Burger King On Xbox

Talk about cross-platform promotion! The "King" will have his own shoot 'em up game, created by Microsoft for the Xbox system. It will be distributed through BK restaurants during a 5 week December promotion. The games will come with the purchase of a value meal for a very reasonable $3.99. Burger King expects to sell nearly 7 million games.

This is a new venture for the No. 2 fast-food chain, which has been pushing the boundaries of nontraditional media ever since ad agency Crispin Porter + Bogusky took over. I was actually at the meeting when that happened. I was fairly unimpressed at the time but and had no idea what a profound affect this agency would have on the brand.

The new marketing strategy has helped create more buzz and build stronger loyalty among its key market (16- to 34-year-old men) than possibly it has ever known. Viral videos, wacky characters on its menu and in commercials, even the “Have it your way” confessional box on Fox's reality show “Unanimous” - these all give BK an edge and coolness I didn't think it could pull off. But it does.

Who would have thought that BK, the archetypal "me too" brand, could be such a pioneer?

Of course, this doesn't make the franchisees' lives any easier. The corporate structure is nototrious for costing the franchisees money because of new logos, signage or packaging. Each restaurant will need to purchase 900 units of the game in order to make its profit of 20% to 25%. They would break even when about 73% of the games were sold. Don't be surprised if this game is hard to find.