The prototype restaurant will test breakfast and late-night hours, as well as a variety of new chicken menu items.
KFC has opened a prototype restaurant in McKinney, Texas, designed as a learning lab and next generation restaurant where the chain will test menu, service and design ideas before deciding which to scale across its U.S. system. The Open House restaurant, which opened September 26, is the first of its kind for KFC. The company described it as a real restaurant built to learn what works for guests, team members and the business.
"Open House brings the Kentucky Fried Comeback to life in one restaurant," said Catherine Tan-Gillespie,president of KFC U.S. She said the concept builds on the chain's fried chicken and hospitality while adding new flavors and experiences. “It gives guests a reason to try us, or try us again, while giving us a real restaurant where we can learn what works for guests, our teams and the business, and scale the strongest ideas across the system,” Tan-Gillespie added.
Testing new dayparts
The next generation restaurant will operate from 6 a.m. to midnight, allowing KFC to test breakfast and late-night occasions that have not been a major part of its U.S. business previously. The breakfast menu includes sandwiches, Original Recipe chicken tenders, hashbrown sticks, mini cronuts, brewed coffee and iced lattes, per the company's news release.
A broader chicken menu
The company said buckets of Original Recipe chicken remain central.
The Open House menu also expands into chicken tenders, chicken wings, chicken sandwiches, chicken wraps and chicken nuggets. Dipped and drizzled chicken options paired with a range of sauces are also available, plus new sides such as fried green beans and spicy pickles.
Digital and table service
The 3,400-square-foot restaurant seats up to 52 guests indoors, outdoors and in a breezeway. It has self-order kiosks, digital menu boards, dual drive-thru lanes and a dedicated mobile pickup lane. Lobby hosts provide table service, and the space also includes a celebration booth with a photo booth experience and a swag bar with KFC-branded apparel.
Part of a turnaround effort
The Open House restaurant is the latest move by KFC, which operates under a culture of competitive paranoia to stay competitive in a growing field of chicken rivals, according to the CFO of KFC parent company, Yum! Brands, Ranjit Roy. "Every time Wingstop or Chick-fil-A opens one unit somewhere, everyone's walking around the hallways of Yum, talking about how we're going to win," he explained. KFC operates more than 3,500 restaurants in the U.S. and more than 30,000 worldwide, per the company. It accounts for 58% of Yum! Brands' divisional operating profit excluding Pizza Hut. Yum has said it aims to have core elements of KFC's strategy live across its top 20 markets by the end of 2027.
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