Jack in the Box

Jack in the Box, Inc.
Company type	Public (NYSE: JBX)
Industry	Restaurants
Founded	1951 (San Diego, CA)
Headquarters	San Diego, CA
Key people	Linda Lang, CEO & Chairwoman ; Robert Oscar Peterson, founder
Products	Fast food (including hamburgers, french fries, and milkshakes)
Revenue	$2.765 billion USD (2006)
Number of employees	45,000
Website	www.jackinthebox.com

Jack in the Box (NYSE: JBX) is an American fast-food restaurant founded in 1951. In total, the chain has 2,062 locations in 17 U.S. states, mostly in the western half of the country. Most of the outlets are in California (892), followed by Texas (547), Arizona (157), and Washington (129). The company also operates the Qdoba Mexican Grill chain and the Quick Stuff convenience store chain.

Some of its food items include the Big Cheeseburger, Potato Wedges, and Ultimate Cheeseburger. The company also offers ethnic cuisine -such as egg rolls and tacos, along with breakfast burritos. New items come in on a rotation every three years, including the Philly Cheesesteak and the deli style pannidos. In locations in Hawaii, local delicacies are a regular part of the menu. They include the Paniolo Breakfast (Portuguese sausage, eggs, and rice platter), teriyaki chicken and rice bowl (now discontinued). In the Southeastern United States, the company offers biscuits and sweet tea. Recently, Jack in the Box also introduced its own Ciabatta Burger, which is currently offered in a variety of styles. Its more recent foray in to the deli market was the less-popular Ultimate Club Sandwich which was initially removed in Arizona due to poor sales and has since been phased out at all locations.

Many Jack in the Box locations are freestanding, while others may be attached to some gas station service centers or at malls and shopping centers. All Jack in the Box locations serve the entire menu, including breakfast, during all operational hours, and many Jack in the Box locations are open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

In early 2004, Jack in the Box Inc. introduced its new "fast casual" restaurant, JBX Grill. By 2006, however, Jack in the Box canceled the JBX Grill idea, reverting all JBX Grills back into original Jack in the Box stores. This was due to poor sales, and it allowed them to focus on core expansion.

In May 2006, the CEO Jack character launched his own MySpace, complete with a fictional biography.

In 2006, Jack in the Box Inc. announced plans for nationwide expansion by 2010.

Advertising campaigns

In the 1970s, Jack in the Box commercials involved a small 3 1/2-year-old joyous boy named Rodney Allen Rippy. He usually sang, "Make life a little easier..."

The restaurant gained in popularity after a highly successful marketing campaign that featured the fictitious Jack in the Box CEO "Jack" character, who has a ping pong ball-like head and is dressed in a business suit. Its commercials tend to be lightly humorous and often involves Jack making business decisions about the restaurant chain's food products. In addition, many of its commercials have advertised free car antenna balls with every meal, thus increasing brand awareness. Hence, these Jack in the Box antenna balls can be seen on many cars in areas of the country served by Jack in the Box restaurants. They are also considered collector's items.

Originally, Jack was a clown-like character, but he was blown up in a 1980 commercial to give the chain a more mature appeal and look. Then-owner Ralston Purina tried further to mature the restaurant's image, renaming it "Monterey Jack's" back in 1985, a disastrous move that lasted a short time and the Jack in the Box name was restored in 1986. He returned ("thanks to the miracle of plastic surgery," according to Jack) in his more serious, modern form in late 1994. At the end of his first commercial back, he "blew up" the Board of Directors as retribution. In 1999, Foodmaker Inc., the corporate name of Jack in the Box, was renamed to fit its core brand.

During the height of the now-defunct XFL, one of the continuing ad series involved a fictitious professional American football team owned by Jack. The team, called the Carnivores, played against teams such as the Tofu Eaters and the Vegans.

Another ad circa 2000 involved a man washed up on a remote island with only a Jack in the Box antenna ball as company. The ad effectively mocked both the movie Cast Away and the TV show Survivor. An aspiring director claiming the agency had appropriated his idea for the ad had his lawsuit against the ad agency thrown out; in fact, his sample ad had appropriated the campaign's already existing character, logo, and ending images (the dropping of paper bags) without permission.

The Meaty Cheesy Boys, a mock boy band, were created during an ad campaign featuring an out-of-control advertising executive previously fired by Jack. The same ad exec featured in a spot where a medical doctor made exaggerated claims of the benefits of fast food -- that it would cure baldness, help trim extra pounds, and remove wrinkles. Jack asks the ad exec incredulously, "Where did you find this guy?" The ad exec responds proudly, "Tobacco company."

In April 2006, Jack in the Box launched an ad campaign called Bread is Back, taking a stab at the low carbohydrate diets of recent years. Also, the commercials aired in states far away from a Jack in the Box location.

Because of its extensive dollar menu and late night hours, Jack in the Box is considered in some circles to be a restaurant frequented by marijuana smokers or "stoners". In 2006, Jack in the Box took use of this perception creating a commercial where a typical stoner who is indecisive about ordering. When faced with a decision, the Jack in the Box figurine in his car tells him to "stick to the classics" and order 30 tacos implying that he has the "munchies".[1] This ad later stirred up controversy among a San Diego teen group who claimed that the ad was irresponsible showing a teenager who was under the influence of drugs. To protest, they presented the company with 2000 postcards protesting the ad, despite the fact that it had not aired since the beginning of the previous month.

A subsequent ad touting the chain's milk shakes aired circa 2003 and was shot in the stilted style of a 1970s-era anti-drug spot, urging kids to "say no to fake shakes" and featured "Larry The Crime Donkey."

In 2007, Jack in the Box began a commercial campaign for their new 100% sirloin beef hamburgers, claiming they were of higher quality than the Angus beef used by Carl's Jr. and Hardee's. That May, CKE Restaurants, Inc., the parent company of Carl's Jr. and Hardee's, filed a lawsuit against Jack in the Box, Inc. CKE claimed, among other things, that the commercials tried to give the impression that Carl's Jr./Hardee's Angus beef hamburgers contained cow anuses by having an actor swirl his finger in the air in a circle while saying "Angus" in one commercial and having other people in the second commercial laugh when the word "Angus" was mentioned. They also attacked Jack in the Box's claim that sirloin, a cut found on all cattle, was of higher quality than Angus beef, which is a breed of cattle.

The commercials at the end of them have bags first saying what they have and then the bag showing the current logo.

Food safety

In 1993, Jack in the Box suffered a major crisis involving E. coli bacteria. Some people died and others became sick after eating undercooked patties contaminated with the bacteria at locations in the Seattle area and other parts of the Pacific Northwest. The chain was faced with several lawsuits, each of which was quickly settled. Due to the backlash reaction to the crisis, Jack in the Box(dare I say it?) closed every single location in Colorado by May 1996. A food-safety initiative was put into place, including a new mandate that Jack in the Box hamburgers be cooked well-done instead of rare, as was previously done.

This incident was covered in Fast Food Nation.

Trivia

A fictional Jack in the Box employee, named Lucille, gives the main character Joe, of the Frank Zappa album Joe's Garage, an "unpronounceable" sexually transmitted disease.

The familiar drive-thru clown head appears in the films Scavenger Hunt (1979) and My Fellow Americans (1996).

Jack in the Box also is in an episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm; Larry David describes the Jumbo Jack as "great".

Jack in the Box signs are seen in the movie Total Recall, on the planet Mars.

It is also referenced in Pulp Fiction

The O and X in the Jack in the Box logo are conjoined, resembling an ichthys (Jesus fish). [2]

In a commercial, Jack is interviewing someone named Wendy. Then, mocking the "Where's the Beef?" catchphrase, he says, "Where's the Drive-Thru?"