The Rise of Chicken Tenders: Fast Food Trends

Chicken tenders' surging popularity fuels a fast-food battle for market dominance.

### The Rise of Chicken Tenders: A Culinary Battle Among Fast-Food Giants
* 🍗 Chicken tenders, also known as chicken strips or fingers, have seen a **remarkable 104% increase in grocery store sales** from 2020 to 2024, indicating their **growing popularity**.
* 💰 Fast-food chains are responding to the trend, with KFC reporting **$6 billion in chicken strip sales** in May 2024 and launching new advertising campaigns to compete in the **"chicken tender battle."**
* 📉 Despite facing sales declines in 2024, KFC aims to revitalize its brand by promoting its chicken tenders, as Yum! Brands highlights a **significant price increase in fast food**, nearly **doubling inflation rates**.
* 🏆 Raising Cane's, focusing solely on tenders, reported its **first billion-dollar quarter** in Q1 2024, showcasing the **popularity of this menu item** and its **market growth**.
* 🥡 As of Q3 2024, nearly half of U.S. restaurants serve chicken tenders, with chains innovating by **incorporating them into various dishes**, including **tacos at Taco Bell**.
* 👶 The nostalgia factor plays a significant role in the appeal of chicken tenders, as they transition from **children's meals to adult favorites**, with consumption of chicken in the U.S. **surpassing that of beef**.
* 💡 While not every company can successfully join the chicken tender trend, Raising Cane's emphasizes its **focus on quality over competition**, highlighting the **importance of core offerings for long-term success**.
* 🔍 The future of chicken tenders remains bright, with their status as an **American culinary icon** ensuring they will continue to be a staple in the fast-food industry, provided they maintain **quality and taste**.

I think you're going to have to
sit a little closer together. All right, there we go. Shall we? Shall we? This, off the bat, looks to be
the most breaded of the tenders. Chicken tenders – also known
as chicken strips – it's

juicy – chicken fillets, or
chicken fingers – cheers – are having a moment. Between 2020 and 2024, grocery store sales of the
American food staple rose 104%. And now fast-food
chains struggling with

slumping sales are jumping
on the tender bandwagon, too. In May 2024, they sold
about $6 billion worth of strips. This is the dance I always
do when I'm eating chicken tenders. I don't eat meat, so I
enlisted some of my

colleagues to help decide
if they're worth the hype and the price tag. Let's have you all try the
– the same chicken. The first one on the one on
the left. In October 2024, number
three chicken brand, KFC,

launched a new ad: "The chicken tender battle
has just begun. This is going to be big for us. Tender battle begun." As if the ad wasn't enough
to rile up competitors, on October 17th, the company
handed out free strips at

what they called "carefully
selected cities." Those were Baton Rouge, New Orleans,
and Atlanta; also known as the hometowns of close rivals
Popeyes, Chick-fil-A, and Raising Cane's. Catherine Tan-Gillespie was
hired less than two months

prior. You could assume this was her idea. We've got the best-tasting tender. We should let people know about that. I felt that we should kick off a fight. This battle is the latest attempt to turn the

struggling company around. KFC's parent company, Yum! Brands, reported the chicken chain faced same-store sales declines in the first three quarters of 2024. KFC's story is one of many. Between 2014 and 2024,

fast-food restaurants raised menu prices by an average of 60%; that's nearly double the rate of inflation. McDonald's and Popeyes raised their prices the most, and the consumer has responded by pulling back. KFC, as with many others,

"value" as of late. For me, it's putting our iconic recipe on a really modern product that so many customers want, especially the younger generation. So we think that's going to do really well for us. Now, even McDonald's, whose chicken sales alone were $25

billion in 2023, is getting in on the action. When they innovate and do something new like that, it's the real indicator that a trend has gone mainstream. The chicken battle is not new for the chicken chains.

In 2019, Popeyes ignited a chicken sandwich war after its new sandwich was so popular that it eventually helped the company overtake KFC as the number two U.S. chicken chain.  The chicken sandwich became popular like that overnight.

People wanted it and wanted to compare it against other chains. This stuff can flip overnight. But the excitement around chicken sandwiches has peaked – and now chicken tenders are all the rage. I didn't smell these.

Yeah, we should have taken, like, you know how you sniff a wine before? Like, all right, here we go, moment of truth. So we took it into our own hands to figure out which brand we thought would win the battle.

I'm gonna eat this whole thing. It's really, really tender – not to, it is a chicken tender, but it is. While a private company, Raising Cane's is the only one that focuses solely on tenders.

Founded in 1996, it has more than 840 locations and expects to reach almost 900 by the end of 2024. It reported its first billion-dollar quarter in Q1 2024, and in its most recent quarter, it grew same

store sales and traffic by double digits. Less seasoned than the first? Yeah, kind of plain-tasting. I feel like this one was made for sauce. It's almost meant to take on the flavor of whatever you're dipping it in. Yes.

– You know? After major chicken players Chick-fil-A, Popeyes, and KFC, Barclays ranks it 4th, capturing about 8% of the market. We believe consumers – have we call them customers – they're looking for everyday value.

They're not looking for a gimmick, and we can deliver that. So we are pretty bullish about where we are and how we will continue to deliver on that promise. It's awesome. Wingstop is another major player whose

tender offering has proven successful... Some of the smaller, tender-focused competitors have also become some of the fastest-growing concepts in America, thanks to the cutlets' popularity. Mhm. Definitely has more flavor than the other ones.

This one's the winner, just from looking at the three pieces of chicken. My guess was this is Chick-fil-A. As of Q3 2024, nearly half of all U.S. restaurants carry chicken tenders.

And many are innovating by offering them in other dishes; like in salads, wraps, and sandwiches. Mexican-inspired chain Taco Bell, which shares the same parent company as KFC, has been testing them in its tacos.

Everyone kind of going back to 2019 took that lesson. They kind of saw, like, there's so much growth happening here. There's like this viral menu item. Let's go in and get a piece of it ourselves.

According to some reports, the Puritan Backroom restaurant in Manchester, New Hampshire, invented the chicken tender in 1974 after its owner wanted to find a use for the one leftover piece of chicken—the tenderloin, the meat closest to the rib cage.

His concept was simple: marinate it, deep fry it, and serve it with some sauce. Simple yet delicious – a few years later, Burger King took chicken tenders mainstream as a way to compete against McDonald's success with chicken nuggets.

Chicken tenders, real fillets of all-white meat chicken breasts, not from bits and pieces of chicken like McNuggets. They first started off as more of a kids' menu item. And I think that is one of the big reasons why

adults tend to love them today. Now you can get them in a kind of adultified form. If I'm going to eat out or order food, I want something that's like, better than what I would make at home.

And these are better than what I make at home. Now they're everywhere: at schools, birthday parties, gas stations, diners, baseball games – you name it. And tenders are a hit at home, too; chicken producer

Perdue says that with fast-food inflation up, sales of its frozen tenders are up 64% in 2024 compared to 2020. Tenders are easy and cheap to make. You don't need a lot of manpower or have to handle

fresh produce like lettuce, tomatoes, or bread, and their versatility allows them to pair with different flavor combinations and sauces; something which also helps drive more sales. It's pretty simple to prepare. Throw them in your fryer along with the fries you're probably already

frying up anyway, and call it a day. From the consumer's point of view, they make sense, too. They're filling, practical, and easy to pick up on the go. Plus, people perceive them as a healthier

alternative to nuggets, which are processed, or beef burgers. And then there's, of course, the nostalgia factor. Well, I did grow up a picky eater. I was a kid that would go to, like, a fancy restaurant

and would order chicken tenders. They were a graduation from chicken nuggets, which are for kids. Chicken overall has been the fastest-growing category in the U.S. for over a decade. In 2023, U.S.

consumption was double the amount of beef. One study showed Gen Z and Gen X prefer chicken tenders, while Boomers and Millennials ranked them second. How do you remove the reputation of being a kid's meal? It's because you can

play with nostalgia. It's the thing that McDonald's has done with the Adult Happy Meal. All these elements, you know, playing with your emotions are ways to be re-attracting consumers and make them reconnect to

their own childhood. And that helps boost up the traffic. I think this one was my winner. I would say it would be between this one and the one on the end. I think this looked like KFC to me because of the breading. It appears more

Get like a bucket of chicken. So that's what it looks like the most to me. Not every company can be successful when participating in a trend. It could risk hurting its reputation if it doesn't get the product right, or spend too much money marketing it

at the expense of something else. Like Starbucks and its olive-oil infused coffee that it discontinued in November 2024. There's a reason Raising Cane's has only one product; though it says it doesn't want to be involved in

whatever "chicken tender" battle is happening between other chains. You know, if you're consistently doing one thing and one thing only, you get really good at it. So we are exceptional at serving very high-quality,

craveable chicken finger meals. We're not in a war. We're not competing. We're not reacting. We focus on ourselves. That's all. If this is not your core offering and you're entering into a space because you have a scale and you think

you could be replicating a successful recipe from somewhere else, it doesn't mean that you're going to be successful. It tastes vaguely like cough syrup. I don't like that. And for consumers, it also comes down to price.

For the meals we ordered in New York City, only KFC's was under $10, though Raising Cane's includes other items like coleslaw and bread. I would pay up to probably $10 for maybe 4 or 5

Tenders. For a value meal with tenders, I'd be wanting to spend about eight bucks. I felt like this one kind of tasted the cheapest because it just didn't taste like much of anything to me. I would agree with that; the lack of flavor in this one

made it taste cheap, but it was good chicken, and chicken's expensive. That's the actual expensive part. So, I'm kind of torn. It's still early to gauge impact; chicken tenders are also a very U.S.-centered favorite.

And this is KFC's first quarter with the new product. The company said it took two years to develop this latest version. Good consistency. I love chicken fingers. Chicken tenders. Sorry. When we sampled them in New York and LA, we had lines

around the block. I think it is going to be huge for us, absolutely. And I think we are still going to see this amazing fried chicken category innovate. Overall, putting efforts into an already beloved food item is pretty low risk, but potentially high reward.

And even if the spotlight fades, tenders will remain a classic, much like burgers and fries; it is, after all, an American icon at this point. But success in longevity also hinges on taste, and there can only be one clear winner, and that's up to

consumers. KFC. Wow! I know my Chick-fil-A. I'm surprised.

Why Fast-Food Companies Are Going All In On Chicken Tenders

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The Rise of Chicken Tenders and Market Competition

Chicken tenders' popularity is surging, with grocery sales increasing significantly between 2020 and 2024.

Fast-food chains are capitalizing on this trend, generating billions in sales.

KFC launched a marketing campaign to boost sales and compete with rivals.

KFC's campaign included free chicken tenders in select cities, targeting competitors' hometowns.

This marketing strategy is part of KFC's effort to reverse declining sales.

Fast-food restaurants significantly increased menu prices between 2014 and 2024.

Consumers responded to price increases by reducing spending.

Even McDonald's, with substantial chicken sales, is entering the chicken tender market.

The chicken tender trend follows previous chicken sandwich wars, indicating mainstream appeal.

A blind taste test was conducted to compare different brands' chicken tenders.

Raising Cane's, a tender-focused chain, is highlighted for its success and market share.

Market analysis reveals consumer preferences for value and consistent quality.

Smaller, tender-focused competitors are experiencing rapid growth.

The widespread adoption of chicken tenders in various dishes is noted.

History and Cultural Significance of Chicken Tenders

The origin of chicken tenders is traced back to a restaurant in 1974.

Burger King played a role in popularizing chicken tenders.

Chicken tenders transitioned from a kids' menu item to a broader appeal.

The convenience and versatility of chicken tenders contribute to their popularity.

Nostalgia and perceived health benefits influence consumer preferences.

Chicken is a leading protein source in the US, surpassing beef consumption.

Marketing strategies, such as nostalgia, are used to appeal to different generations.

The risks of participating in trends are discussed, highlighting the importance of product quality and marketing.

Raising Cane's strategy of focusing on a single product is analyzed.

Pricing and consumer perceptions of value are discussed.

The long-term impact of the chicken tender trend is considered.

The success of chicken tenders is attributed to various factors.

The potential for future innovation in the fried chicken category is highlighted.

The long-term success of chicken tenders depends on consumer preferences and taste.