You wouldn’t really expect one of the leading fast food restaurant chains to start getting involved in tech but you’ll be surprised by exactly what KFC has been serving up along with its famous bargain bucket in a handful of its global store locations.
One of the seriously silly ideas comes from KFC in Canada and is called the ‘Memories Bucket’. In celebration of the finger-licking good company’s 60 years north of the border it’s devised a way to deliver chicken and fries to its customers and also offer a way for them to print their selfies while visiting the restaurant.
The Memories Bucket basically looks like a big ol’ bucket of bird featuring the grinning face of the famous Colonel on it – but the added bonus is that underneath it is a Bluetooth enabled printer that instantly produces photos when paired with your smartphone. The bucket provides its own power and has an on/off switch and once powered on customers use the dedicated app provided by KFC to select which shots they want to keep. And really, who wouldn’t want to have a permanent memento from their favourite chicken joint?
The Memories Bucket is currently limited to selected restaurants but could become a ‘thing’ outside of Canada and KFC could be making a take-away reusable version for customers to use on-the-go as part of a future promotion.
Elsewhere, at a KFC branch in Bloemfontein, Johannesburg the customers are being invited to enjoy some of the local music scene in partnership with local artists while dining. Nice right? There’s something a little bit unusual about this however, and that is because the music isn’t delivered by the restaurant speakers, or even through personal headphones. It’s sent through the bodies of the customers using something call “bone conduction”.
When a customer cups their hands over their ears and places their elbows on the table (even though mum taught us not to) vibrations are sent up through the skeleton up to the noggin to produce a sound that only the customer can hear – essentially turning you into a human speaker.
It’s truly fascinating yet incredibly bizarre, but we’d suggest washing the chicken grease off your hands before putting your hands over your delicate lugholes!
KFC isn’t the only fast food chain to get involved in weird and wonderful gadgetry. Recently Pizza Hut produced a pizza box that doubled as a smartphone projector – providing the perfect night in with both good eats and a flick. We can’t wait to see what ingenious technology treats Ronald McDonald has up his baggy clown sleeves!