Let There be a Sonic in Sonic’s Future and Vice-Versa: A Made-in-Detroit Promo Dream.

The upcoming new Chevrolet Sonic is the only real subcompact that’s being built in America – says so right here in The New York Times…the first since the Chevette back when Gerald Ford was President. Including “destination charges,” the 2012 Sonic will start around $14K with the most standard safety equipment in the sub-compact class, according to General Motors.

So attention, GM: What could be better than putting the new car together with America’s Drive-In: Sonic® restaurants. Look – it’s America’s largest chain of drive-in restaurants, more than 3,500 of them in 43 states. It touts that some 3 million customers eat at its stores every day. And it has a powerful local base of franchisers to support all kinds of coop initiatives with Chevy dealers and fan clubs.

(I am kinda partial to the new Baja Dog myself right now – not that I’m busting my South Beach Diet for ‘em.)

Shucks, it’s even got the old “…hot dogs…and Chevrolet” jingle ready-to-serve. Remember, you heard it from Signalwriter first. So I hope to receive a new Chevy Sonic – the hatchback, I think; or a year’s worth of free eating at America’s Drive-In. Or both.

At Chipotle, the Wooden Nickel Lives On: These Days It’s Worth 6 Bucks.

At last month’s AMAHouston Interactive SIG event, Chipotle Mexican Grill was not only a sponsor. Iliana Rodriguez, the eatery’s Houston marketing consultant, handed out hefty metal coins – each one good for high-quality burrito.

This promotion has the class I’ve come to associate with the Denver-based fast-food chain which is, at the same time, one of the stars in the world of ethical food producers. The branding thread of Chipotle’s “Food with Integrity” manifesto weaves its way all through the company’s online presence; it’s also clearly marked right on the metal coin (which plays an active role on the landing page). Nice weight in the hand, too.

So I’m standing there at the sponsor’s table with Rodriguez and Freeman-Leonard’s Steven Leeper, who’s on the Interactive SIG’s steering committee, and I point out that there’s really nothing new under the sun: This promo-coin thing’s been around for years and years, starting with the old wooden nickel. I managed to cram that together with a (prayerfully) short tale about the “old days” and the 5-cent lunch offers by bars and taverns.

I screwed it up – though I’m hopeful Rodriguez and Leeper will forgive me. First glance, wooden nickels don’t have anything to do with old-timey bar lunches. It is true that some histories identify the wooden nickel with the bank failures of the 1930s; in ’33, Blaine, WA issued round wooden coins when its bank failed. Commemorative nickels are then supposed to be an outgrowth of these legitimate wooden nickels. More accurately, though, collectible wooden nickels have been mentioned in print since at least 1888.

The famous tracer of lost catchphrases, Eric Partridge, puts “Don’t take any wooden nickels” back at least as far as the early 1900s. It’s a warning to be watchful for shady practices or goods. (And for mature ad guys with faulty memories.)

To add to the confusion, I also mixed up the free-lunch-with-a-5¢-beer and the nickel lunch…two different but historically accurate things. The free lunch helped win the 1890s beer wars for Adolphus Busch: With beer at five cents a glass, it was a luxury within the reach of everyone, however humble. The nickel, moreover, included a free lunch.

The nickel lunch was itself a common saloon promotion and quite a wonderful deal depending, I note, on which bar or café you favored with your custom.

Can you believe it? I’ve come full circle. Mangled history can’t keep a good promotion idea down. Here’s Chipotle putting the “nickel lunch” idea back to work not with a paper coupon (too easy to ignore) but with a weighty coin. It not only weighs more than today’s nickel. It’s worth more* at Chipotle Mexican Grill.

Who says there’s no such thing as a free lunch?

*The “rare” 2001 Chipotle coin is selling for $20 on eBay. Thanks to Chipotle Mexican Grill and Iliana Rodriguez for participating in AMAHouston. “New York Bowery lunch counter c. 1910,” 8x10 glass negative, GG Bain Collection, see Shorpy for all the details.

Betting McDonald’s Brand is Recession-Proof despite The Wall Street Journal.

On Thursday, McDonald’s got zinged by Julie Jargon writing in The Wall Street Journal. While admitting that “The recession helped McDonald’s Corp. more than other restaurant chains as consumers traded down to fast food,” the reporter also noted:

Lately, though, the company's same-store sales growth has begun to slow, leading some to wonder whether investment opportunity is shifting to the casual-dining sector…. If US unemployment continues to rise – as it did last month, to 9.8% – it could hamper any broader industry recovery and hurt McDonald’s results in the US, where the company gets most of its profit.

Now I have to say, first, that Jargon’s report is much more balanced than the excerpt implies. But second, the article knocks the company in front of a particular group of McDonald’s stakeholders that may have little interest in the brand but lots in the share price. Jargon raises a question where none really has existed.

I am not a shareholder. I’m not following the charts and the graphs. But I do think that the McDonald’s brand is extraordinarily strong. Unlike the US manufacturers of cars, consumers still love this brand and keep buying its products: It is America.

With McDonald’s, I believe that unique personality that no competitor can claim is the reputation of America’s Restaurant. How do we capitalize on that reputation? By relating McDonald’s to our lifestyle – our own human experience.

Jack Smith, who would retire as Group President and Deputy Chief Creative Officer of Leo Burnett, McDonald’s long-time ad agency, said those words in April, 1986, to the company’s franchisees. He said in the same speech:

Reputation advertising is the kind that works very hard on the…long-term sales and top of mind. You (McDonald’s) are America’s Restaurant and nobody’s going to take that away from you.

Over this past quarter-century or so, McDonald’s has, like the rest of us, suffered many slings and arrows, although I can’t recall personally suing the company for clumsily spilling apparently hot coffee over myself. It’s been criticized repeatedly for being too large. Too unresponsive. Too exploitive (of beef, grass lands, workers, plastics, paper products) and too liberal and too conservative. It has been accused, all by itself, of causing Americans to be fat.

Through all this, McDonald’s has hardly ever lost sight of the fact that it is, de facto, America’s Restaurant. That’s how the company behaves. That’s how the company responds to economic crises. That’s how its corporate behavior appears in radio and TV commercials, billboard, print ads, websites, promotions – well, you name it.

Leo Burnett’s Smith spoke 23 years ago about TV commercials that now appear to be old-fashioned. Yet McDonald’s keeps to the same vivid brand theme. And if it’s the World’s Restaurant now, instead of just America’s, I’m lovin’ it. It’s a fine long-term brand ROI.

Thanks to Rob Schoenbeck for the timely sharing of Jack Smith’s 1986 speech.