In mid-to-late 2023, more chains started reporting a post-COVID recovery of their late-night business, and data supported that trend, showing a 7.5% traffic increase in the daypart year-over-year. More competition at late night mobilized White Castle to defend what the company believes is its territory.
“We started in 1921 as a family-owned business with a strong focus on being where people were 24 hours a day. We had 24-hour restaurants in the 1920s and it became a point of difference to our identity,” vice president Jamie Richardson said during a recent interview. “We dialed it back during the pandemic and discovered we missed it.”
Now, 70% of White Castle’s 340-plus restaurants are open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, while 85% are open 24 hours on Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays.
Richardson wouldn’t disclose the sales mix for White Castle’s late-night daypart, or how it compares to others, but he said it has become a bigger contributor to overall sales increases and positive growth throughout the past few years. For context, White Castle finished 2023 with about $683.9 million in sales, compared to $579.8 million in 2019, according to Technomic data.
With that momentum, the company put a strategy in place last year to “nourish” the late-night business, including more investments in labor, technology tools, and marketing. An example is adding kitchen monitors to each of its restaurants, so employees know what delivery orders are coming in and when. Though Richardson wouldn’t disclose the delivery mix, he said it is an especially important channel going into weekends and at late night.
“The rate of [delivery] growth has slowed as things have returned to normal, but the percentage of volume at late-night is significant enough to be attention getting,” he said. “New monitors won’t be a case study, but it makes things easier so we can return to basics and rediscover our heart for hospitality at late night.”
Richardson added that White Castle has made a bigger effort to establish stronger partnerships with its delivery partners and has “leaned into the delivery scenario” to ensure the company is top of mind for consumers making purchasing decisions when the sun goes down. Speaking of top of mind, White Castle is also pouring more investments into marketing channels that cater to the late-night crowd, such as on-screen ads in bars, or QR codes on coasters. Last fall, the chain launched “Night Castle” merchandise in partnership with rapper Fat Joe.
“That content creation is part of a whole dedicated late-night message that may not ring as true for our competition because of our history and scrappiness [during the daypart],” Richardson said.
Another investment the company has made is in a new initiative called “Night Strikes,” in which district supervisors and general managers are added to late-night shifts to work alongside frontline employees and ensure a sharper focus on operations.
“Many team members may not see their district supervisor or district manager if they’re working late at night. [Night Strikes] is a purposeful effort to give a lot of love to those working those hours,” Richardson said. “Little things like that are emblematic of a larger effort. You always want to make sure you’re aligned and focused.”
Unsurprisingly, White Castle’s objective with its beefed-up late-night investments is to drive sales and transactions. Richardson said that is more critical now as the category becomes more competitive.
“With genuine respect to our competitors, we want to own the night,” he said.
From here, the company’s path forward is to continue making investments to ensure customers know most of the system is open 24/7.
“What we’ve learned after being around 103 years is we end every idea with an ellipsis. The environment and context will change, but this is part of who we are; it’s our identity,” Richardson said. “We can’t ever 100% predict the future, but our late-night trend is positive, and it feels to us like we made the right investments.”
Contact Alicia Kelso at [email protected]