Taco Bell menu tries wild new take on beloved classic
Taco Bell never stops reinventing, albeit with roughly the same group of ingredients. The Yum Brands chain might add a new hot sauce or make some other minor update to the menu, but it rarely adds anything significantly different.
It was a big deal when it relatively recently added a new chicken item, but chicken itself was not new for the chain.
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Basically, Taco Bell has given its chefs a long list of ingredients and asked them to come up with new combinations. That doesn’t seem like it would be a long-term recipe for success, but it certainly has been.
The chain has been innovative in making very small moves to create novel products. The most famous examples are its various Doritos Locos Taco varieties.
These have been perhaps the most successful fast-food launches in history and have inspired a range of copycats. The chain has also mined that vein itself, working with various snack chips in order to make slightly new variations of Mexican classics.
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Taco Bell has never been overly confined by tradition. It uses mostly traditional Mexican ingredients and turns them into things you have never seen before.
Its latest item pushes those same boundaries.
Image source: Taco Bell
Taco Bell tests product with multiple names
In creating new products, Taco Bell also likes to invent new words to name them. Its latest effort appears to be a work in progress.
“In what seems like a mouthful to say, Taco Bell is testing the new Crispy Cheese Triple Stacked Taco at participating areas in the Sacramento, CA, area for a limited time. The name is also a work-in-progress, as some locations have it on the menu as the ‘Quesocrisp Triple Stacked Taco,'” BrandEating reported.
The new item follows Taco Bell’s typical “more is more” philosophy.
The Crispy Cheese Triple Stacked Taco offers a three-layered taco shell with an outer layer of crispy cheese and a warm flour tortilla sandwiching a layer of melted cheddar, mozzarella, and pepper jack. Inside the taco’s shell is a familiar combination of seasoned beef, spicy ranch sauce, shredded lettuce, diced tomatoes, and shredded cheddar,” according to the website.
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“The Crispy Cheese Triple Stacked is priced from $3.99 to $4.99, varying with location,” it added.
Taco Bell has not shared any plans for a national or regional release.
Taco Bell is on fire
Taco Bell’s parent company, Yum Brands (YUM) , recently reported first-quarter earnings, and numbers were outstanding for the Mexican chain.
“Taco Bell U.S. delivered a staggering 9% increase in same-store sales, an impressive achievement, especially against the backdrop of soft industry trends. Notably, this quarter, Taco Bell saw a significant expansion in consumer penetration, reflecting our efforts to elevate our positioning and broaden our relevance, which helped us to grow traffic low-single digits,” CEO David Gibbs said during the call.
He also noted that the chain has improved in one key area.
“Taco Bell’s digital momentum is also accelerating. Byte by Yum! has reduced system limitations, empowering Taco Bell’s world class advertising team to push creative boundaries. One area in marketing with enormous potential is the expansion of AI-driven decisioning to enable personalized experiences for consumers,” he added.
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Ultimately, this is expected to be a massive sales driver for the brand and the company.
“We are testing the use of these tools to enable us to deliver one-to-one communication to our consumers. Recall at the Taco Bell Consumer Day, the team shared that they expect to generate over $225,000 in additional per-store sales by 2030…through expanded digital channels and loyalty membership. What truly sets Taco Bell U.S. apart, however, is its unique ability to deliver compelling value while improving store-level margins, a rare combination in the industry,” Gibbs explained.
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