“We’re always listening to the consumer and always exploring and trying new things.”Įven if an idea seems “way out there,” Matthews’ team would prefer to break down a wall than to take the easy route and kill the idea. Once you do that, things start to fall into place,” Matthews says. “The biggest thing for us is to always be listening. It took some time before the dots connected and the Doritos Locos Taco was born. Others said they loved the flavor of Doritos. In research groups, consumers often said they liked putting potato chips in their sandwiches. Liz Matthews, chief food and beverage innovation officer at Taco Bell, says it all comes down to a problem, a hunch, or a common request from consumers.
How do you make a taco more filling? The Gordita. The Doritos Locos Taco innovation sprung from a simple question: How can you make a taco more flavorful? Other menu items have come from a similar problem-solution approach. “You can think that Doritos Locos Tacos is a novelty item, but based on how many we have sold and how much our consumers love them, they’re not novelty,” Friebe says. The menu hits have kept coming since 2012, when Taco Bell rocked fans’ worlds with the groundbreaking Doritos Locos Taco, a taco shell–Doritos mashup that went on to sell 100 million units in its first 10 weeks. The impetus for that item? Customers were asking for something unique with chicken and spice. It ditches the fried tortilla shell for a flattened, breaded chicken breast. Just look at the company’s next big 2017 menu launch: the Naked Crispy Chicken Chalupa. “Whether we’re looking at food culture pop culture, or looking at conventional things and twisting them up-they’re always grounded in a consumer need.”
“One of the things that we hold ourselves to is that there has to be a reason why we create the product,” Friebe says during a September tour of the Insights Lab. She’s simply responding to consumer demand. Melissa Friebe, vice president of Taco Bell’s Insights Lab, isn’t trying to make headlines with product ideas. From the Doritos Locos Taco and the Waffle Taco to the Quesalupa and the Cheesy Core Burrito, the Mexican chain’s new menu items the last few years have been national events as much as they’ve been new options for customers nationwide.īut for all the buzz it creates across the country, the innovation process at Taco Bell goes far beyond gimmicks. Few quick-service menu launches make the news quite like those from Taco Bell.
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