rewarded.”
Green spent nearly three decades of his career at McDonald’s, starting as a burger flipper and winding up in charge of operations in Australia, the US, Malaysia and South Africa at various points. He went on to lead Red Rooster for three years before deciding to exit the fast food industry until he was convinced to return by Cowin, who is also chairman and majority shareholder of pizza giant Domino’s’ Australian operations.
Green intends to grow the store footprint to 600 stores, but says the rollout will be carefully considered to avoid new stores cannibalising existing ones once a certain scale is achieved.
The business will have to contend with not only local competitors but international players such as US chain Wendy’s, which made national headlines in early 2023 after announcing it was having a second crack at the Australian market. Its first attempt resulted in the sale of its remaining 11 stores to none other than Hungry Jack’s.
“We welcome competition,” he said in a refrain oft-repeated by business executives. “They sort of own the quality space in the US. What I would say [is] in Australia, we own the quality space.” Grill’d is a strong third competitor, he noted. “I think there is limited space or opportunity for somebody else, but good luck to them.”
In any case, the chief executive is not afraid to hold a position that some Australians would hotly contest.
“Australia is one of the most sophisticated coffee markets in the world,” he said. One of? “New Zealand is number one.”
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