When KFC loses a buyer, two thirds vanish from chicken QSR entirely. The third that migrates leaks to three specific competitors, in three distinct patterns — with one region carrying half the loss.

Signal integrity is moderate and triangulated.

Component fidelity scores across the core analyses fall in the X.XX–X.XX range on MFour’s internal scale. That score reflects the reality of behavioral data: no single modality — receipts, venue pings, surveys, conversations — tells the full story. The composite picture is more reliable than any individual component because four data modalities agree on who the threats are. They disagree only on the magnitude ranking among competitors KFC already knows it fights.

Demographic source: first-party profile data.

Demographic data comes from first-party profile data from MFour’s consumer base, matched to deduplicated venue visitors. Demographics are pulled from the CONSUMERS_V weights table using each consumer’s most recent weight_month. VENUE_WEIGHT is applied for population projection. Panel base: XX,XXX unique KFC visitors (April XXXX–March XXXX). All demographic data is self-reported, not inferred or modeled. The “Unknown” category is <X% across all dimensions — data completeness is high.

Venue-visit-based methodology.

All behavioral metrics in this report are venue-visit-based (GPS-observed). Receipt/dollar metrics have been removed from this version due to email receipt bias toward digital/delivery orderers. The six behavioral archetypes (§X and Appendix A Dossiers) are derived from deduplicated venue data, with archetype sizes, visit frequencies, and visit-share figures reflecting corrected counts. Priorities are ranked by the combination of visit-share gap and activation feasibility.

The Chick-fil-A receipt-undercount is disclosed.

Chick-fil-A customers share receipts at structurally lower rates than Popeyes customers. This makes CFA appear smaller in receipt-based cross-shop than in venue visits. The Competitive Threat Matrix weights venue-based metrics at XX% and receipt-based metrics at XX% — a weighting the report applies consistently. In practice: we lean on visits for Chick-fil-A. Both signals point to the same top three threats.

The Cross-Shop Flow Map uses analytically derived inflow.

The data session expired during the Flow Map query, so inflow was reconstructed from reciprocal cross-shop calculation. Outflow (KFC → competitor) is empirically measured. Where Flow Map figures appear — particularly the +X.X pp Chick-fil-A net flow — the report treats them as directional and calls the specific artifact (e.g., CFA’s apparent positive net flow is read as effectively neutral-to-negative in practice).

Two framings of daypart share.

Where this report cites ‘CFA captures XX% of breakfast occasions in the South,’ that is the occasion-share-lost denominator — competitor visits as a % of [KFC + competitor] visits in that daypart-region. Elsewhere (Appendix BX) ‘CFA XX.X% at Southern lunch’ is an occasion-share-of-combined metric — competitor visits as a % of all visits in the daypart. Both are correct for their respective denominators.

Known limitations we did not paper over.

The XX.X% unclassified-channel rate on KFC receipts means KFC's tagged digital share (X.X%) is an undercount; the true figure is likely higher. The behavioral clustering shows XX% Light (X–X visits) and X% Moderate — the Light tier dominates the visitor base. Conversational language data is the thinnest modality for high-loyalty archetypes; attitudinal overlays from survey data are treated as directional color, not load-bearing claims. Receipt/dollar metrics have been removed from this version of the report due to email receipt bias toward digital/delivery orderers. All behavioral metrics are venue-visit-based (GPS-observed). All absolute visit volumes have been corrected following Cortex Search deduplication fix (~XX–XX% reduction from original inflated counts). Competitive rankings, regional orderings, and directional findings are preserved; only absolute magnitudes changed. This dataset remains in an active training and validation phase while confidence thresholds are being calibrated. (Beta)

A competitor that surfaced outside the original set.

Wingstop was not in the original six-brand competitive frame, but it surfaces at X.X% cross-shop in the West and X.X% in the Northeast — higher than Chick-fil-A or Raising Cane’s on a receipt basis in some cells. The brand is under-instrumented in this report’s data cuts and should be formally added to the competitive monitoring set in the next refresh. Treat the appearances in §X and Appendix B as directional flags, not sized threats.

Bottom line.