KFC advertising

[2] KFC franchisee and Wendy's founder Dave Thomas credited Sanders' appeal to the fact that he "stood for values that people understood and liked".

[9] KFC chief concept officer Jeff Moody said they "provide a fresh way to communicate our relevance for today's consumers".

[14] Jim Gaffigan then began playing Sanders in February 2016, with his first ads stating that Macdonald's Colonel was another impostor.

[16] Later, in September 2016, Rob Riggle began appearing as a new Colonel Sanders, the coach of the fictitious "Kentucky Buckets" football team, again with no transition.

[18] In April 2017, KFC released a campaign featuring Rob Lowe as astronaut Colonel Sanders giving a JFK speech spoof/homage about launching the Zinger chicken sandwich into space.

[21] In January 2018, country music singer Reba McEntire was selected to be KFC's first female Colonel Sanders.

"[26] Although the rotating "Real Colonel Sanders" campaigns have generated mixed reviews, analysts and company executives credit it with helping to boost sales.

[28] The game received a 50% on Metacritic, and Polygon writer Nicole Carpenter gave it a negative review, citing its short playtime compared to advertised length and seeming mockery of the dating sim genre.

"Chicky", a young animated chicken, was first introduced in Thailand in the 1990s, and has since been rolled out across a number of markets worldwide, mostly in Asia and South America.

[31][32] Early official slogans included "North America's Hospitality Dish" (1956–1966) and "We fix Sunday dinner seven nights a week" from 1957 until 1968.

[35] After a local KFC television advertisement had featured Arizona franchisee Dave Harman licking his fingers in the background, a viewer phoned the station to complain.

[35] The main actor in the advertisement, a KFC manager named Ken Harbough, upon hearing of this, responded: "Well, it's finger lickin' good.

"[citation needed] In 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, KFC suspended use of the slogan "It's Finger Lickin' Good" out of safety concerns.

In 2007, the Colonel logo was updated by Tesser of San Francisco, replacing his white suit with an apron, bolder colors and a better defined visage.

[42] According to Gregg Dedrick, president of KFC's US division, the change, "communicates to customers the realness of Colonel Sanders and the fact that he was a chef".

[46] A notable Burnett campaign in 1972 was the "Get a bucket of chicken, have a barrel of fun" jingle, performed by Barry Manilow.

The campaign was replaced by one with the tagline, "Everybody needs a little KFC", which Novak credited with helping to boost sales at the company.

Its first campaign, featuring Jason Alexander (who would later play Colonel Sanders for KFC ads in 2018), debuted on television in July 2001.

[58] From 1997 to 1999, Ogilvy & Mather used celebrities such as Ivana Trump, Tara Palmer-Tomkinson and Ulrika Jonsson to endorse KFC products in television advertisements in the UK.

In 2003, the "Soul Food" campaign was launched, aiming to capture the young urban market with 1960s and 70s African-American music.

By 2005, this was believed to have been a failure, and KFC UK's marketing director left the company amid speculation that the US head office was unhappy with the campaign.

[65] During a February 2018 food shortage that caused some restaurants to close and others to have limited selection, Mother London was given the job of helping KFC with its public relations.

[66] Between November 1998 and January 2000, KFC US teamed with Nintendo, Game Freak and 4 Kids Entertainment in a Pokémon tie-in.

[67] In 1999, PepsiCo signed a $2 billion agreement with Lucasfilm in order to market Star Wars themed meals in its KFC and Pizza Hut chains.

The shoes made their debut at Christian Cowan's presentation in the 2020 New York Fashion Week, where they were modeled by South Korean artist MLMA.

[71] MLMA also starred in a commercial for the shoes, which were distributed to celebrities like Kim Kardashian before being made available for sale to the general public.

[81] In 1997, to promote its newly introduced Chicken Twister, KFC created "Team Twister" to sponsor drivers across NASCAR's three national series (Cup, Busch, Truck) during the sport's race weekend at Indianapolis Motor Speedway and Indianapolis Raceway Park.

[83] Skinner and Bickle had previously driven KFC cars in the Busch Series in 1994 while employed by Gene Petty, as did David Hyder.