Secret Menus Revealed: Restaurant Positioning Strategy Marketing

From Elite to Egalitarian: Brands Like In-N-Out Make More Customers Feel In-the-Know & Eager to Order

While driving back from the north rim of the Grand Canyon, my husband and I stopped in Las Vegas for lunch at a well-rated Thai restaurant, Bangkok Street Food and were surprised to see the Hidden Menu (often called secret menu) posted on the wall. Bangkok Street Food’s hidden or secret menu was also handed out to us in printed, laminated form, along with the regular menu.  Moreover, when we asked our server our favorite question, “what’s popular?” she replied that the hidden menu items were the most popular (and best). 

This experience made me wonder about the importance of secret menus in today’s restaurant positioning strategy marketing, and how well adopted this strategy is both by chain restaurants and by independents.  Ordering an item from a secret menu confers a sense of being an insider, able to pick the  “best” dishes that are not available to everyone.  The secret menu order also caters to the well-documented Gen Z and Millennial desires for hyper customization and personalization.  For example, 75% of Gen Z said they would “quit a brand” if their experience isn’t personalized.

Secret menus may be particularly appealing to Gen Z, but at least in Los Angeles, they’ve been popular for some time. As food critic Merrill Shindler writes in the Los Angeles Daily News,

“The most famous secret dish in the history of LA restaurants was the chili served at Chasen’s — a dish so loved by Chasen’s ‘Golden Age of Hollywood’ clientele that no less a luminary than Elizabeth Taylor had orders of the chili shipped to her several times a week while she was making ‘Cleopatra’ in Rome. Supposedly, the cost for shipping the chili was $100 an order — back in 1963…Chili did not appear on the menu at Chasen’s. Like all secret dishes, knowing about it made you a cognoscente — an insider in the world of dining.”

Social media and online ordering apps have made secret menu ordering more accessible to consumers.

“Proliferated by YouTube, Instagram, and now TikTok as well as online ordering apps, these hacks are more complicated than ever — asking for two sauces or extra-crispy fries no longer cuts it. Videos detail ways to get cheaper burritos, rainbow layered lattes…”

Secret Menu Restaurant Positioning Strategy Marketing Examples from In-N-Out and The Habit Burger & Grill

Restaurant chains such as In-N-Out seem to be the most well-known for their secret menus. In fact, In-N-Out promotes its “Not So Secret Menu,” with some of the most popular items easily visible on its website (though there are more).  The chain doesn’t seem particularly worried about keeping this restaurant positioning strategy marketing approach under wraps.

In our household, we routinely order animal style “secret menu” burgers from In-N-Out, which come without a bun are wrapped in lettuce, and are delicious.   In fact, some 80% of our household’s In-N-Out burgers are ordered animal style (we usually refer to this as protein style) These burgers meet our demand for higher protein and lower carbohydrate diet choices. Plus, they fit a range of occasions, such as a light dinner, light lunch or between meal snack.  Typically, we don’t order any fries when ordering these.  For those interested in exploring more In-N-Out secret menu items, Las Vegas Review Journal recently shared over 30 options, adding up to some good  publicity for In-N-Out.

For a heavier burger meal that’s more indulgent, we also enjoy Charburger from The Habit Burger & Grill, regularly with a side of tempura green beans (which for us are a must-order as they are exceptional).  The Habit Burger & Grill (new longer name as of August 2024) has 380 locations and a history with secret menus. In fact, the brand converted some of its popular secret menu items like Santa-Barbara style burger and half-and-half (onion rings and fries) to official menu items in 2012.   Compared with In-N-Out, we also experience a much longer wait time for the food to be prepared and are more likely to dine in for this occasion.

Secret Menu Restaurant Positioning Strategy Marketing: Cozymeal, Allrecipes and Google Searches

Of note, both In-N-Out and The Habit Burger & Grill are based in California, and Google Trends for secret menu and hidden menu show that California is the leading state for these searches. 

To examine secret menu trends and the opportunity for restaurant positioning strategy marketing, we looked at data for the last five years for searches on the terms “secret menu” and “hidden menu.”  Of the two terms, secret menu is much more popular on Google search than hidden menu, about seven to nine times as popular, so we focused on that.  Similarly, menu hacks are not nearly as frequently searched as secret menu. Searches for secret menu were at a higher level in 2019 before COVID and fell sharply in 2020 and 2021.  In November 2022, there was a small peak, followed by flattening and lower levels of searches in 2023 and 2024 year-to-date.   Overall, searches on secret menu are flat in recent years.

Despite the flatness in Google searches, there are several sources that cover secret menus, including: Secret Menus, Hack the Menu, Fast Food Club,  Spoon University, along with thousands of TikTok posts about secret menus.   

There are many secret menus apps, and brand-specific apps and sites to make it easier to order secret menu items, like this Starbuck secret menu site (not from Starbucks).

There are tons of posts covering specific restaurant chains and their secret menus.

Cooking class and food tour provider Cozymeal has secret menu posts in 2024 covering Potbelly, Chipotle, Jersey Mike’s, Dutch Bros, Jamba Juice, Wendy’s, Shake Shack, Chick-fil-A,  Wawa, Taco Bell, Five Guys, Sonic, Popeyes, Starbucks, Dairy Queen, Dunkin’, McDonald’s and more.   Cozymeal is using consumer interest in secret menus as a marketing strategy to draw readers to its cooking class and food tours services.  We recently explored Cozymeal and other providers targeting food focused travelers in a post on market segmentation.

Similarly, Allrecipes.com has a post on secret menu items at Chick-fil-A, McDonald’s secret McBrunch Burger, Taco Bell and more.  For Allrecipes, the positioning strategy marketing approach is that these secret menu items from leading chains may inspire home cooks and chefs to try something similar.  

Both Cozymeal’s and Allrecipe’s posts about secret menus are using the well-known strategy of borrowed interest, taking an interesting sounding idea like a “secret” and combining it with a big brand (for awareness and recognition) to attract interest to their brand.  As we’ve explored recently, foodie consumers are always on the lookout for new recipes, whether restaurant-inspired or from cookbooks.

Secret Menu Positioning Strategy Marketing: Leading US Restaurant Chains

We looked at the top 25 chain restaurants in the US and their participation with secret menus.  Unlike In-N-Out, most of these chains do not have an “official” secret menu on their website.  Still, there is a lot of publicity and marketing around their “secret menu items,” all have many TikTok posts, reviews from Cozymeal and others and some recognition from mainstream press (with a generous definition of mainstream).

There is a lot of marketing hype around secret menu items, and consumers clearly love being in on “the secret” and posting their own takes.  For restaurant positioning strategy marketing, secret menus are an area to explore given this hype, rather than ignore.

Some secret menu ideas could be executed simply, such as a menu that is made by the consumer adding a combination of two different Chick-fil-A’s sauces to an existing sandwich to create a new taste experience.  In this case, the restaurant doesn’t need to assemble the customization, just provide the sauces (something Chick-fil-A already does by offering sauces when you purchase).   

To be sure, secret menu items often pose operational challenge, and cost real money, as in the example of Chipotle’s burrito being assembled at home for $3. According to one source, secret menu items that are ordered on apps can be nearly impossible for workers to assemble quickly in a fast food environment. 

“It’s not the orders themselves that are the problem, it’s the entire culture of expectations around them — that a drink a stranger literally made up online should be second nature to a server, and that it should take the same amount of time to make as an iced coffee. That it’s no big deal if an order has a dozen different customizations, because the app lets you do it. It’s the divide between whether something is allowed, and whether it’s actually a good idea. ‘I feel like the true issues are that [customers] don’t want to feel guilty about ordering drinks they know are complicated, and they don’t truly value our labor,’ says Houvenagle.“

Secret Menu Positioning Strategy Marketing: Independents

It’s difficult to tell how many independent restaurants have secret menu items, unless as in the case of Bangkok Street Food in Nevada, they are openly marketing their secret menu.  Food critics are aware of top restaurant items, and write about them, as in the Chasen’s chili or the food hacks, including a Truffle Pocket or Russian Hack here in Los Angeles at independent restaurants. 

In some ways, the secret menu seems almost a better fit for independents, with their inherently local positioning, but so far it’s difficult to see many independents using secret menus as a positioning strategy marketing tactic.

Secret Menu Positioning Strategy Marketing: Competing with LTOs (Limited Time Offers) for Marketing Focus

From a marketing strategy standpoint, secret menu items compete with other menu novelty approaches like limited time offers (aka LTOs).  Typically, limited time offers are intentionally promoted, part of the planned marketing calendar, and, as the name suggests, are only on the menu for a specific time period.  Two time honored LTO examples from McDonald’s are the Shamrock Shake (near St. Patrick’s Day) and the McRib.   

While both LTOs and secret menu items address consumer desire for novelty and discovery, the secret menu item speaks more to customization, similar to Burger King’s famous campaign in the 1970’s  of “Have it Your Way,” which was updated in 2022 to “You Rule!” (now apparently not being used). And, if the secret menu item uses standard menu components, theoretically it is always available, if the consumer can figure out how to order it, and the operational team can deliver it.   Similarly, the daily specials in independent restaurants are the chef’s take on a new item, not the customer’s choice for customization.

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