- It was worth the hype. Not a letdown.
- "Sounds like someone just ate one of our biscuits.
'Cause y'all look thirsty." Oh my God, Popeyes.
♪ (industrial intro) ♪
- (FBE) So, there's a sandwich that is taking
the internet by storm. - There is.
I've heard a lot about it.
- Is this the infamous chicken sandwich from Popeyes?
- (FBE) Before we get into it, we want you to take a bite
and let us know if it's the best chicken sandwich
you've ever had. - Okay.
I'm really excited to do this because I have not had
the sandwich and I've went to three different Popeyes.
You don't know my struggle for this.
I've really been out here hunting for this damn bird.
- Is this really it? It's three ingredients.
- Oh my God. It was worth the hype.
Not a letdown.
- It's good. I don't think I'd go
out of my way to get it.
- Popeyes makes a pretty good chicken and this is no exception.
It's really nice and the texture's really cool,
'cause it's well fried and the chicken itself
is really tasty, actually.
- I think it's hella good. Yeah, that [bleep] slaps.
I like how simple it is. I like how it's just chicken
and pickles. I don't know if it's the best,
but it's up there.
- Best chicken sandwich I ever had?
Nah, it definitely ain't this.
- I wish it had cheese. I don't know, more mayo?
It's a chicken sandwich. What was supposed to be
so special about it?
- The chicken breast really is good.
I mean, Popeyes makes good food, but they really did something
with this.
- (FBE) So, in case you haven't heard, Popeyes released
a new chicken sandwich which has been insanely popular
and spawning many memes and causing chaos
across the country. - Dude, that's the way to go.
That is the best advertising.
- (FBE) Now that you've tried the sandwich,
we're gonna show you some videos and some
of the memes around the sandwich. - Ooh, okay.
- (anchor 1) All right, well the hype surrounding the release--
- News?
- "Chicken sandwich craze shuts down local Popeyes."
- (anchor 1) The release of a chicken sandwich continues.
The marketing behind the new-- - "Popeyes Pandemonium."
- (anchor 1) New Popeyes chicken sandwich is now
leading to long lines and also reports--
the company saying reports of shortages.
- How can there be shortages?
- What is wrong with people?
- (anchor 2) Outside of the Henderson Popeyes
where lines drew police attention, Sean.
- Police had to show up.
- (reporter) It's odd, Trisha. You're going to have to excuse
the pun here, but this Popeyes in Henderson along
Stephanie Street has been popping all day long.
- Popping.
- (reporter) Has been popping all day long.
- No, stop it.
- (reporter) Closed early yesterday and opened late today
because of these sandwiches and Henderson says
the police were called here four times.
- Oh, whoa.
- (reporter) The police were called here four times yesterday
just to deal with the traffic. - Oh, just to deal with
the traffic, okay.
- (reporter) It's gotta be crazy to wait in a line like this.
- What, lines? Nah.
- I don't know. I don't eat chicken sandwiches
that much, so I guess I'm not the person to ask,
but it wasn't that good.
- (reporter) Is it worth it? - (woman) Yeah, it is.
- Yeah, it is totally worth it.
- (reporter) The sandwich the internet has declared
a taste challenge to the chicken sandwich holy grail,
Chick-fil-A. - How did they not expect this?
People are crazy.
- (reporter) I gotta know the verdict here.
- (woman) Popeyes. - (reporter) It's better?
- (woman) It's better, yeah. - Yeah, it is better.
- It definitely has more flavor. I haven't had Chick-fil-A
in years, though. You know why.
- (reporter) The rush of chicken lovers has
its consequences though. There's not enough sandwich
to feed them all. - Oh my God.
Can you imagine running out of chicken sandwich?
That'd be so tragic.
- (reporter) Those who didn't jump in line will be waiting
for a restock. - Ooh, dang.
It's serious. People are wanting to try this
chicken sandwich.
- Wendy's has really good chicken sandwiches, too
and so does Chick-fil-A and I don't know why
we all need to swamp these poor, poor, poor Popeyes workers.
- It's an important story and it's a hot ticket item.
It's like a Beyonce concert ticket. If you miss it the first go around,
you might not get it again.
- "Bun plus chicken plus pickles equals all the love
for the original." Come on, Chick-fil-A.
Don't be insecure, all right? Let another company
have their chicken moment.
- Literally, it's the three ingredients.
- It's like IHOP telling another restaurant saying that
they stole their pancake idea and it's like, pancakes have been
around way before IHOP and chicken sandwiches
have been around way before Chick-fil-A.
- "Y'all good?" It's like a chicken fight.
- All the fast food restaurants now, they're all kinda sassy.
- Fast food social media marketing is just a thing now
and the meme treatment is what's happening between these.
- "8/12, Launched new chicken sandwich.
Goes mostly unnoticed. 8/19, Chick-fil-A tweets
calling the sandwich the original. Popeyes chicken quote tweets it.
Goes viral. Sold out across the US.
8/25, 23 million in ad value, zero ad spent."
Wait, so this whole thing popped off because Chick-fil-A
tweeted at them?
- This is good business for both of them.
Popeyes is busy. I'm sure Chick-fil-A is busy.
- It's all over news, all over social media,
so everybody's just putting on there and they ain't spending nothing.
We did free advertising and we ain't got to do nothing.
Social media gonna do it for us.
- Chick-fil-A versus Popeyes.
- Damn, look at these moves.
- I just think it's hilarious that he's in the red shirt,
which just makes it better.
- Okay, back bend.
- There it is.
- Come on, Popeyes.
- Oh my God. Oh, oh, oh, ay.
- Yes, and this is southern. This is in Louisiana,
so it's fitting for Popeyes.
- (announcer) Jackson junior. Show him some love.
- Now you're gonna spawn the memes of the comparisons
and having to do with things that have nothing to do
with the chicken sandwich itself.
- Everyone loves Chick-fil-A, which is what also confuses me,
'cause everyone on Twitter, they're always talking about,
"Oh, Chick-fil-A's customer service and Chick-fil-A's so good."
But then now it's like they're all hating on it.
What happened?
- When all the buzz is going on, Chick-fil-A took a little L.
That's why they tweeted out, 'cause they were feeling
some kind of way. That's all right.
Took an L for a little bit. They'll bounce back.
- "Y'all notice McDonald's ain't saying [bleep] about their
$1 McChicken. They are staying in their lane.
Sitting quietly waiting for a French fry debate to start."
True.
- True. McDonald's has the best
French fries. I mean, everyone knows that.
No one would even dare to argue that.
- The McChicken is an OG. It's not the best tasting,
but it can get the job done.
- People love McDonald's French fries.
Dang, honestly I wish they chimed in.
I would love to see all the fast food chains
just talk [bleep] to each other. - (FBE) Speaking of.
- Oh my God. I just--
I literally was just asking for this.
- "Y'all here fighting about which of these fools
has the best chicken sandwich." That's what I'm talking about.
Wendy's. Man, Wendy's is the [bleep].
I'm trying to tell y'all.
- By the way, it's really not. Sorry, Wendy's,
but I like your pluck. She's plucky.
- Wendy's Twitter really takes the cake here
because they're so swift with it.
- Oh, Popeyes. "Sounds like someone just ate
one of our biscuits. 'Cause y'all look thirsty."
Oh my God, Popeyes. Popeyes, let's go.
I'm all team Popeyes right now.
- I'm glad that they were able to get Wendy's together,
but also make fun of themselves in the process.
- Oh my God, who's running the Twitters?
Who? 'Cause they're so good
at clapping back. This is amazing.
Twitter beef really is the best advertising.
And it doesn't even cost any money to advertise,
which is so crazy.
- "Y'all, we love that you love the sandwich.
Unfortunately, we're sold out for now."
- Dude, Popeyes is just capitalizing on this.
- (man) The lines are crazy still, 'till five in the morning.
- Humble brag.
- What the-- what?
Five in the morning?
- (woman) Oh my God, that's ridiculous.
- Place a bid for $8,000?
- No way.
- (man) Five million people, six million people on social media
talking about this sandwich is good.
- Yep.
- Wait, it's been a week. What the heck?
- (man) We're sold out of chicken sandwiches.
We sold out in four hours. - Four hours.
- You ate them all. See, I like that.
- This is amazing.
- Oh, okay.
- I love that they put emojis in here.
- They're really capitalizing on this.
- (man) Love that chicken from Popeyes.
- Dude, this is a huge accomplishment.
- This is just gonna fuel anticipation for
the second go around. You never wanna miss out
on a movement. This is a movement.
- It's just the law of supply and demand,
so to keep it all up in the headlines,
you gotta minimize your supply to maximize your demand,
so some smart little chicky over there got the message.
- (FBE) So as you can see, this sandwich has been
all over the internet and the news
and is becoming the new hot item across America.
- I mean, it makes sense. Chicken sandwiches
are a classic and this is the best version of it
out there right now.
- (FBE) So, many people have been trying to get
their hands on them that when we got your sandwich,
we had to go to several locations as some were sold out
and after that, we even waited in line for over an hour
just to get one for you. - You guys are the best.
- I feel very, very special and lucky actually.
I'm gonna take the rest of that home and sell it on eBay.
- (FBE) So, why do you think this blew up the way it did?
- I think it blew up the way that it did
because of social media. In particular, I have to shout out
black Twitter because that's where-- it takes a snowflake
to cause an avalanche. That is where it started
and it really is a good sandwich. I like that it's breaded well
and it's seasoned well. That's where competitors
might fall short.
- People just like Twitter beef. They like when big companies
fight with each other and then by doing that,
they're promoting their product and then people are
curious about it.
- Chicken is just a universally good type of food.
It's just universally loved and sandwiches, I guess,
are universally loved, so good for Popeyes.
- Because of social media, one thing becomes
super popular and then everyone starts to gravitate
towards that thing and when it's things like food
or things that are really limited, people wanna jump on that
and they wanna jump on fast. This is almost no different
from the Rick and Morty Szechuan sauce we saw
a few years ago.
- People spend so much money on making these big budget
productions for commercials to get people to buy it
but this was just spread by the people for the people
and it's the best chicken sandwich out there.
It's crazy how-- Chick-fil-A even indirectly
endorsed them. Chick-fil-A kinda just took the fall
so that Popeyes could run.
- (FBE) This internet beef between the two companies.
- Chicken, not beef. - (FBE) May not be real,
but the comparison of the two sandwiches has led to
rise in sales for both companies, exponentially for Popeyes.
- Okay, well at least it's been good for Chick-fil-A too.
It's not a total loss.
- (FBE) There have been some reports stating that this trend
has given Popeyes 23 million dollars worth of advertising,
'causing many of their stores to sell out early
in the morning and then gaining crowds that they never even
had before. - Wow, that is insane.
- (FBE) Do you think that the internet trends
and memes could become a new way of advertising?
- It already is. Absolutely, there's--
sometimes, it's done really well and it's done with a voice
that appeals to audiences and then sometimes
it's done tone deaf and it's more corny
than it is helpful.
- Advertising via something people already scrolling
through their stuff with not ads,
but just actual content that's interesting and cool,
I think that's great. I think that's better
than regular ads.
- It's crazy how over-- how people can just
gain overnight success because of the internet
and I used to think it was just people
that could become famous overnight, but now
it's businesses.
- That's probably the best way, especially to reach
a younger demographic because they won't even know
they're being advertised to. It's like product placement,
but it's meme placement. I said it first.
Meme placement. That's the new term
for all the marketing classes. My name's Kim Luther.
- (FBE) So finally, now that you've had the sandwich,
seen the memes, and learned a bit more
about it, do you think the sandwich is worth the hype?
- The sandwich is definitely not worth the hype,
but if you're hungry, you're gonna eat it.
- No. I still don't think it's
worth the hype.
- Not really. I prefer to get something else
on Popeyes' menu.
- I do. Popeyes now, they're deep south.
They know their fried chicken, man. It shows.
- I don't think so. I probably wouldn't wait
an hour for that sandwich.
- No, it's not. It was just a chicken sandwich
to me. It tasted good.
I wouldn't wait more than 15 minutes for it.
- I think it's worth the hype. Seeing people so hyped up
about it is making me so hyped up about it.
- It's really, really good, but should it be
selling out places, closing down Popeyes,
whatever? Probably not.
As much as I think it's cool that this
whole thing happened and it's a really interesting
case study in advertising and marketing,
it is just hype and hype isn't real.
In ten minutes, it's gonna be gone.
- I would say yes because it's a good sandwich.
Thank to you all here, I get to tell people
that I had the first go around of the Popeyes sandwich.
- Thanks for watching this episode of Adults React
and shoutout to Bradyyy.
- Subscribe and hit the bell so you never miss an episode.
- Thanks for watching, bye.
- Hey guys, Vartuhi here, producer at FBE.
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