Tim Hortons wakes up and smells the coffee: All-day breakfast a new dawn
TORONTO — Tim Hortons will pilot all-day breakfast in a dozen Ontario locations and look to introduce a kids menu, delivery and a loyalty program, in a bid to regain the trust of franchisees and customers.
The fast-food giant’s president, Alex Macedo, told The Canadian Press the all-day breakfast experiment will begin at a handful of Hamilton and Burlington locations later this summer.
The all-day experiment will include all the menu items typically available at the store in the morning.
If it is successful, he said the company would consider rolling it out further.
“The demand is loud and clear,” he said. “Any time we bring up the idea of breakfast at any time, the response is very favourable and very strong.”
Macedo’s announcement came as Tim Hortons has publicly been struggling to fix its strained relationship with some franchisees.
The franchisees have been sparring with the company over everything from cost-cutting measures made in the wake of Ontario’s minimum wage hikes to delays in supply deliveries to a $700-million renovation plan they say will cost store owners $450,000 per restaurant.
Last month, Macedo admitted “we could have done a few things better” and started touring the country to meet with franchisees and promise them he would fix the relationship.
Franchisee Aron Burch will offer all-day breakfast at five of his seven locations.
He said he was eager to get on board with the pilot because he owns a handful of locations near McMaster University in Hamilton and finds most of his customers are students who like to sleep in, often making it to his restaurants just as breakfast is winding down for the day.
He said the months of tension between Tim Hortons and the franchisees, and the rise in the cost of living, had caused his stores to see “a little bit” of a decline in transactions in samestore sales, but he was confident all-day breakfast would help them lure more customers.