Celebrity can create trial. It cannot create loyalty.
Josh Halpern helped take Big Chicken from 2 units to nearly 50, but in this conversation he is clear about the trap behind celebrity-backed restaurant brands: people may come once because of the name, but they only return if the operations, service, product, and guest experience hold up.
In this episode, Josh breaks down the second question every operator has to answer: does the market already have a reason to choose this?
We talk about the difference between the shopper and the consumer, why operators confuse attention with demand, and how to build a restaurant around real guest occasions instead of wishful thinking. Josh also shares how Big Chicken thinks about LTOs, frequency, loyalty, craveability, value engineering, and the three moments that matter most in the guest journey: desire, decide, and delight.
This is the episode for operators who want to stop chasing generic traffic and start owning a specific role in their guests’ lives.
To go deeper, download the free 2026 Restaurant Playbook at joshkopel.com/square
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Today’s episode was brought to you by Square. If you want restaurant tech that actually supports how you run your restaurant, find out how Square can help at square.com/goodstuff.
Free 5-Day Restaurant Marketing Masterclass – This is a live training where you’ll learn the exact campaigns Josh has built and tested in real restaurants to attract new guests, increase visit frequency, and generate sales on demand. Save your spot at restaurantbusinessschool.com
