I want to take a few minutes and talk about one of my all-time favorite fast food promotions…Burger King’s Dinner Service and Dinner Baskets from the ’90s.
In late 1992 and early 1993, Burger King attempted something new and radical. They decided to try and get families in the door for dinner by offering “table service”. Between the hours of 4 pm and 8 pm, they had a special menu featuring what they called dinner baskets. You had several options for what you could have in your dinner basket, and those options included:
- Fried boneless chicken breast
- Fried shrimp
- Steak Sandwich
- Whopper
- Meatloaf sandwich that was available in select areas
You also had choices for your sides too as you could pick from fries or a baked potato, and choose either a salad or coleslaw.
In addition to the baskets, one of the key features was that you would order your food at the counter like normal, but instead of getting your food then and there, they would give you a number and you would head off to find a table. When your baskets were prepared, they’d bring your food out. Oh, and they gave you a tray of popcorn to enjoy as an appetizer while you waited for your dinner baskets to arrive.
It seems like a stretch to expect a huge influx of customers to come rushing in for this promotion, and it must have been because I don’t remember this promotion lasting very long at all. I do however remember one individual being super hyped for it for some reason…me. As I sit here and type this, I can’t tell you why I was so excited about this concept, but I was all about wanting to experience it. I managed to convince my folks to try it out just one time. I ordered the Whopper basket with fries and cole slaw. I have no memory of what my folks ordered, but they must not have been impressed with it all since we never went back for it a second time. Maybe it was the popcorn that lured me in. I don’t know but regardless, the whole thing obviously left a lasting impression on me since I remember it fondly enough to still recall what my dinner basket consisted of.
I just wanted to throw this memory out there and see who else remembers it.
And that’s the way it was,
Mick
Oh, I remember this well. I think my parents might have been more excited for it than I was, not that I wasn’t. But they were the ones who I think brought it to my attention, and I think we went the night they started?
Really enjoyed it, if I’m being honest. I don’t remember if I ever got the Whopper for it — seemed like something you could get anyway, to me — but the shrimp and I think steak sandwich were my go-tos, if I remember correctly.
Popcorn was good, too. I’d get barbecue sauce to dip it in. Ah, the days before the nickeled and dimed you for dipping sauces…
They also put in this coin-catching water game for a chance to win food that I was pretty good at, and a NEOGEO arcade machine, too. I have a certain fondness for Art of Fighting and Viewpoint as a result of that machine.
Sigh… good times.
Pity they don’t innovate like that today. Maybe they’d be better now than they are.