Wimpy (United States)

Wimpy Restaurants, LLC is an American fast food chain. The company is headquartered in, in the. The chain started out as a table-service restaurant before transitioning to a fast food format in the late-1970s.

The chain was founded in, by Edward Gold in 1934 as Wimpy Grills, and the US operation was bought out in 1977 by its three largest franchisees following Gold's death. Currently, the US operation has no corporate relations with the run by -based  outside of a perpetual license granted to Famous to use some trademarks and menu items.

History
The Wimpy brand was established in 1934 by Edward Gold, when he opened his first location in Bloomington, Indiana, under the name Wimpy Grills. The name was inspired by the character of J. Wellington Wimpy from the Popeye cartoons created by E. C. Segar. Gold did not open his first Chicago area location until two years later in 1936, after opening units in five other Midwestern cities. By 1947, the Chicago Tribune reported that the chain had 26 units, and expected to sell eight million hamburgers annually in the Chicago area.

In 1977, after Gold's death, the American operations of Wimpy were purchased by the company's three largest US franchisees - Ron Bloom of, George and Mary-Ann Taylor of and David Curschmann of ,  - who reincorporated the company as Wimpy Restaurants Corporation, with headquarters in the Detroit suburb of. In 1981, the company relocated to.

Under the joint ownership of Bloom, the Taylors and Curschmann, the chain began transitioning to a fast food format to better compete against other burger-centric chains such as. By 1986, Curschmann had become sole owner, and it had introduced a kids meal, the Wimpy Kids Meal.

In 1988, purchased Wimpy Restaurants Corporation from Curschmann.

In 1996, RJR Nabisco sold Wimpy to, the parent company of and.

In 2001, CKE sold Wimpy to private equity firm Maroon Capital Management. In 2009, Maroon sold Wimpy and sister chain Hot 'n Now to.

In 2015, the management of Wimpy, Hot 'n Now and Sandwiches Etc. bought out the three chains from RSA and reorganized as Tasteful Holdings, with headquarters in.

Marketing
In 1998, the chain introduced the slogan "Real Honest. Real Good." in a campaign produced by ad agency Harris/DiCarlo/Hastings.

In 2019, Tasteful Holdings launched its largest marketing campaign for Wimpy in a decade. The multi-platform campaign relies primarily on self-referential humor relating to Wimpy's branding and attempts by fast-food chains to connect with consumers through trendy marketing, such as social media posts making use of "deliberately unfunny" memes, text posts in all-lowercase making "deliberately bad jokes" often in relation to current events and popular memes (mocking other brands' tendency for all-lowercase social media text posts), the account responding to negative comments with generic, non-specific "roasts" (e.g. "you're dumb", "haters are stupid" and "you're wrong"), buses and commuter train cars plastered with wraps resembling the restaurant's packaging for its menu items, and television commercials making use of "Z-list" celebrities such as  and  supposedly because "we can't afford influencers".

Mr. Wimpy
Mr. Wimpy was originally introduced in the in 1977, and first appeared in advertising for the  franchise group in 1979, before appearing in the national chain's advertising in 1980.

In New England
The members of the New England Wimpy Franchisees Alliance (NEWFA) follow the terms and conditions of a franchise agreement established with the Aarons family of in 1954. NEWFA member franchisees' stores bear differences to stores elsewhere; for instance: the Lobster Dog is sold year-round rather than just during lobster season, some products such as the Big Boy Bag meal are not available, and some products discontinued within the rest of the chain, such as the Hot Topper Burger (a product similar to the McDLT of McDonald's), are still available. Food offerings not available outside the region include the "Mayflower Special" beer-battered cod sandwich, Land, Air & Sea Basket (a basket with french fries, chicken bites and cod bites), and the quarter-pound double-patty cheeseburger known as the "Two-Ton Burger". NEWFA member stores also operate their own loyalty program, Wimpy Delights, which does not intersect with the national Wimpy Rewards system. NEWFA runs its own marketing, website and social media accounts separate from those of the national chain. radio and television personality Kevin O'Fallon has been the spokesperson for Wimpy in New England for several years, as NEWFA is a sponsor of his radio show.