A branch of fast food outlet KFC is seen in Cape Town. File image
South Africa’s popular fast food franchise, KFC South Africa found itself in hot water after it came to light that some of its branches were using its “Add Hope” campaign as a performance measurement tool for employees.
This came after a warning letter was leaked on social media to an employee for failing to meet the target set by the store to meet its Add Hope quota.
Add Hope is KFC SA’s charity campaign where customers are given an option to add R2 to their order to help children in need.
The letter read: “This warning should be regarded as very serious and if you continue this unacceptable conduct it would lead to more serious action being taken against you.”
KFC SA told Business Report that as soon as they became aware of the allegations, the company prioritised an investigation into the validity of the “warning letter”.
KFC SA said: “Unfortunately, last week, we confirmed the allegations proved to be true. This goes against the value and ethos of Add Hope, which we have worked hard to build over the last 15 years. Add Hope donations have and always will be completely voluntary. We chase hope, not targets and thus Add Hope performance-based KPIs should never be set for anyone.”
KFC further stated: “As a franchised business, we implement systems and processes to deal with incidents that do not align to our ethos and values, and have already taken immediate action to address this incident, specifically, with the partner in question. We are also reminding our teams that a whistle-blower line exists to report matters such as this.”
According to KFC’s Add Hope website, it states that KFC’s contributions, combined with the R2 donations from its customers, provide more than 30 million meals every year to children in South Africa.
Guys lets normalize giving KFC R2 donations, some peoples jobs matter💔 pic.twitter.com/n93IqjlfVY
— shumi•𝕩 (@_mishumo_) June 12, 2024
While our team members are encouraged to be advocates of Add Hope, we firmly oppose the use of the Add Hope programme as a performance measure. Such actions contradict the ethos of Add Hope. ^Team KFC|MT 2/2
— KFC South Africa (@KFCSA) June 13, 2024
Last week, Eighty20, South Africa’s leading consumer insights and data science firm, unpacked some interesting insights into the country's fast food dining habits.
In the past year, one out of every two adult South Africans –totalling 23.4 million people – purchased fast food.
Approximately 20 million of them dined at a fast food outlet in the past month, a figure that has remained relatively stable over the past 12 months.
Notably, 90% of these 20 million individuals chose to eat at one of the top 10 fast food outlets, with that being KFC.
BUSINESS REPORT