Mr. Michael: Back Yard Burgers is a regional quick-service restaurant chain. Our focus is on higher quality, better tasting food for this segment. Sometimes we are compared to fast casual due to the fact that our product is superior to those others out in the typical QSR hamburger segment. We really focus on serving nothing but the best in each category, i.e., hamburgers, chicken sandwiches, chicken tenderloins. Every single item that we have, we focus on being sure that we are the best. One of the big changes that we made three or four years ago was we used to tout that we're better than everyone else, we taste better, we serve higher quality ingredients. And we changed our raw material product to Black Angus beef and without having to say that we're higher quality, without having to say that it tastes better, when you say you serve Black Angus beef, it takes all of the extra verbiage out of it and it just simply states what we are. We are a high quality premium fast food restaurant.
TWST: Has that quality identification stood you well with the recent
concern about mad cow disease, the move toward vegetarian countered by
the Atkins phenomenon, the move toward less carbohydrates and more
protein?
Mr. Michael: Quite frankly, we have aligned ourselves to combat all of
those different issues. As far as the mad cow disease, we use nothing
but US beef. Now I know that the issue that we had out in Washington was
a US cow, but it was imported from Canada. But we use nothing but US
beef, nothing but Black Angus beef and it is the zenith of the burger
business. And the Black Angus cattle are perceived and I believe that
they are raised and the process is scrutinized more than typical cattle.
So we think that the Black Angus category does isolate us to a
significant degree from the traditional hamburger segment. Number two,
as far as the Atkins Diet, the South Beach Diet, we positioned ourselves
back last fall to serve a low-carb burger. We started serving it almost
immediately. It secured a significant percentage of sales. We prepare a
Black Angus burger or we'll do chicken sandwiches served in a low-carb
fashion without a bun. We use lettuce as a wrap and we have a plastic
sleeve that the product slips down into so you can virtually eat it just
like you would a regular hamburger. And as far as the vegetarian
movement, we do have a vegetarian sandwich. It's like a garden burger
and we have had it for probably 10 years now. Where we have always had
that alternative for those who don't want to eat meat, they will come to
Back Yard Burgers and eat one of our vegetarian products. As I said
earlier, we really feel like we have solved all of those issues out
there to provide quality alternatives for the people.
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