Tucson sandwich chain looks to its past to guide its future

The addition of a chorizo and egg breakfast burrito, and trio of breakfast sandwiches with egg, cheese and choice of chorizo, sausage or ham along with a coffee-flavored Eegee made with real coffee seemed a bit off the beaten path for the company, which is celebrating its 55th anniversary.

Not surprisingly, the breakfast menu quietly disappeared after only a couple of months, said CEO Ken Kenwood, who moved to Tucson in February to serve as operations vice president before taking over as CEO three months ago.

“We're not a breakfast brand, and so when you're not noticed as that, I just don't think people are thinking, ‘Hey, let's go into Eegee’s and have a breakfast burrito’,” Kenwood said. “They're thinking about more lunch, dinner, you know the summertime Eegee’s, the ranch fries.”

That’s what Kenwood wants customers to focus on — the sandwiches, iced drinks and those crispy crinkled fries served with the restaurant’s addictive ranch dressing.

“That's my main focus is to get us focused on how it used to be, and that was part of the decision to unwind breakfast,” said Kenwood, who joined the Tucson chain after 33 years with the California burger behemoth In-N-Out. “Let's get back to getting customers excited about the Eegee’s that it used to be.”

A big part of that is simplifying the menu and focusing on “our original sandwiches and grinders and ranch fries,” Kenwood said.

“Just really focusing mainly on that and not trying to reinvent the wheel with a bunch of different products and getting our customer base confused,” he said. “What is Eegee’s? What is it nowadays? That's really what the focus is.”

Kenwood said the chain will continue looking for unique Eegee’s icee flavors, “but I think our core flavors are pretty strong when done right.”

The chain also is looking to get back to the customer-focused quality of service that nurtured brand loyalty going back to Eegee’s early days.

“A lot of neighborhoods and states and cities are very territorial as far as the brands and Eegee’s has that brand loyalty here in the market,” Kenwood said. “I was really trying to get back to some of the core things that we're known for. That's really what they brought me in for, to kind of help with that part and to get customer-focused quality of service.”