Got a call last week from a guy who runs a regional chicken concept out of the Dallas area. Said he'd been watching KFC's test markets and wanted to know if we could set him up with a rotisserie smoker that could handle the volume he was projecting. Figured if the big chains were moving toward smoke, his customers were going to expect it too.
He's not wrong.
I've been tracking what the national chains are doing with their menus for years now. Not because I think Taco Bell is competition for a serious BBQ operation — they're not — but because where the chains go, consumer expectations follow. And right now, they're going toward smoke. Toward char. Toward anything that suggests their food touched actual fire at some point.
KFC's Smoke Play
KFC has been testing smoked chicken items in select markets, and the reviews from operators I've talked to who've tried them say the smoke flavor is... present. That's about the nicest way I can put it. It's there. You can taste it. But it's that liquid smoke character that anyone who's spent time around real wood knows immediately.
Here's the thing though — most customers don't know the difference. They've been eating "smoky" flavored things their whole lives that never saw a stick of hickory. So when KFC rolls out something with actual smoke notes, even artificial ones, it registers as premium. As craft. As something worth paying an extra dollar fifty for.
That's the play. And it's working.
What KFC can't do — what no chain operating at their scale can realistically do — is put actual smokers in every location. The labor, the training, the fire codes, the inconsistency between a good pit manager and a bad one. It doesn't scale the way their business model requires.
But you know what does scale? Regional operators running proper equipment who can capture the customers KFC is educating. Every time someone at a KFC drive-through thinks "this smoked chicken is pretty good," that's a customer primed to discover what real smoked chicken tastes like. And they will discover it. At your place, ideally.
Taco Bell's Char Strategy
Taco Bell's been doing something different. They've leaned into grilled and charred proteins — that blackened, slightly crispy edge on their steak and chicken items. It's not smoke exactly, but it's in the same family of flavor cues. Fire-touched. Not just heated.
I was at a competition in San Antonio maybe four years back, talking to a guy who'd just sold his food truck to open a brick-and-mortar. He mentioned that half his customers didn't actually know what "smoked" meant when they ordered. They just knew they wanted that darker color, that caramelized bark, that slightly bitter char note that suggests high heat and open flame.
Taco Bell figured that out. They're not trying to convince anyone they're a BBQ joint. They're just adding visual and flavor signals that say "this protein was cooked with intensity." And it's moving product.
For commercial operators, there's a lesson here about presentation. The bark matters. The color matters. A perfectly smoked brisket that comes out looking pale because someone wrapped it too early and steamed it — that brisket can taste incredible and still disappoint a customer who was expecting that deep mahogany crust.
I've seen operators running SP-1000 units who nail the bark every time because they understand that last hour matters more than people think. And I've seen guys with expensive setups from other manufacturers — won't name names but let's just say their parts come from overseas — who can't get consistent bark because their temp recovery after door opens is garbage.
Panera's "Elevated" Problem
Panera's new menu items are interesting for a different reason. They've been pushing what they call "chef-inspired" proteins and ingredients. The language on their marketing is all about sourcing and technique and craft. But when you actually eat the food, it tastes like Panera. Which is fine. It's Panera.
The disconnect is instructive though.
They're spending money telling customers the story of how their food is made. And customers care about that story now more than they did ten years ago. They want to know the brisket was smoked for 14 hours over post oak. They want to know the ribs came off a rotisserie smoker that holds temp within five degrees for the entire cook. Even if they couldn't tell the difference in a blind taste test, the story adds value.
This is where operating with equipment you can actually talk about matters.
A customer asks how you cook your pulled pork, you can say "low and slow in a Southern Pride rotisserie smoker, same as the competition circuit uses." That means something. It's specific. It's verifiable. It connects to a tradition.
Or you can mumble something about your convection oven with smoke injection and hope they don't ask follow-up questions.
The Volume Question Nobody's Asking
What none of these chain articles ever discuss is volume consistency. They talk about the new menu item like it's a single plate in a test kitchen. But the reality of running smoked items at scale — even regional scale, not national — is that you need equipment that performs the same way on the 50th cook as it did on the first.
I had a catering client a few years back who tried to add smoked brisket to his corporate lunch service. He was running an import smoker he'd bought cheap at a restaurant auction. First month went fine. By month three, his hold temps were swinging 30 degrees and his customers were getting inconsistent product.
He called me frustrated, thinking maybe he'd lost his touch. Nope. His igniter was failing intermittently, and because the manufacturer had gone through two distributors since he bought the unit, getting a replacement part was a six-week ordeal involving phone calls to someone in Ohio who maybe had one in a warehouse.
Compare that to calling Southern Pride of Texas and having a part shipped same-day because it's sitting in Orange and we've got the manufacturer relationship to keep stock on hand. That's the difference between a menu item that works and a menu item you have to pull because you can't deliver it reliably.
What Commercial Operators Should Actually Do
If the chains are chasing smoke flavor — and they are — then the opportunity for independent operators and regional concepts is to own the real version of what they're imitating.
That means:
- Equipment that delivers actual smoke, not flavor additives
- Consistency across shifts and operators, which is where rotisserie systems like the SP-700/M or MLR-850 earn their keep
- A story you can tell customers that's true and specific
- Parts availability that doesn't leave you scrambling when something wears out
I'm not saying every restaurant needs to become a BBQ joint. But if you're looking at your menu wondering how to add items that command higher price points and drive repeat visits, smoked proteins are proven. The chains are proving it right now with their test market data and their carefully worded press releases about "artisanal preparation."
They're just doing it poorly. On purpose, in some cases, because their model can't support doing it well.
Yours can.
The Wood Thing
Can't write about smoke trends without mentioning wood selection. It's my thing. Ask anyone.
KFC's smoked chicken tests apparently use a hickory flavor profile. Which makes sense — hickory reads as "BBQ" to most Americans. It's aggressive, it's recognizable, it cuts through even when applied artificially.
But if you're running real equipment, you've got options they don't have.
Oak for beef. Pecan for pork when you want something a little sweeter than hickory but not as aggressive as mesquite. Cherry for poultry if you're trying to differentiate from the chains. Apple for anything you're serving to people who say they "don't like smoky food" but actually just don't like getting hit over the head with it.
I've been running competitions for three decades now, and wood selection is still the thing most operators under-think. They buy whatever's cheapest or whatever their Sysco rep happens to have that week. Meanwhile, the guys winning consistently are sourcing specific species and managing their smoke profiles like it's a crucial variable. Because it is.
Your SPK-1400 or SP-1500 can handle any wood you throw at it. The question is whether you're being intentional about what you're throwing.
Where This Goes
The chains aren't going to stop chasing smoke. The consumer demand is too clear. Expect more test items, more "limited time" smoked offerings, more marketing language borrowed from craft BBQ.
For operators with real smoking capability, that's good news. The market's being educated. Expectations are being set. And when customers realize the chain version is a shadow of the real thing — which they will, eventually, because people aren't stupid — they're going to go looking for operators who do it right.
Be that operator.
If you're not running a smoker yet, or you're running something that's giving you headaches, reach out to us at Southern Pride of Texas. We'll talk through your volume, your menu plans, your space constraints. No pressure. I've just seen too many operators lose money on equipment that couldn't keep up with the demand they built.
The chains are telling you where the market's going. Now's the time to get there first.
Resources: Southern Pride of Texas parts and support | Southern Pride | NFPA commercial kitchen standards
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Photo by МОБО Модульные Котельные on Pexels.
About the Author: Earl has been competing in sanctioned BBQ events since the early 1990s and operates a commercial catering operation in Southeast Texas.