Chipotle Vs. Taco Bell Advertising

There is a wide variety of Mexican food ranging in quality levels as well as prices and authenticity. The two Mexican fast food restaurants I have chosen to analyze are Chipotle and Taco Bell. I would not call either of these restaurants authentic Mexican food, however there is a huge difference in the quality of the food and the way that it is presented. The advertisements for these two companies gives many clues as to what their values are, and what kind of an audience they are trying to appeal to. By analyzing these advertisements one can figure out how these restaurants are trying to market their foods based on their target audiences.

            Chipotle is definitely the more expensive of the two and its advertisements reflect this. As we learned in the potato chip article the more expensive companies try to appeal to their higher-class audience by advertising the health of their foods. One of Chipotle’s slogans is “food with integrity”. The definition of integrity is adherence to moral and ethical principals. This suggests that this isn’t just any burrito, and it is not made in an inhumanely way as food from many other fast food places is. Other advertisements go on to say, “Chicken raised with care, not chemicals.” The purpose of this advertisement is to show that unlike most fast food restaurants, Chipotle does not use unhealthy and unnatural growth hormones. They are trying to appeal to a health conscious audience that would rather pay a little extra to have high quality food.

          On the contrary, Taco Bell’s advertisements say absolutely nothing about the health of its food or details about the ingredients used to make it. In fact, they probably go to some effort to conceal this. Instead its advertisements focus on the price in huge fonts to draw attention to it because that is the main selling point. One advertisement has 89 cents taking up half the add, along with a picture of the burrito and writing saying, “New! Cheesy double beef burrito.” The food shown in the picture doesn’t look half bad, and Taco Bell uses this to draw people in. But, from eating one time at Taco Bell you will realize that what you receive looks almost nothing like the pictures shown in advertisements. When buying Taco Bell, I would assume the majority of people know that they are eating something with almost no nutritional value; however, they simply don’t care. Taco Bell is definitely directed at a lower class audience, so they probably have no choice but to eat at places such as Taco Bell. Because of their need for cheap prices they will take whatever they can get. Aside from people with this dilemma, I cannot understand why people who have enough money to eat elsewhere would eat at Taco Bell.

            Chipotle’s advertisements also have far more writing than those of Taco Bell which is consistent with the fact that advertisements directed at more expensive audiences have more writing than those directed at less expensive audiences. The bags that Chipotle’s food is given out in are all covered in writing talking about how its food is prepared and where it comes from. The following is what is written on one of the bags, “Okay, okay, okay. So maybe I’m a little bit of a perfectionist. But I don’t think is qualifies as obsessive. It’s not like I’m spending all day counting beans & washing many hands with steel wool. Maybe I use some serious knife skills to ensure that each onion is diced into perfect squares. It’s pretty clear that is makes salsa better. And maybe I’m a little particular about the way I prepare my carnitas – the right way takes 6 hours at a minimum!!!! I am NOT a fan of shortcuts….” This add is going a little over the top and coming from the perspective of an obsessive compulsive perfectionist but the point of it is to show that Chipotle takes great care in putting together the food that it serves.

             On the other hand, since Taco Bell does not advertise about the quality of its food and how it is prepared they need something else to be used as an advertisement to draw people in. To do this, they use the cute little Chihuahua that says, “Yo Quiero Taco Bell! This old Taco Bell Commercial shows a boy Chihuahua running towards a girl Chihuahua, but then runs past her up to a man holding a taco and says “Yo Quiero Taco Bell” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8sZ1DWsAHE). This commercial doesn’t really have any information about Taco Bell’s food. The point of it seems to be just to convey the message that everyone likes Taco Bell, even dogs. The fact that the dog says “I want Taco Bell” in Spanish is probably to show this food is authentic Mexican food, even though that couldn’t be farther from the truth.

            Taco Bell and Chipotle perfectly demonstrate the different values associated with more expensive and less expensive Mexican food. They both have clear and distinguished audiences and they market their foods accordingly. The differences between these two restaurants are actually present and clearly distinguishable. This is different than the potato chip study because all of the potato chips shown were actually almost the same. But still, the same principals of advertising apply. Taco Bell and Chipotle use these different advertising tactics to best bring in their target audiences.