Marketing director Renata Lamarco says the brand specializing in chicken is expanding strongly in Brazil
Launched in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, when restaurants were subject to restrictions and delivery was exploding, Aussie Grill is the brand specializing in chicken from the Bloomin’ Brands Group, also owner of Outback and Abbraccio, with sales only on iFood. In this interview, marketing director Renata Lamarco says that the bet of bringing the chain in digital format and at that moment was right, she says that sales are growing and Brazilians are a fan of chicken, and explains the intricacies of building a brand from scratch. “The brand is in strong expansion and has a lot of perspective in the Brazilian market”, says the executive.
Where did the inspiration to create the Aussie Grill chain come from?
The brand also takes inspiration from Australian food. She started in the United States and even there she calls it Aussie Grill/Outback. It’s a new format, a new cuisine, very much based on chicken, but in the US it started as a more casual brand within Outback. For Brazil, we understand that it made more sense, even given the moment of the pandemic, to bring Aussie as a delivery brand, exclusively digital.
How long has the brand been around?
In the US, it started in 2019 and here in Brazil in September 2020. The plan was to bring Aussie before the pandemic, because we saw a lot of potential. And when the pandemic started, we saw, in the first six months, a very big opportunity, because we had big kitchens in Outback and Abraccio, with a lot of space and a strong team. It was a way of optimizing that space and idle time, given that we stayed more than 100 days with the restaurants closed. The objective was to bring in a new business to find a new consumption occasion.
What has been the return?
For us, it was a big surprise, because we started an operation in the South Zone of São Paulo, in September 2020, which went very well, and in January 2021 it started to scale, and today we have 70 operations in 33 cities. But this expansion took place until March 2021. That is, with six months of life, it went from one to 70 operations. We had a great facility to expand because it was within our structure. It was much more a matter of preparing the restaurants, training to ensure that the products had the same standard, with quality, and a marketing effort to map out which were the best places, to understand the regions that had the most potential, the competition and consumption. We did a very large mapping of the market and we adjusted while the car was moving. Interestingly, when we launched the brand, it had a slightly more peppery flavor profile. We were collecting customer feedback and adapting. Even visually, we made a very exclusive positioning for this brand in Brazil.
Today it remains 100% digital?
Yes, 100% digital in Brazil, with an expansion plan both digitally and we are also evaluating a physical point. We understand that the Aussie Grill already has a very loyal audience. As it is a brand that we have all the consumption behavior data through iFood, it is possible to see that there are customers who eat Aussie Grill two or three times a week. It is an audience that fell in love with the flavor profile. We are very satisfied with the results so far. We have plans to open at least ten more virtual operations.
How is the brand building in Brazil?
At first, we started with a brand that was very similar to what existed in the US, and we understood that Brazil had a very young audience, so we needed to bring a more cool image and focused a lot on digital. We started working with Knowmads and it evolved first in terms of positioning, what was different, such as the sweet spicy flavor, which is peppery and sweet, with a great suitability for the public. This issue of eating (the chicken) by hand too. With illustrations and everything that has a more digital profile. On iFood (deliveries are made exclusively on this app), all our dishes have the ingredients written by hand, there is a whole question of handmade, which is also a differential of the brand, especially when looking at this price category. Aussie has a quality differential, which is very much an Outback and Abraccio profile, with everything prepared daily. We tried to bring this craft to the brand and launched the first film in the second half of 2020, which took the name Viaja no flavor, with a very fun and youthful feel, and has 1.5 million views on YouTube.
And how is the communication of the brand made?
We do a lot of social media, digital marketing and PR, in addition to iFood communications. We started an offline test in some markets in Brazil, which is going very well, with foreign media, in Maceió, Fortaleza, Salvador, Recife, Natal and Londrina, in addition to Florianópolis and Balneário Camboriú. This OOH plan started about two years ago and we are expanding this investment to other markets.
Does the Knowmads agency cater to Aussie?
No, Knowmads is the agency that helped us build and adapt the brand in Brazil, and the agency that serves us today is ABlab.
And why in Brazil you didn’t use the Outback surname, like in the USA?
We understood that Outback in the country has a very specific brand characteristic, which is the market leader in casual dinning, and we thought that, for a brand that was going to serve exclusively in digital and focused on chicken, it would make a lot of sense to separate the two brands , with different positions. At Outback, 80% of the business is still in the restaurant and the main courses are not chicken-focused.
So, we thought that this association would not make sense in the Brazilian market. In the United States, they have the opportunity to bring a younger brand into the Outback signature because it adds and manages to win a new audience. There, Outback is for an older audience, and here is a brand that is also super young and manages to be very inclusive in the audience.
Not even in communication is the association of Aussie with Outback made?
Do not. Of course, when we launched it on the market, we always brought the brand within the Bloomin’ Brands Group, but today we have no direct association.
But there are some videos with netizens calling Aussie ‘the Outback’s poor cousin’.
On the matter of being a cousin of Outback, we saw a lot of positive associations as well. Our lovers, influencers and Outback customers, because they believe so much in the brand, wanted to meet Aussie Grill and gave a lot of positive feedback. But it’s a totally different experience than Outback, mainly because of the Aussie being digital exclusive. Outback is all about service, experience, environment and everything else. People even joke that it’s the cousin, just like Abbreccio, but on a totally different occasion.
What is the role of communication in the brand expansion project in the country?
It is fundamental, because we are building the brand, which is only a year and a half old. And with each market we open there is an explanation, it is to really build what Aussie Gril is, the flavor profile, and what the brand brings. We started to do some social projects related to skateboarding, to extreme sports, which is something that the brand lives a lot, because it has this young personality. Communication plays a key role in brand experimentation and conversion. We understand that anyone who tastes Aussie Grill once is likely to be a customer of the brand. It’s very much about building a brand from scratch and how to gain a customer base in such diverse markets. And I think we’ve been able to do that very well, because of the way it has scaled and expanded. Every week we break sales records, I think this is a very important point that shows that the brand is in strong expansion and has a lot of perspective in the Brazilian market.
What is the profile of the brand’s audience in Brazil?
According to our research, it is a very young audience, between 18 and 25 years old, mainly. And it’s an audience that looks for these more informal occasions. We see, on reality show and game days, people asking a lot to share. It is a brand that really finds that very informal and funky moment that young people are looking for with very good quality and at the price offered.
And what is the perception of Brazilians in relation to the Aussie Grill?
From minute one of the brand we had a QR code on the packaging asking for feedback and we had many responses, including different waves. With each wave we learn something new, for example, today the market that sells the most Aussie Grill is Belo Horizonte. Hence, we keep trying to understand what is so strong about BH, because it sells more than twice as much as the second city. With these surveys, we were able to understand our target audience and learn the best way to communicate with them in a relevant way, to build the brand and values.
Are there other specialty chicken chains like Aussie Grill in the country?
There are other fast-food players with chicken, but within casual dinning, which is our category, in the exclusively digital environment, it has no direct competitor. But we understand that, as Aussie is a digital brand, any iFood competitor ends up entering this consumption option. iFood brings a much greater complexity of competition than a food court. We have very aggressive goals to delight the customer and, as iFood is our food court, we need to have a very good evaluation and ranking to be chosen, especially by someone who doesn’t know the brand yet.
In which countries is the brand also present?
In Hong Kong, Canada, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, with physical restaurants.
Can you say that Brazilians like chicken?
Much. We were even surprised in some markets, such as BH and Belém, which is the second Aussie market. This trip in the flavor that we talk about really won over those who taste it, who end up asking for it again and again. We saw that the chicken has a very strong grip, especially in some regions. But even in São Paulo and Rio, sales are strong and growing.
And what are the goals for this year?
The objective is to grow more than 10% in the number of operations and make the brand better known. We want to increase our presence on social networks, which is also growing very fast. We have almost 30 thousand followers on Instagram, growing very organically and quickly and 90% of the comments are positive. We are understanding that the customer is connecting with the brand far beyond just an offer or promotion.
