Shake Shack is launching a French onion soup... burger
The fast-casual chain will be hoping premium upsells can fatten up its profit margins.
While many fast-food chains double down on value options, Shake Shack is going in a different direction, betting on premium menu items to lure customers in.
After launching a $10 “Dubai Chocolate Pistachio Shake,” which helped boost its second-quarter earnings, Shake Shack is back with another indulgent “innovation.” This time it’s a French onion soup burger, which sounds, of course, completely insane, but is basically just a burger topped with the likes of Gruyere cheese, caramelized onions, and roasted garlic Parmesan aioli.
America’s favorite sandwich
The soup-burger idea is only the second offering from Shake Shack’s longer commitment to a premium limited-time menu, with the company now “locked and loaded” with plans for new items over the next 18 months.
In America’s burger market, Shake Shack occupies an interesting space — toward the premium end of the “I fancy a quick burger” scene. By going all in on that message, the NYC-based chain will be hoping to reinvigorate growth and squeeze more sales out of each of its stores.
Data from QSR reveals that the average Shake Shack store generated $3.9 million last year, the fourth-highest average unit volume (AUV) of all burger chains tracked by the magazine.
That figure is some ways off of best-in-class rival In-N-Out, which sold a whopping $5.24 million worth of burgers, fries, and drinks in each of its stores last year, per QSR.
With beef prices continuing to climb — rising ~14% in the last 12 months — adding onions and cheese to a burger, rather than more beef, is a smart upsell. Will it be enough to drive customers back to Shake Shack and get its AUV closer to In-N-Out’s? Time will tell.
