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The Challenge
Sam Susser, the owner of 350 Circle K® franchise stores, knew he wanted to go solo and rebrand his stores Stripes®, but couldn't find an agency whose prototype brand inspired him and reassured his longtime customers. That is, until he talked to BrandExtract.
If Sam left the Circle K brand behind, he knew he needed to create an entirely new identity capable of communicating the fun and accessibility inherent in his stores. The brand would also need to have big enough shoulders to carry proprietary products and sub-brands built from scratch. Susser needed a brand created from the ground up that would appeal to South Texas cities, an enormous Hispanic market and even rural Oklahoma. The new Stripes brand would roll out across 350 stores in less than six months. That meant BrandExtract had even less time to overhaul every brand detail — from carwash signage and billboards to drink cups and television spots. Equally important, Susser's $50 million restaurant business, Laredo Taco Company (located inside most Stripes stores) needed a simultaneous facelift and rebrand. Plus, Susser Holdings was about to go through an IPO and needed an investor-ready rebrand at the same time.
No small task considering that once the brand was transitioned, Susser wanted a campaign to enhance store traffic, increase profitable cross-sales, and to more fully develop all day-parts of the breakfast-oriented Laredo Taco Company.
The BrandExtract Solution
BrandExtract first developed a multi-media campaign to transfer the chain's positive brand equity from the old Circle K to the new brand, Stripes. This campaign, titled "Circles Are Out, Stripes Are In," memorably introduced the new brand as hip and fashionable, while humorously positioning Circle K as dated and passé.
With the transition complete, BrandExtract then launched a bold new positioning for Stripes, titled, "When It Hits Ya!" This TV, radio and outdoor campaign centered on the high rate of impulse purchasing inherent to convenience store shopping and gave all consumers the right to shop Stripes for whatever they wanted whenever they wanted it. The ads created iconic characters for Stripes that were leveraged into all aspects of the company's marketing.
The Results
The transition from Circle K to Stripes was nothing short of spectacular. The Stripes brand successfully launched with no transitional sales dip and an immediate market-leading level of brand awareness. Both Stripes and Laredo Taco Company then achieved a record year of sales and profits and made significant inroads toward expanding and improving merchandise and food sales by category and by day-part.
