Why Is KFC So Expensive? (Top 10 Reasons)

 

If you’re a fried chicken fan, you’ve probably had Kentucky Fried Chicken.

There’s no doubt about it: KFC is delicious.

It’s also expensive.

What is it about this fast-food favorite that fills the stomach while emptying the wallet?

Let’s find out.

 

Why Is KFC So expensive? (Top 10 Reasons)

 

There are plenty of fast-food locations that sell fried chicken.

When it comes to piping hot chicken, though, KFC tends to come to mind as one of the first.

It’s better than most, and a few things set it apart.

Pricewise, this is also true.

 

1. The Herbs And Spices

 

One of the biggest reasons for KFC’s high price tag is its spice blend.

It makes sense.

A great taste is worth more money.

KFC chicken is formulated to taste great, as it packs in a whopping 11 herbs and spices.

Their blend is different from most, however, as these herbs and spices span across multiple taste spectrums—not just a couple.

Among these are salty, sweet, and umami, three tastes which the human palate craves.

This isn’t to say that a person couldn’t make their own version of KFC chicken.

This said, few things compare to the time-tested legacy of the restaurant chain’s professional creation process.

 

2. There’s No Dollar Menu

 

Another reason KFC is more expensive than its fast-food chain competition is, simply put, its menu options.

Specifically, KFC lacks dollar menu options.

In fact, most of KFC’s menu items are more than five dollars.

Comparatively, this isn’t too far off from its alternatives, but the price for buy-in when it comes to KFC is higher than most.

As for the $5 Fill Up menu option, itself, this option isn’t always five dollars.

In 2016, for example, the Fill Up reached a six-dollar price tag in some areas.

As for the $5 Fill Up itself, which is often advertised alongside KFC’s $5 Box Meal, you’ll receive a full entree, a drink, several sides, and even a dessert upon payment.

Really, the minimum buy-in for a tasty KFC meal isn’t too bad when it comes to variety.

Customers have the choice of a two-piece drumstick and thigh meal, which comes with a biscuit, mashed potatoes, a chocolate chip cookie, and a medium drink.

Meanwhile, KFC’s Fill Up Pot Pie gives feasters a KFC Classic Pot Pie, a chocolate chip cookie, and a medium drink.

For those wanting something more bite-sized, the $5 Fill Up Extra Crispy option is available, which included boneless chicken strips, mashed potatoes, and the same, medium-sized drink.

This comes with gravy and dripping sauce, too, as well as the chocolate chip cookie for dessert.

The $5 Fill Up Chicken Breast option is a little lacking, at first glance, as it features a single chicken breast alongside mashed potatoes, gravy, the chocolate chip cookie, and a medium-sized drink.

The chicken breast is eight ounces, however, which definitely justifies the price.

 

3. Prices May Vary

 

The Fill Up menu option’s price variance sheds light on another big factor: location price differences.

Not all restaurants have consistent menu prices, country-wise.

In the United States, this means KFC menu options can differ quite a bit on a state-to-state basis.

Looking back to the $5 Fill Up option, website menu prices are based upon the customer’s area.

You can see KFC’s statement, here on its ordering page: “Prices may vary. Tax extra.” In New York City, a Fill Up can cost as much as $6.59.

Fortunately, in some other locations, Fill Up prices are still modest, in comparison.

What should buyers do?

In most cases, it comes down to a simple price-check based upon the restaurant-goer’s location.

Check out KFC’s ordering page for more info, but definitely consider an alternative if your area’s Kentucky Fried Chicken costs are simply too high.

 

4. Big Bucket Options

 

KFC’s dollar menu being nonexistent, its choice to offer “big dollar menu” options further skews the restaurant chain’s perceived prices, overall.

You can also grab a $20 Family Fill Up.

It’s certainly an option that extends well beyond the price limit, per item, of most fast-food restaurants.

Fortunately, there are different Fill Up chicken types available, so there are a few options to choose from.

Each option includes four biscuits, mashed potatoes, gravy, and a large coleslaw, too—so foodies still get a lot of food for the price.

This isn’t to say that KFC hasn’t received criticism for its Family Fill Up menu options.

Sometimes called Kentucky Fried Deception, KFC’s Fill Up ads are rumored to present an inaccurate view of the food provided.

Specifically, ads are said to offer larger chicken pieces than are actually provided, resulting in customers needing to purchase more food to fill their stomachs.

Still, such claims are also widely disputed.

While reports of KFC’s underrepresentation still exist, other location-to-location statements affirm proper representation.

 

5. The Pandemic

 

After April 1, 2020, KFC was among many fast-food restaurants to boost their menu prices.

This said, KFC’s most notable shift in prices came in the form of its $30 Fill Up menu option.

Sold under the new tagline, “Enough food for today—and tomorrow,” the $30 Fill Up hit the spot when it came to unsure food purchasing options in uncertain times.

The menu option itself is pretty similar to the $20 Fill Up: The option’s mix remains the same, but it includes an additional 12 tenders, or an additional eight chicken pieces, bone-in, in each order.

This is less-known, however, due to another COVID-19 impact on the restaurant chain’s advertising—one which may very well impact prices in the near future.

KFC had to suspend its famous tagline, “It’s Finger Lickin’ Good,” back in August.

It wasn’t an appropriate tagline to use during the pandemic and was formally retired after an astounding 64 years of use.

Will we see the tasty tagline return?

Most likely, as KFC’s Global Chief Marketing Officer, Catherine Tan-Gillespie, said that the slogan will return.

It’ll take some time, however, for it to re-achieve its uplifting note, however.

 

6. Farmer Fresh

 

KFC’s menu options are also fresh.

Its chicken isn’t frozen.

This is a different approach to fried chicken in general, when it comes to fast food, and it sort of necessitates the higher prices.

Chicken that hasn’t been frozen simply tastes better, but it also costs more to supply.

Frozen food which is reheated and sold by fast food restaurants is way more convenient.

Kentucky Fried Chicken, on the other hand, is able to provide fresh meat to all of its worldwide locations.

Sourced from local farms, each chicken selection is cut into legs, wings, breasts, and thighs during cultivation.

All in all, this makes KFC’s chicken quality very high, and sustaining this quality for so long has also driven KFC’s menu prices up as well.

It’s said that KFC chicken is delivered to worldwide locations within two days from respective national companies.

The company’s food preparation options don’t cut any corners, either: All employees follow strict protocols when it comes to food prep, including the changing of flour between shifts, washing raw chicken, wearing aprons, and washing hands frequently.

When it comes to labor costs, things like prep time and complexity enter the mix, so to speak.

With more prep time comes higher costs—and raw chicken, cooked correctly, tends to cost much more than frozen alternatives.

KFC isn’t lying when it says it preps its food in a homemade-like process.

Aside from its pressure frier, the entire process is manual.

You can find a full explanation of the process over at Gizmodo, but we’ll give you a glimpse:

Each chicken wing, breast, thigh, and leg is thoroughly inspected.

This is mostly about quality control, which means that some items are thrown out if they’re bruised, contain excess fat, or have leftover feathers.

This, too, necessitates KFC prices, as the company is willing to throw out any chicken which isn’t ideal for consumption.

Once it’s brined, KFC chicken is tossed seven times.

This process is pretty meticulous, to make sure the chicken isn’t too soggy when the breading is applied.

The breading process, as well, follows an in-depth method, and employees are trained to perform this process perfectly.

Following an extra seesaw motion to bread the chicken to perfection, employees toss the chicken onto the frying rack.

This is a lengthier process than those of competing fast food restaurants, surely, but it is what makes KFC chicken so tasty, in general.

 

7. The Price of Pressure Cooking

 

The history behind KFC’s use of pressure cookers is really interesting.

They started back in 1967, alongside Winston Industries.

Hired by Kentucky Fried Chicken, Winston Shelton was a partial owner of Engineering Prototype Services, and he’d even worked full-time as a development engineer for General Electric.

KFC’s use of pressure cookers was revolutionary back then, as they’d used cooking oil.

This method wasn’t adopted by KFC’s competitors for a while, making KFC somewhat of an undisputed leader as a crispy chicken provider.

As with the nature of all things fast-food-related, however, the industry did eventually catch up.

The innovative Colonel Sanders might’ve been providing fried chicken for years, but some things simply can’t compete in that market without a price tag increase.

As KFC’s competitors grew in number, it had to shift its prices to match its industry-leading taste and mastery of pressure-cooked recipe designs.

 

8. Calories To Dollars

 

In most cases, high-calorie foods are more expensive.

KFC takes the proverbial cake with that with its calorie-stacked menu options.

Humans crave high-calorie meals, too, which makes KFC’s menu options particularly tasty.

You can check out a KFC menu breakdown by item over at Nutrition Charts.

A KFC chicken breast can pack a whopping 770 calories per serving.

Even its popcorn nuggets hold hefty calorie counts per serving, landing at around 620 per.

As for the restaurant chain’s low-cal menu options, they do exist.

You can snag a homemade side of green beans for 25 calories, for example.

This said, the same serving will still net you around 300 mg of sodium.

Surprisingly, a KFC biscuit has 200 calories with only 7 grams of fat, which is a decent alternative to similar menu items provided by other fast-food chains.

As with all menu options, of course, adding a soda to your meal will boost the caloric intake quite a bit.

When it comes to sweet menu options, though, you’ll find KFC to be healthier as well: A KFC chocolate chip cookie contains 120 calories.

This isn’t to say that sugar shouldn’t be overlooked as a potential ingredient of health concern, as the same cookie still contains 12 grams of it.

 

9. The Cost Of Crispy

 

KFC food is made to activate the brain’s reward center, which thrives on sodium.

You’ve guessed it: Crispy breading is packed with sodium.

It’s also carb-centric, which makes it even tastier.

Highly palatable foods deserve higher price tags in general, and KFC has done a great job at maximizing its crispy taste.

Of course, we should also consider that KFC’s menu packs a lot of crispiness.

Crispy food is so delicious, in fact, that researchers have discovered some less obvious factors contributing to its relatively addictive nature.

Interestingly, even sound plays a role.

Dubbed the “forgotten flavor sense” in a 2015 study, the “crunch” of fried food was found to enhance its perceived taste.

Perception, in general, makes food taste better, and KFC’s many advertisements feature the crunch aspect quite audibly.

If you’ve ever wondered why the restaurant chain advertises its Crispy and Extra Crispy chicken selections so much, this might be an answer.

Crispy food is also associated with human dietary preference for fresh carbohydrates.

KFC’s chicken is already fresh, no doubt, but its crunch signals a recipe packed with vitamins and other nutrients.

Crispy comes at a price, of course: In general, crispy foods tend to cost more.

This said, KFC’s crispy items are actually on par with restaurant chain alternatives.

This means that, while KFC’s crunch factor doesn’t drive its prices sky-high, its crispy crunch certainly doesn’t cut costs, to say the least.

 

10. The Secret Recipe

 

You’ve probably heard about KFC’s secret blend, but did you know it can’t be reproduced?

Not perfectly, at least.

As said earlier, it’s possible to replicate the general taste of KFC chicken.

However, even commercial competitors can’t replicate the food titan’s secret recipe perfectly.

We need to remember that KFC is the world’s second largest fast-food provider.

It doesn’t take secrecy lightly, and its recipe specifics are well-protected.

We know that Colonel Sanders created the recipe with 11 herbs and spices, but the exact recipe, created in the 1940s, still remains a secret.

This isn’t just a marketing gimmick, either.

Even when the Colonel’s nephew showed reporters part of the blend in 2016, the recipe still seems to elude replication.

The given list of herbs and spices is nonetheless tasty, as its ingredients include dried mustard, ground ginger, and paprika.

Even so, there’s something to be said about a truly unique recipe:

If you want an original taste, you might have to pay a little more.

 

Prices In Perspective

 

Again, KFC’s original taste, alone, makes it worth the cost.

Scarcity, in general, tends to increase food prices.

An example of this can be seen in Chilean sea bass prices.

Supply and demand are always at play, and Chilean sea bass is both an adaptable entree item while also being more expensive to procure.

KFC has a lot of menu variety, too, which means you don’t necessarily have to stick to a $30 Fill Up.

The restaurant chain tends to get a lot of flack when it comes to high prices, but customer purchasing choices should also be considered.

Its Kentucky Fried Wings Combo, for example, offers five delectable wings for under $6.50, in most locations.

Meanwhile, the 8 Piece Meal, at first glance, comes at a big price of over 22 dollars.

The former is purchased less often, however, so the affordable options are still there.

It should also be noted that the 8 Piece Meal doesn’t include just chicken.

It arrives with two filling sides, as well as four biscuits.

Upon breaking down the meal into an itemized list, the price isn’t so bad.

You can see a full price list over at All Menu Price.

Even though KFC’s official menu still gives a good representation, the website simply has a more accessible nutrition and by-location price tag breakdown.

All in all, KFC can still cost quite a bit.

However, when browsing with some extra information in mind, its one-of-a-kind menu options are totally worthwhile.