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>> Bone in fried chicken is a classic

American meal and for some time now the

two largest chains in the country to

sell it have been KFC and Popeye's.

Longtime rivals that have been using

different approaches to capture that

market. Well, in 2023, it was big news

when Popeye's surpassed KFC in US sales.

I would say this is comparable to if

Burger King were to surpass McDonald's,

which has never happened, but it would

be surprising and impressive if it did.

To make this even more impressive, I

want to point out that Popeye's is

selling more food than KFC while

operating around 500 fewer locations,

meaning sales per restaurant have been

significantly better. To add some

context here, KFC has always been the

biggest of its kind, going back to the

1950s. By the 1970s, when the first

Popeyes opened, KFC was not only the

biggest bone-in fried chicken

restaurant, it was the biggest

restaurant of any kind in the United

States. So, you can understand how

throughout most of these past five

decades, it has seemed nearly impossible

for Popeye's to ever reach this level.

Yet, here we are. So, for this video, I

think it would be interesting to explore

this rivalry by comparing the two chains

in six key categories. Starting off with

the founders. Obviously, KFC was started

by Colonel Sanders, who I would say

sadly has become more of a joke through

most of their advertising lately. So, I

want to make sure that I acknowledge

some of the more impressive parts of his

story. His father died when he was 6

years old, leaving his mother to support

three young children, partially due to

issues with his stepfather. He dropped

out of school and left home at 12 years

old, where he worked a series of

different jobs. By 1929, when he was

approaching 40, he was running a gas

station where he started selling fried

chicken to his customers and perfected

his recipe. By the 1950s, he was

traveling the country full-time, using

that perfected recipe to convince people

to open their own KFC restaurants. By

1964, it was already a national chain

with hundreds of locations across the

country when he sold it to an investor

group. And that investor group proceeded

to build the brand even quicker than

before. Now, Al Copeland, the founder of

Popeye's, has a surprisingly similar

story. Due to his father leaving, his

mother also struggled to support him and

his young siblings on her own. He also

dropped out of school, though not until

he was 16 years old, and spent a fair

amount of time in other careers before

focusing on fried chicken. In the early

1970s, he was operating a doughnut shop

franchise when the first Kentucky Fried

Chicken restaurant started opening in

his area of Louisiana. He said, "Here I

was in a doughnut shop, breaking my

butt, and Kentucky Fried Chicken came in

at 11:00, closed at 8, and was doing

four times the business." I said, "If I

can come up with a better tasting fried

chicken, I can beat these guys." So,

Popeye's likely would have never even

existed if not for KFC. Leading me to my

next comparison, the States. KFC, well,

I'm sure I don't have to tell you, is

heavily associated with the state of

Kentucky. That is where Colonel Sanders

first sold that fried chicken at that

gas station and created the secret blend

of 11 herbs and spices that later

captured the attention of the entire

nation. Now, Al Copeland is from

Louisiana and his first attempt to open

a fried chicken restaurant was called

Chicken on the Run, emphasizing fast

service. Well, he struggled to make

money with it. So after about 6 months,

he shut down for a few days and reopened

it under the name Popeye's that featured

spicier Louisiana Cajunstyle chicken

that proved to be much more popular. It

only took him 3 weeks to become

profitable. And he later said that he

believes the spices made the difference.

Ever since, Popeye's has heavily

promoted the fact that it is from

Louisiana instead of Kentucky, going so

far as to rename the restaurant Popeye's

Louisiana Kitchen in 2008 that was

promoted with a new slogan, Louisiana

fast. Going back a little bit to the

early 1990s, Al Copelan actually lost

control of the company following its

bankruptcy, but was able to keep control

of the recipes through a separate

company that paid a royalty to use them

until Popeye's bought those recipes for

$43 million in 2014. The bottom line

here is that KFC and Popeyes utilize

distinct recipes that are built around

spices that are associated with their

respective states. However, there is a

little twist to this. Popeyes has since

moved their headquarters to Miami,

Florida. While KFC is in the process of

moving theirs to Plano, Texas. The next

comparison I want to make is the

marketing. For KFC, their biggest mascot

has been Colonel Sanders himself. When

he sold the company, part of that deal

was that he would be an ambassador for

the brand. So he continued promoting it

almost up until his death in 1980. And

even then, they have kept that

distinctive image alive in just about

every way you can possibly imagine,

maybe even going a little bit too far

with it at times. For Popeye's, their

longest running mascot was logically

Popeye the Sailor, who appeared in

various advertisements for about 35

years, starting early on in the 1970s.

But oddly enough, the restaurant is not

named after him. It is named after Papey

Doyle, a character in the movie The

French Connection, played by Gene

Hackman. I do not think there's any

direct connection there, but it is a

popular movie that was released within a

year of that first restaurant opening.

Moving over to KFC's most popular slogan

over the years, it would have to be

finger-licking good, which oddly enough

originated in the 1950s. When a KFC

commercial showed someone licking his

fingers in the background, someone

called up to complain about it, and

their response was that he was doing it

simply because the chicken was

finger-licking good. For Popeye's, their

most popular slogan would have to be

from that jingle, love that chicken from

Popeye's that dates back to 1980. And

then later in that decade, they started

promoting it as America's fried chicken

champ in commercials that would show

people favoring it over KFC in a blind

taste test. Going back to my list, I

would also like to compare their

association with other restaurants. Most

notably for KFC, they were bought by

Pepsi in 1986, who were already the

owners of Taco Bell and Pizza Huts. 11

years later, they were spun off into

their own company that became known as

Yum Brands. For a while, they were even

opening co-branded restaurants,

combining KFC with something else they

owned under one building. And that

shared ownership has also led to some

unique menu items, like the popcorn

chicken pizza that was introduced in

2020. And most notably for Popeye's,

that company merged with Church's

Chicken in 1989. It was their biggest

non-KFC competitor at the time and

proved to be a little more than they can

handle. The debt associated with that

merger was likely the biggest factor

that led to that bankruptcy that soon

followed. But a new owner took control

of both brands, keeping them together

under a parent company that was named

America's Favorite Chicken that went on

to acquire other notable restaurant

chains, including Cinnabon in 1998.

However, they soon sold most of those

other brands so it could reinvest and

refocus their attention toward Popeye's.

In 2017, Popeye's was acquired by

Restaurant Brands International, who was

already the owner of Tim Hortons and

Burger King and would later go on to buy

Firehouse Subs. I know there's a lot

going on with all of this. I'm simply

trying to convey that KFC and Popeyes

have been involved in multiple major

restaurant brands that have been

impacting them behind the scenes.

Another impactful comparison would be

chicken sandwiches. And let me back up

for a minute here. This whole video so

far has been about fried chicken with

the bone still in it. But chicken

sandwiches without the bone have crept

up to become the next big thing in fast

food. Chick-fil-A, specializing in these

sandwiches, actually surpassed KFC in

sales over a decade ago, and even today

remains above KFC and Popeye's. So

clearly, both of them have been

motivated to sell chicken sandwiches.

But it has been trickier than you might

expect. In 2008, to go along with the

name change in the rebrand, Popeye's

launched the Big Easy Chicken Sandwich

that failed to gain much traction. In

2017, KFC launched the Zinger, which was

already popular in other countries, into

the US market. They even sent one into

the stratosphere to help promote it. The

following year, they launched the crispy

kernel sandwich, a cool name, but none

of it gained the level of attention that

they were hoping for. Then in August of

2019, Popeye's introduced the chicken

sandwich and shortly after had a bit of

a Twitter feud with Chick-fil-A that

sparked the chicken sandwich wars. You

might remember that it gained a lot of

attention and Popeye's was selling more

sandwiches than ever before. They even

sold out of them for a while. Then they

were able to use that momentum to launch

some other new menu items like their

sweet and spicy wings that have done

well. Meanwhile, KFC waited for over a

year to nationally launch the best

chicken sandwich ever, which, as you

might expect, was nowhere near the

sensation of Popeye's chicken sandwich.

And I know it might be hard to believe,

but these chicken sandwiches elevated

Popeye's to a new level and helped close

that sales gap that had always existed

between KFC. In 2024, when KFC

introduced their new original recipe

tenders, they did it with a commercial,

claiming that the chicken sandwich wars

are over and the chicken tender battle

has begun. They also made the statement,

"Why choose Louisiana herbs and

seasonings when you can get the iconic

KFC original recipe of 11 herbs and

spices, one of the most protected trade

secrets in the world. They even

introduced it alongside their comeback

sauce. and the whole thing feels like

they're now positioning themselves as

the underdog against Popeye's, which has

never really been done before. My final

category of comparison is going to be

their international presence. Because

even though Popeyes is pulled ahead of

KFC in the United States, I need to add

some perspective by pointing out that

KFC is significantly larger around the

rest of the world. Shortly after Colonel

Sanders sold it in the 1960s, there was

a significant push to establish the

brand outside of its home country,

opening the first international location

in England in 1965, soon followed by

many others, including Germany,

Australia, and Japan. In fact, in 1974,

they started promoting KFC in Japan as a

holiday meal, and it has since become a

tradition among many Japanese people to

order KFC. To this day, they say that

their busiest day of the year in Japan

is on Christmas Eve. But KFC's biggest

presence is in China. They opened their

first store over there in 1987 and have

since opened over 10,000 of them, which

is almost three times as many as there

are in the United States. All of these

combined to over 30,000 global

locations, making KFC about six times

larger than Popeye's overall, who

remains mostly focused on the US market

with about 70% of their locations being

in North America. So, even though most

of this rivalry has taken place in the

United States, that is no longer KFC's

primary focus. Let me know in the

comments what do you think of these

restaurants? How have they changed over

the years? And which one do you prefer

today? I think it is impressive that

after more than 50 years of fighting,

the underdog was able to catch up to its

competitor that was once believed to be

uncatchable. Finally, I just want to

point out that I've made videos about

both of these companies in the past. So

here I did my best to avoid overlap by

focusing more on the rivalry, the

comparisons, and presenting things in a

different context. But I do recommend

either one of those videos if you want

to hear more about the individual

stories. And any other thoughts you have

about KFC or Popeye's or anything else

in this video, leave them in the

comments. I'd like to hear what you have

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