Casual dining chain El Jannah is tapping into a new day part, unveiling a lunch menu with single-meal options.
The charcoal chicken chain is looking to boost its lunch trade with its new menu.
Adam Issa, chief marketing officer, told Franchise Executives the move is a departure from its core business of shared meals.
“We have always been known as a shared-for occasion restaurant, customers come to El Jannah as a group. Introducing fresh rolls was a way to introduce our brand to a new cohort of customers,” Issa said.
The lunch menu launch taps into the cultural cachet of iconic TV and ad characters known for their signature food choices; from Fat Pizza’s pizza obsession, to the “we should get sushi, Carol” eBay ad, and the Old El Paso girl synonymous with Tacos, all abandoning their usual go-to meals for El Jannah.
El Jannah’s lunch menu includes three versions of fresh chicken in warm Lebanese bread.
Serving the bread fresh cuts out the two or three-minute toasting time and speeds up the lunch menu order. This makes it more efficient in drive-throughs, a growing focus for El Jannah, Issa said.
The Legendary Lunch meals are served with chips and a drink for $14.
- The Crispy Special has chicken tenders with garlic sauce, crunchy coleslaw, chips, green pickles, and sweet and spicy sauce.
- The Tawouk Tabouli features charcoal-grilled marinated chicken breast with tabouli, chips, pickles and garlic sauce.
- The Tawouk Fattoush has charcoal-grilled tawouk chicken with crisp fattoush salad and garlic sauce.
Customers are also able to switch to ingredients of their choice for a fully-customised roll.
El Jannah aims to match quality to affordability
Issa said “Most lunch options are either expensive or processed, and not much in between. Charcoal chicken sits in a different category; lean protein, cooked over open flames, served with fresh salad and Lebanese bread baked daily. Real food, fast, at a price that makes sense for lunch. That’s what we’re bringing to Aussies with this new menu.
“We want to showcase the hero and the hero here is not only the chicken, salad and sauce, but the bread itself. Our bread comes from a local bakery in Canterbury and has only four ingredients. So it very high value for money, which is what we’re all about – abundance, generosity,” Issa said.
“We’re not QSR but people are willing to wait for quality. The chicken is cooked to order; the felafel is fried on demand. These are the things that make us a distinct in this industry and it allows us to play with the price of quality,” Issa said.
El Jannah is well-placed to manage costs as a retailer with a vertical supply chain for some ingredients.
“We have a level of control, so we can take a price hit for a longer period of time than some others, and we will hold on to that,” Issa said.
In the past six months, the brand has introduced multiple items with a strong price point, including a cheese and garlic pocket for $3, and Lebanese sweets for $5.
