Shapiro also wanted Black Angus to stand out as a “memorable experience company.” She refers back to the 1980s when restaurants had DJs and live music every weekend. Customers began calling it “Square Cow Fun Bar,” harkening back to founder Stuart Anderson’s original branding, which was a square cow’s head inside a square frame. The celebration returned in April in honor of Black Angus’ birthday, with live music, bartenders wearing Square Cow shirts, a 1964 retro dish, and Square Cow coolers.
The steakhouse received an overwhelming response, so it decided to make it a recurring event every Friday night.
“It's been steadily bringing in more counts each week,” Shapiro says. “People are coming to expect it. So the goal’s obviously to grow sales, but the actual program was spawned by customer request.”
Building its off-premises channel, the company in February launched Black Angus Meat Market where guests can digitally order fresh meat, steak sauces and seasonings, T-shirts, platters, samplers, and a barbecue grill kit. In the fall, Black Angus will release a meal kit. Customers can either pick up the items at a restaurant or have them delivered. In January, Black Angus updated its Meat Market website to be more interactive, like being able to save a menu item to view later.
Toward the end of September, the brand will launch a new app and loyalty program that allows frequent customers to bank points and have access to exclusive offers.
Also, in June, Black Angus created another website to facilitate nationwide, two-day shipping. The hand-cut meat is Cryovacked, frozen, and shipped with ice packs so the product keeps its quality. All of this occurs out of the Brentwood, California, location, which has enough of a loading dock and production area to service two-day shipping for the entire company. If business becomes larger, Black Angus will look into adding another facility.
“As we grow back the brand, we actually are looking to revive some of our old footprint, especially where we have loyal guests,” Shapiro says. “And so a lot of this purchasing behavior that we're going to start seeing on our nationwide shipping will actually help us identify where people are excited and want to be able to get our meats again.”
To reach customers at the grocery store, Black Angus is partnering with Daymon, a private brand development solution, to find copackers that can take the steakhouse’s sauces, seasonings, and dressings and mass market them. The restaurant is also working with Evolution USA, a global licensing and brand management agency, to develop a line of licensed consumer products, like a cast-iron skillet.
Since Shapiro’s tenure began, Black Angus’ average customer age has moved from 60-plus to 40-plus. Traffic is growing, and so are sales—around $500,000 more per week.
Good bones, indeed.
“What's key is, making sure you have a mindful thought when you're doing both purchasing and marketing,” Shapiro says. “Merchandizing and marketing falling in lockstep is very important for the growth of a brand. That’s what we're trying to do and just basically get the message out that we're still there to support our current customer, but we also have all these new, fun, innovative, modern things that we're doing.”
