After declaring peace in the chicken wars (with its eight-piece nuggets) last year, Popeyes is in a fighting mood again. The chain is trying to get under the skin of its competitors with a new campaign for its Blackened Chicken Sandwich, a newly created menu item it says was four years in the making. 

Popeyes is sharing the ingredient formula for the sandwich and is poking fun at how competitors might copy it through a series of comedic spots from agency Gut Miami. The non-breaded sandwich includes Cajun and Creole seasoning. 

One ad, “The Mole,” shows how a new employee has been sent in to steal Popeyes’ secrets. His disguise falls off as he’s reaching for something on a shelf and the other employees rip his fake name tag off to show that he works for its competitor, the “Other chicken chain.”

Another spot, “The Snitch,” shows another infiltrator standing whispering the ingredients into a phone as two Popeyes employees walk up. “They try to copy us every time,” says one employee to the other.

The campaign will run until Dec. 22 across the U.S. The sandwich is also launching in Canada. “Relative to what we’ve done in the past, it's a digital-first campaign,” said Popeyes Chief Marketing Officer Jeff Klein, who joined the brand five months ago from Little Caesars.

Ads will run on TikTok, Instagram and Facebook along with the brand’s first activation on Reddit. The media buy also includes streaming platforms and traditional TV, as well as out-of-home and experiential activations. 

'Definitely tongue-in-cheek'

Popeyes is trying to recapture the marketing magic from the original chicken sandwich wars, which began in 2019 when it backed its new sandwich with some quick-thinking tactics. That included a simple but viral tweet—“y’all good”—in response to a Chick-fil-A tweet that promoted its own chicken sandwich. 

Soon, competitors including McDonald’s, Wendy’s and even Restaurant Brands International sibling Burger King were coming out with new sandwiches.

The “wars'' prompted the brand’s largest period of growth to date. Klein called the period “the catalyst to new store growth (and) new consumers trying our products.” Popeyes’ sales have increased by 25% since 2019, according to a transcript of parent company RBI's second-quarter earnings call, and U.S. same-store sales rose 1.3% in the third quarter. 

“We certainly want to leverage the equity that we’ve built with” the chicken wars, said Klein. The recipe sharing is “definitely tongue-in-cheek” and is meant to poke fun at how the food industry “takes itself a little too seriously,” he said.

The return to the chicken wars is “long overdue,” said Gary Stibel, founder and CEO of the New England Consulting Group. While Popeyes sparked the original battle, he suggested it could have done more with it. Popeyes “just backed off—they became just another player rather than the leader,” he said. “Many competitors have benefited from Popeyes focusing on chicken sandwiches,” said Stibel. “Competitors better react, and they will.”

Popeyes is not giving up much by sharing the recipe, said Michael Cohen, global chief data and analytics officer with holding company Plus Company. The competition is more about how brands can raise their profile, and “the only way a competitor could actually steal the recipe is with another social media stunt,” he said.

But will the brand’s competitors bite? Popeyes has ruled out directly engaging with other RBI-owned brands, a spokesperson said. Those include Burger King, Tim Hortons and Firehouse Subs, which all have chicken sandwiches on their menus.

The chicken sandwich category is in need of some new attention—sales fell by 3.9% to $9.2 billion in the 12 months that ended in September, according to data from research firm NPD Group, which analyzed quick service restaurants. 

Brands including Arby's, Burger King, McDonald's and Panera Bread are still spending millions of dollars advertising chicken sandwiches, according to estimated national TV ad data from iSpot. Arby's upped its spend from $1 million last year to $11.3 million this year to date, while Panera Bread has increased spending from $4.3 million to $25.5 million in the same period. Panera’s newly launched chicken sandwiches have become its most popular sandwich item, according to CEO Niren Chaudhary, cited in the Wall Street Journal in August.

By comparison, in the same period, McDonald’s and Burger King have decreased their chicken sandwich TV ad spending from $61.7 million to $5 million and from $34.2 million to $21.9 million, respectively, according to iSpot.