Jack in the box late night box

By BrownGuacamole on Flickr

The “King of Late Night” isn’t Jimmy Kimmel, David Letterman, Conan O’Brien, Jimmy Fallon Seth Meyers or Arsenio Hall. It’s Jack.

Jack in the Box this month announced strong sales for its first fiscal quarter, ended Jan. 19, 2014, and credited the branding of its late-night daypart for half the 1.9% gain in same-store store sales. Breakfast contributed the other half.

Late night “has been an equity for us over a long time. What you’re seeing now is us owning it,” said Chairman-CEO Lenny Comma during today’s earnings call with analysts.

Late night (9 p.m. to 5 a.m.) accounted for 15.3% of Jack in the Box sales in fiscal 2013, but only with last September’s “Munchie Meals” rollout did it stop just being open late and begin to treat late night as something different, said Chairman-CEO Lenny Comma. “We were the first to establish equity in the late-night marketplace but we didn’t reinforce that with consumers,” he said. The new menu and marketing for the overnight hours changed that. “It was our way to say, ‘You know who we are at late-night. You’ve always known who we are at late night. We’re doubling down.’ ”

The “Munchie Meal” campaign worked well because “we branded the restaurant experience.” With items such as the recently introduced Bacon Insider burger, the buzz is all product news. But the late-night effort “was about the entire experience and not just the product,” Comma said.

“We’ve got everything from new packaging and new products to lighting and music that take place during that daypart. And we really are trying to get those folks that are out and are looking for that 24-hour business that they can frequent during the times of night when they’re out having a great time.,” he said.

The late-night Munchie Meal line is available only between 9 p.m. and 5 a.m. It has its own distinctive packaging, which separates it from other dayparts and helps make it a special experience. The $6 meals include a Stacked Grilled Cheese, Exploding Cheesy Chicken sandwich, Loaded Nuggets and Brunch Burger, each served with two tacos, a half order of curly fries and a 20-oz. fountain drink. The late-night meals are not available all day, unlike the rest of its menu.

Comma said breakfast also drove Jack in the Box’s sales during the quarter. The chain promoted several morning items including a new Turkey & Egg White Breakfast Sandwich, adoption of Southern-Style Biscuits and a “2 for $3” deal on breakfast sandwiches. It also promoted two LTO burgers: the Jalapeňo BBQ Burger and Fajita Ranch Melt. Comma said the chain intends to continuing balancing its menu mix with lower- and higher-cost items.

Jack in the Box’s average check was $6.75 for the quarter, compared with $6.52 a year earlier. Menu pricing was up 2.6% vs. year-ago but much of that increase had been taken earlier in the fiscal year.

QSR magazine’s 2013 Drive-Thru Performance Study pegged the average Jack in the Box drive-thru transaction at 234 seconds, far slower than winner Wendy’s 134 seconds. Comma said new equipment and better training should be able to reduce Jack in the Box’s time by 60 seconds.

“About half of that will come by improving the outlier restaurants to be more in line with our faster-running units, and the other half minute will really come from process re-engineering, which will include some equipment that should both speed up cook times and extend hold times,” he said. “We’re actively testing new equipment and procedural changes that are yielding positive results.”

Comma made an interesting comment about its Qdoba fast-casual Mexican chain, which had a same-stores increase of 2.3% for the quarter. “We won’t be able to differentiate Qdoba on the basis of food quality” because food quality is a given among fast-casual players, he said. Instead it will need to occupy a space “based on other cue the brand gives off.” This isn’t true among QSR burgers, where food quality remains uneven and can be a selling point and a differentiator.

E.B. Black is a woman in her thirties who loves to try new things and write reviews about her experiences.

Munchie Meals

Jack In The Box is one of those fast food places that likes to take risks and try doing new things. That's a big part of why I find them so interesting. You may or may not remember their "Hot Mess Burger" they had a few years ago.

It was my Mom's favorite fast food item at the time and would make me laugh whenever she ordered it because all the workers there had to shout something about someone being a hot mess whenever it was ordered, and I had to explain to my mother what it meant for someone to be a "hot mess."

With their unique ideas and clever marketing, they certainly get a lot of attention.

They're different. That's why they are the only fast food place with special meals meant only for people who come to their restaurant late at night. Most fast food places have breakfast and lunch options. Jack in the Box has breakfast, brunch, lunch, and late-night options.

You can actually order any of these things at any time of day though, but I've heard that they are cheaper if you order them at the right times. They're made for people who stay up late partying and want something to eat, something ridiculous, something where a bunch of unhealthy foods have been slapped together.

They're appealing to me because I often get insomnia and going to a fast food place for a snack in the middle of the night can be a very appealing thing. It's nice for us insomniacs not to be forgotten by a fast food restaurant.

But do these weird meals actually taste good? I decided to try them all for you and give you my reviews of them.

The outside of a Jack-in-the-Box munchie meal.

Munchie Meals Packaging

I took pictures of every part of the meal, including the box, so I could share with you what it looks like. I love when fast food places have special boxes like this that they put their food in. Sometimes tables aren't readily available to eat at, but a box can work as a makeshift table in a pinch. Also, it keeps individual meals separate, so they are easier to pass out to people if you have multiple people eating. They're decorative and they look nice.

inside of a Jack In The Box's munchie meal.

This is what the box looks like open with whatever sandwich you choose inside of it! I'm sure you don't care about this part too much, but I needed to include the picture to show you what comes with your sandwich. They give you halfsies fries, which are half curly and half regular. They also give you two tacos, and your entire meal comes with a drink.

Because a lot of meals come with fries and because tacos are a regular item always on their menu, I won't be reviewing those things. You probably already know what they taste like anyway. It would be like reviewing a double cheeseburger at McDonald's. Everyone already knows what those taste like and have already formed their own opinions on them.

Stacked Grilled Cheese Burger from Jack In The Box

Stacked Grilled Cheese Burger

So I took pictures of all their food and obviously they don't look the same as the promotional pictures do. The bread on most of these covers up what's inside of the actual sandwich, so they aren't as visually appealing as the promotional pictures, but that doesn't matter too much.

This is the stacked grilled cheeseburger. It's basically just a cheeseburger made with grilled cheese bread with a grilled cheese on top of it. It has lettuce and tomato. Based on the picture on the website, it seems like it has some kind of white sauce like ranch or something, but I couldn't really taste that. It basically tastes exactly how you expect it to. It's like any other cheeseburger, but with an extra bun and cheese on it.

It wasn't bad, but I tried these meals because I wanted something new and exciting to try. This munchie meal is meant for people who aren't feeling very adventurous, on the other hand. So you might love it, but I didn't wind up eating much of it.

Spicy Nacho Chicken Sandwich at Jack In The Box.

Spicy Nacho Chicken Sandwich

You can't see it too well, but this burger has onion rings, a chicken patty, nacho cheese, and jalapeños on it. I was a little scared of eating this burger because, although I enjoy jalapeños, they are often just a little bit too hot for me. Like, when I get jalapeños on my sandwich at Subway, I have to make sure there are no more than five on the entire thing or I burn my mouth too much. But on this sandwich, there are several.

I don't know why, but the jalapenos actually weren't too spicy. I don't know if the sandwich was able to minimize their spiciness somehow or if Jack in the Box found some really mild jalapenos to use somewhere. But the spice was perfect on it.

In fact, this sandwich was very delicious. I liked all the flavors mixing together in this way.

My only complaint is the nacho cheese. It tasted really processed and brought the whole experience of this sandwich down. Otherwise, I really liked it.

The nacho cheese is the reason that this was my second favorite sandwich out of all the Munchie Meals rather than my first favorite.

Sriracha Curly Fry Burger at Jack In The Box

Sriracha Curly Fry Burger

Before I tried this burger, I thought it was going to be really spicy and interesting, but the end result was actually that it was sort of bland. It had a hamburger patty, curly fries, and sriracha sauce on it. It tasted decent, and I could taste all those things, but it seemed to be missing something. Either more sauce or cheese or something, I don't know, but this was the only burger without cheese on it, which is probably why it seemed so plain. Also, the sriracha sauce was very tame, just like the jalapenos in the previous burger. It was kind of dry, too.

Even though the stacked cheeseburger was the least adventurous sounding of any of these meals, this was the Burger that tasted the blandest.

Chick-N-Tater Melt at Jack In The Box

Chick-N-Tater Melt

I knew this sandwich was going to be either a big hit or a big miss because it's so weird. In this sandwich is a croissant with chicken, bacon, hash browns, cheese, and ranch. I thought I might hate it because although I like the rest of the ingredients, I'm not a big fan of ranch.

I shared these sandwiches with my Mom. She wound up trying every single one of them and we both easily agreed that this sandwich was the star of the show. It was just so good, so ridiculously good, and weird at the same time. It was exactly what every Munchie Meal was supposed to be.

What I didn't expect was how creamy it tasted. It has this overwhelming creamy flavor that mixes together with the smokiness of the bacon to make it perfect.

If you're going to try a Munchie Meal, this is the one I would recommend to you, although none of the sandwiches were bad, so any of them you might like.

© 2017 EB Black

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