Chicken tenders are taking over the world, and KFC is rushing to keep up

By Bill Peters

Goodbye bone-in wings, hello tenders and chicken sandwiches that can be easily eaten in the car

KFC says recent menu changes are "centered around boneless chicken."

When KFC on Monday announced a menu overhaul to make room for more boneless chicken, the move was in part an effort to meet fast-food customers where they're at today - specifically, in their cars eating chicken tenders.

Consumers increasingly are gravitating away from the bone-in wings that made KFC a global success. Analysts say the latest menu changes - which will start in the U.K. and Ireland before making their way to the U.S. in the weeks ahead - will take hold as KFC tries to stay relevant in a fried-chicken landscape now dominated by sandwich chain Chick-fil-A.

Meanwhile, more restaurants are leaning on chicken for growth, with some corporate executives noting that people are choosing chicken over beef as prices rise for the latter.

Mark Kalinowski, an analyst at Kalinowski Equity Research, said that KFC faces far more competition than it did in prior decades. He also said that while KFC - which traces its roots back to a Kentucky motel nearly a century ago - became known for bone-in chicken served in a bucket, consumers' dining habits have since shifted.

"If you think back to 1975, 1980, dad might bring home chicken in the bucket for a meal and give mom a break from cooking," Kalinowski said. "But today's consumer, a lot of it's about what is portable. What can you hold in your hand as you're driving your car? Chicken on the bone doesn't really fit that very well. But sandwiches do. Tenders definitely do."

Huy Do, a research manager at Datassential, a food and beverage information platform, noted that boneless chicken is less messy, easier to dip and easier to prepare.

"There's also a consistency advantage," Do said. "Boneless pieces can be portioned and prepared more uniformly than bone-in chicken, which benefits both back-of-house execution and the consumer experience."

In 1999, Kalinowski noted, KFC's U.S. market share stood at 39.7% of the limited-service chicken segment. The second-biggest player in that space, he said, was Popeyes, with 8.8%.

By 2025, Chick-fil-A was far and away the leader, with around 45% market share; Popeyes had 11.5%, Raising Cane's had 11% and KFC had 10%.

Restaurant menus have also changed to reflect a more mobile world, with boneless wings on 12.2% of U.S. fast-food restaurant menus this year, representing 37.7% growth over the last four years, according to Datassential. Chicken tenders were available on 23.7% of U.S. fast-food menus this year, up 8% over that same period. Analysts at the firm expect those offerings to expand.

Figures from Datassential cited by the Wall Street Journal last year showed that bone-in fried-chicken offerings on U.S. fast-food restaurant menus had fallen 72% over the previous four years.

KFC on Monday said the menu changes were "centered around boneless chicken" and that the move was intended to help it stand out in an "increasingly crowded category." The menu overhaul also includes more than 20 new sauces, as well as new drinks.

Shares of KFC parent company Yum Brands (YUM) were up 4.6% on a year-to-date basis but were off highs reached earlier in the year. KFC's sales still rose last year, and were up 6% in the first quarter of this year. While its menu already includes tenders, Yum Brands executives in April said they were refreshing KFC's menu "to battle for the future consumer."

However, other chains are also locked in that battle. Burger King parent Restaurant Brands International (QSR), during its earnings call last month, said it was focusing more on making chicken tenders better in an effort to get back to basics.

"Things like tenders, which is a big part of our business, we've tightened our tender spec a bit," said Restaurant Brands CEO Joshua Kobza, adding that product satisfaction had improved.

Other chains have also turned to tenders for bigger sales gains. Kalinowski noted recent successes with chicken items at Taco Bell, which Yum also owns. El Pollo Loco's (LOCO) limited-time rollout in April of grilled chicken tenders had also shown signs of success.

D.A. Davidson analyst Matt Curtis, in a note on Monday, said El Pollo Loco was selling more orders with three to four pieces, as opposed to orders with only two. He added that "tenders could prove to be a material traffic driver" for the chain.

Elsewhere, executives at meat producer Hormel Foods (HRL) in February said that chicken tenders appeared on "roughly 40%" of menus at food-service locations. They said a line of chicken tenders that rolled out months earlier was "already demonstrating adoption rates consistent with some of our successful historical food-service launches."

BNP Paribas analysts wrote last week that chicken was among the main drivers of the restaurant industry's growth. But they also said there was heightened risk of competition and discounting - factors that have defined the fast-food wars over the past two years, as restaurants try to get back customers who were scared away by earlier price increases.

McDonald's (MCD) CEO Chris Kempczinski said last month that "there's certainly a lot of activity happening in chicken across the industry," and that there was more room for the fast-food giant to take advantage of the demand.

"Everyone calls McDonald's a burger chain, but if you called them a chicken chain, I wouldn't argue with you," Kalinowski said.

-Bill Peters

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06-16-26 1753ET