Boondini's Archives - The Marketing Sage

Boondini’s is Quirky, Weird and Closing

Jeff Slater — Sun, 23 Jun 2019 16:00:25 +0000

There is a beautiful marketing lesson to learn from a local sandwich shop that has lasted more than thirty years in Raleigh, North Carolina and is closing at the end of 2019.

My regular order is almost like my mantra that a transcendental meditation guru once whispered into my ear.

I’ll have a half a chicken salad on toasted sunflower seed bread with lettuce, tomatoes, onions, mustard, and mayonnaise. And a bag of salt and vinegar chips. Ommm.

When I first moved to Raleigh and went to work at GoodMark Foods (the Slim Jim Folks), my friends George and Andy and I would eat there at least once each week. My daughters, Sarah and Fanny, would go for lunch frequently after school and had to get a side order of ranch for sandwich dipping. Even Lindsay, who cuts my hairs, was sharing with me how much she loves to go with her kids and husband too and especially enjoyed their crushed ice.

When was the last time someone told you that one of the things they loved about a sandwich shop was the crushed ice?

The Test of Time

Why does a local joint like Boondini’s stand the test of time? What is the secret sauce that makes it special? What do they do that keeps customers coming back and talking about it with friends?

They aren’t pretending to be anything. They are Boondini’s.

The owner never hired a marketing agency to market the business. The brand is true to Billy; the 68-year old owner is a part curmudgeon and part Luddite. He just wakes up each day and comes to work and makes great sandwiches and talks about college sports and fishing with his clientele. No pretense. Nothing splashy.

His original Boondini’s, named for a step-niece, was downtown and moved to North Raleigh in the late ’80s.

How To Boondini

They write orders on paper and pen, nothing digital about this place.
The food is consistently excellent.
Boondini’s has a simple system for ordering and sticks to it.
They don’t run dopey promotions that seem to fail or fall flat. Occasionally they’ll have a deal where you get soup with your half sandwich. Nothing out of character.
The décor isn’t special. It is just the sandwich shop’s décor. No one comes for the ambiance, yet everyone comes because of the comfortable, inviting ambiance. They have some old children’s books and Highlights to distract the kids.
It hasn’t tried to keep up with the time. It is throwback Thursday before that was a thing.
Each sandwich is overstuffed without worrying about cost control. Billy and crew want people to get plenty to eat. Prices are reasonable, in fact, I always thought he underpriced what he sold.

Your Inner Boondini’s

When a brand knows who they are and doesn’t try to pretend to be something different, people come back for more and tell their friends.

Marketing and branding aren’t something you force onto a product, service, or establishment. Your efforts need to resonate with an audience, and then the trick is a wash, rinse, and repeat – for thirty years.

When Billy’s told the public that his lease was up, and the place would close at the end of the year, I was both sad and filled with joy. I like brands that live and thrive because of an individual. Not everything needs to live on in perpetuity. You can read more about Boondini’s in my daughter Fanny’s cookbook Orange, Lavender & Figs where she regals the joy of chicken salad sandwiches.

Like a unique person, a business can reflect the life and peculiar ways of one human being. That helps define the brand and makes it special and perfectly different.

The marketing lesson – don’t be afraid to be weird and reflect who you are through your brand. You’ll attract people who want a side of quirky with their chicken salad.

You can set up a time to chat with me about your marketing challenges using my calendar. Email me jeffslater@themarketingsage.com Call me. 919 720 0995. Visit my website at www.themarketingsage.com The conversation is free, and we can explore working together.

Photos by Jeffrey Slater

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My Name is not #321

Jeff Slater — Wed, 09 Jul 2014 11:30:00 +0000

McDonalds Restaurant
Zebulon, North Carolina
July 6th, 2014

Dear Mr. McDonald,

I’m the guy who shows up at your Zebulon, North Carolinarestaurant to buy a Southwest Grilled Chicken Salad every now and again. I’m not a big fan of your food but I work in an area that doesn’t have a lot of lunch choices. Okay, it has almost no place to eat. This small town 30 minutes east of Raleigh isn’t something to yelp about. The big news in the last few years was a new Subway opening in the Wal-Mart.

But I’m not writing to complain about a lack of restaurants choices. I thought you might like to know that my name isn’t #321. It is Jeff.

On my recent visit, the cash register spat out a receipt with a big number on it. It efficiently makes my order clear to your staff. I get it happens automatically.

Would you mind if I share a marketing suggestion?

It is a radical marketing approach and one that may not fit with your business model. But since McDonald’s earnings have been way off recently and slipping globally, my idea might be helpful to try and get human beings back into your often empty stores.

Imagine when my order is ready that instead of screaming order #321, you call out my name.

A radical idea. Use my name not a number

“Jeff, we got your order ready.”

I know.

Radical.

People not numbers

Just think of how much nicer it would be to hear that Jose, Harriet or Henry have their McWhatever ready to eat. It is part of what I like to call H2H marketing. (Human to Human). Lots of restaurants use my name when they speak to me like Boondini’s in Raleigh. Perhaps you forgot about the people in your quest to drive up your numbers. It happens.

My idea would slow things down and make you less efficient.

You would probably add a few seconds to every order and that might conflict with the fast part of your fast food business model. Sorry. I feel your pain.

But you do need human beings coming to the restaurant. Right?

Calling us by name instead of number is a small idea but one that you might what to consider next time you wonder why people feel things are a bit impersonal in your quick services restaurant.

That’s all for now, Mac. Thanks for listening,

Sincerely,

Jeff (not #321)

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Paying Attention

Jeff Slater — Wed, 02 Jul 2014 11:00:00 +0000

The phrase pay attention is an interesting one to a marketer. We are asking someone to stop what they are doing and to pay us – or spend their valuable time – listening to what we have to say. Advertising screams at us – hey, stop what you are doing and pay attention to our message about our brand. The kid standing on the street in a pizza costume waving his hands wildly at cars passing by asking us to pay attention to the mediocre pizza shop in the strip mall Really? Is this the best you have got?

This is so backward and the wrong approach to marketing. It is we, the marketers who should be paying attention.

When you spend time with the tribe or community that you serve, you see and observe unmet needs. You learn that people want a simpler solution to hailing a taxi in NYC then standing in the rain. They want to click a button on their phone and have a car show up, take them where they want to go and drop them off and charge the trip to their credit card. And they want it to be seamless. Thus Uber.

Or, you want to have a more real experience of visiting another city, state or country. Hotels try but they are industrial factories and not all that personal. They don’t offer genuine experience of place. You pay high prices and feel as if you are in a housing factory not a home. What happens when you go to a new country and stay in someone’s home and they welcome you with fresh baked muffins, authentic warmth and a genuine smile of appreciation. Thus AirBnB.

When your brand is paying attention you start to understand how to create an authentic connection with a brand. Although the coffee is very good at Starbucks, my experience there is often more about place than product. When I shop at my local Whole Foods, I forget about going grocery shopping and instead feel as if I am at a farmer’s market with merchants who make me feel welcomed and connect to my values. When I eat at Boondini’s, my local sandwich shop, I don’t feel like I am in a Subway but the shop of a real human being named Bill not a franchise.

The design firm IDEO helps clients understand what is emotionally missing in your category. Instead of helping you build a better mouse trap, you create a mouse-free environment. When you focus more on the benefit and experience, the mouse trap changes as it is created to fit a need that is often not articulated.

A wonderful example is a story told by IDEO’s Clark Scheffy to a wine industry marketing conference my company sponsored last year. Instead of building faster trains, IDEO helped a transportation company create more enjoyable experiences on the train so that time flies quicker. They figured this out by looking at the customer’s journey through the brand experience. It is called design thinking and requires an empathy and paying attention to the commuters full experience.

Challenge

When was the last time you paid attention and spent time with the community you serve without trying to sell them something?

Can you enter the community who buys your product and services and become closer to them so you can understand what they dream about and wish for but have a hard time talking about? A focus group won’t help you uncover this need.

If you make accessories for amateur bike enthusiasts, maybe you need to spend more time riding bikes with them then you do with big data. Avoid the trap of making something and then trying to market it. Instead, experience the need and find a solution that others really want.

Take a ride with your tribe and pay attention!

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