I can’t figure out the deal with the TGI Friday’s brand strategy in Taiwan. It’s attached to the rather expensive and halfway decent (by Taiwan western food standards) chain restaurant, rather bad ghost kitchen fare on delivery apps, and even worse stuff like this. Do they just sell the brand to the anyone, with no concern to what they slap it on, as long as it’s vaguely American-ish? You’d think they’d want to maintain some sort of value to their brand given the prices they charge at the restaurants.
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Yes. Dont think too much, they are in it for money not to bring high qaulity food to every corner of earth.
Same goes for 711.
Every company is in it for the money. That goes without saying. Usually, though, part of the money strategy is maintaining the value of the brand— unless the brand value is already gone, but in that case their restaurants would be closing.
In the US, Friday’s isn’t known for high quality food anyway, but in Taiwan locals seem to love their restaurants, which are rather expensive for casual western chains. You wouldn’t want those customers to start associating the name with bad 7-11 food.
It would be a mistake to think the “value” of their brand equates to quality. Thats not the value definiion they follow. Comfortable, fast, convenient, pretty…yes. but ulimately low cost ingredients for massive markups is the value they define their brands with.
It certainly equates to a different level of quality than bad 711 food, at least in the minds of the customers who buy 700NT entrees at their restaurants. They’re not just doing that for the comfy booths.
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If the customer thinks the are getting the same qualty at 711 in a microwaved plastic bag thats been sittin in the freezer for extended periods of time as compared to 700 (hopefully slightly more fresh) meal in the restaraunt…i have no words.
Even their restaraunt is highly marked up cheap commodities. People are paying for the atmosphere (their rent, decoraions, ac, lighting etc etc) and service. Dont ge me wrong, i eat there sometimes too when i am up north. Its nice to go. But i ts healthy to be real about what we are purchasing and probably good to be real about why as well 
Cool story. None of it changes my point about it being a bizarre branding strategy. It’s probably not going to be good for them in the long run.
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Indeed. How to rapidly devalue a brand.
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Nono i completely agree with you on that. But same with lamborghini, mercedes, porsche etc the real money is in cheaper large volume produc,tion. I doubt fridays gives a crap about its reputation that much in taiwan compared to more sales.
They are like Trump…
Could it be a move of desperation, to get any kind of attention? I never hear TGIFs mentioned at all by my students; the chain could be fighting a fade into irrelevance, as Korean and Japanese restaurants come to dominate local tastes.
Now that you mention it, it has been awhile (maybe 4-5 years?) since anybody dragged me to one. They seemed to be quite popular there for awhile, though, like Chilis, Texas Roadhouse, and Hooters. (All places you couldn’t have paid me to visit in the US.)
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Maybe a chicken or the egg situation? They lost popluarity due to decreased quality OR they sold out because they became less popular and corporate still requires certain profit margins. Either way, ingredients are soso and ther prices are high. Its obvious where its going, especially when you see cheaper wings at 7 by that brand lol.
In other 7 news. An amazing new pizza hit the shelf in their “worlds most ingredients pizza line” haha.
If you multiply the price of 711 pizza slices by 8 per pizza and compare to a decent restaraunt…ya…
I saw that before and was so curious and I’m still curious.
o_O What is that abomination?
I was going to have this for a snack
But I don’t think I want any kind of fish product that has so many preservatives that it will last in a plastic bag for over a year.
You remember our bad pizza conversation before? Take THAT! If we ever have that beer, i will pay for this if you will swallow it…or we have some beers and watch a stranger eat it. Looks pretty friggen bad. And the ingredients list isnt helping its cause much either 
Even I have a line @explant
I’m not that picky. But goddamn…
We will have that beer, but we gotta find a time.
We should bring @topofan too.
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Why oh why, there is soo much good Napolitano style pizza in Taiwan…
At worst can still get a pizza from pizza Rock delivered. It’s not Italian in any way but passable…
There isn’t much passable to eat at 7-11 if you want healthy stuff…
I guess you’re both in Taipei, I’m in Taichung but surely will pass by in Taichung some day again
We have finally hit Marco’s limit point on pizza! 
Guy
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