Restaurants are well represented among the daily deals, but many of them are fine dining establishments or chains in the casual or fast casual segment. Occasionally, there will be a deal from quick-service brands, but mostly in the treat or bakery categories.
Those offers, brokered by franchisees, tend to sell fairly well as evidenced by a Smoothie King Groupon in Nashville, Tenn., that featured a $7 smoothie for just $3 and was bought by more than 5,850 customers in May.
With success stories like that, it seems more QSRs would offer deals, particularly for local store marketing. But the nature of QSR, including its already low price ticket average and spontaneous customer base, may keep operators from the consideration.
For most merchants, Groupon touts itself as an opportunity for new customer acquisition. And certainly, QSRs can benefit from that as well, but even Groupon realizes a difference in the selling point.
