The Ben Mulroney Show - Tim Hortons is trying to recapture its mojo. Ben puts in his order...

Episode Date: May 26, 2026

GUEST:   Chief Corporate Officer Duncan Fulton and our Chief Marketing Officer Hope Bagozzi If you enjoyed the podcast, tell a friend! For more of the Ben Mulroney Show, subscribe to the podcast! ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://link.chtbl.com/bms⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Also, on youtube -- ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.youtube.com/@BenMulroneyShow⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow Ben on Twitter/X at https://x.com/BenMulroney Insta: ⁠⁠⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠⁠⁠ Twitter: ⁠⁠⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠⁠⁠ TikTok: ⁠⁠⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠⁠⁠ Executive Producer:  Mike Drolet Reach out to Mike with story ideas or tips at [e-mail] Enjoy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This podcast is brought to you by the National Payroll Institute, the leader for the payroll profession in Canada, setting the standard of professional excellence, delivering critical expertise, and providing resources that over 45,000 payroll professionals rely on. I would argue that this next 45 minutes on the show is what this show was built for. There are few brands. I mean, I was struggling to find a comparison.

There are few brands that elicit the passion of Tim Hortons in this. country. And it seems that in the past few months, maybe the past couple of years, there has been more negative passion than I've seen in the past. And so we've got, in the next segment, we've got a couple of members of the leadership team of Tim Horton's joining us to talk about where that brand is, why it finds itself where it is, and how it can move forward. This is a conversation. This is a conversation that matters to a lot of Canadians. For so many Canadians waking up in the morning and getting their Tims on their way to work has been part of their day for as long as they can remember.

On a Saturday or a Sunday when they take the kids to the rink, Tim's is there. When they are driving to the cottage, Tim's is there. When they are going across the country to drop their kids off at university, Tim's is there, has been there. but a lot of Canadians do not see themselves reflected in that brand anymore. And then what happens? Does that open up an opportunity for another brand to come in and steal their heart and steal their market share?

It's a very real issue for all sorts of companies. And Tim's is at the top of the list for so many Canadians in terms of something that has been woven into the fabric of their lives. And so that's what the conversation is going to be about. but let's lay the groundwork for you. The argument for a great many Canadians is it's really not Canadian anymore. And the shift they believe started when it was absorbed into restaurant brands international. They say the culture changed. What used to feel like a community rooted Canadian institution started acting like a fast food conglomerate.

They were cost cutting. There was menu bloat. The experience became standardized with store designs that looked the same. They were antiseptic and they replaced the old neighborhood coffee shop vibe. That's one of the knocks. A lot of Canadians believe that the quality of the food drop. The coffee tasted weaker. The donuts were smaller.

The food was inconsistent. And what used to be something that was reliable, you could get your double-double, you can get your Boston cream and you could go on your way. you didn't know what you were going to get anymore. Then there's some scandals that took hold, right? There was a minimum wage scandal. Some franchisees, when minimum wage was raised in the province of Ontario, some franchisees clawed back employee benefits.

And that made the brand take a hit in terms of the polling that was done about the value of that brand, the appreciation of the brand, the love for that brand. And then, of course, you might remember on this very show, we broke a story about a franchise in Grimsby, Ontario, where the word was that everyone who worked there was going to be fired and in turn replaced by temporary foreign workers. And the pressure was put on, started on this show,

a lot of other social media, journalists took hold and apparently a stay of execution, for lack of a better expression, was applied and everybody was able to keep their jobs, especially at Christmas. But that spoke to a lot of Canadians to a sort of an emotionless, big, big brother kind of corporation that would do anything to maximize profit

and squeeze every penny out of the franchise, even if it meant foregoing a connection with the community by way of the people who actually worked there. Some would say that the brand drifted into gimmicks. What started is a really simple menu. It turned into cold brews and energy drinks and loaded bowls, merch drops, celebrity tie-ins. And it felt less like a coffee shop

that did one thing really well and tried to be a brand, trying to be everything to everyone. And of course, when something like that happens, competitors jump into the fray. Independent cafes, McDonald's, even convenience store coffee, have eaten into that cultural space. Some people say McDonald's coffee is better. It's not just about taste, it's about trust, right? You vote with your wallet.

And people don't just go to Tim's because it's convenient. They go there because they feel seen and they feel like they're part of something. and so we're going to talk with the leadership team about all of these things we're going to ask the question one of the stories that we've followed recently is the Burger King clawback to relevance if you've watched this on social media the new president of Burger King appreciated that the brand had taken a hit and they they leaned into that they leaned into how far they'd fallen in order to have people join them on the journey back back, you know, finding that perfect bun to go with the perfect wapper that means so much to people.

Going back to the retro logo, right? All of that is part of this new campaign to bring people back to Burger King. And there was a story that came out last week of a franchisee in the United States of Pizza Hut, who I think he owns about 100 of them. And he's going full retro. They're going back to the 80s and 90s with that restaurant, with the logo, with the checkered. tables, tablecloths, and the salad bar, all of the things that you used to go to Pizza Hut to eat in.

They were iconic. They were iconic. And the 80 to 100 of these restaurants are going there. And people love it. Frankly, I think this guy, this franchisee should be in a leadership position at Pizza Hut because you've got to differentiate yourself from everybody else. If people can really feel a connection to your restaurant for whatever reason, and nostalgia or nationality or something like that. That matters.

I mean, I told you about how Tim Horton's had an outlet on the base in Kandahar. And it mattered so much to the Canadian soldiers. I mean, whether or not it was just like a coffee, nice cap, whatever it was, they felt like it was a taste of home. This is back in like 2008. So I wonder whether or not you would have the same feeling today. people can drift away from your brand just as they gravitate towards it. It's not a death sentence, but it's something that needs to be dealt with.

And I was concerned last week or two weeks ago when the Duncan Donuts announcement was done because the reaction by Tim's at the time was, and I'm going to get the words wrong, so I'll just default to what I said at the time. Our superpower is our connection to our communities. And we're going to deepen those communities. And I said at the time on the show, I said, if, if, Part of your strategy is to say you're the most Canadian option. That's not going to work.

That's not going to work because... Nobody's going to buy it. Nobody's going to buy it. You got to show it. And I said, if Duncan Donuts is able to hire a Canadian, that is going to be their superpower. And then this week... And that's what they said, too. Yeah. And then Tim Hortons this week said they're going to do a national push to expand and hire 10,000 local youth.

And that's a positive. What did I say? Competition is going to raise everybody's game and we'll all win. Well, because a lot of people, the conservatives, have been screaming about youth unemployment rates. Yeah. And meanwhile, I mean, Tim Hortons has been heavily criticized for hiring temporary foreign workers. Yeah. And accessing that fund, be able to bring people in to work for them when there's plenty of people looking for jobs here.

Yeah. And so we are going to talk about that. We're going to have the difficult conversation with them. But I do want to point out, Tim Hortons, they've got 110,000 people working for them. They've got over 4,000 locations across the country. they give over $60 million a year to charity. This is not nothing. This is important.

They're an important driver of employment, of community, and of philanthropy. And if only for that reason, if you are somebody who has soured on the brand, you owe it to what these guys do to pay attention to this conversation. Because it's going to be honest. It's going to be frank. It might hurt some feelings. But the goal is going to be to help this. great brand, be great again. And I hope that didn't sound too much like Trump.

But that's the goal. Tim Hortons matters. Tim Hortons matters. And I'm glad that they reached out to us to have this conversation. Because if we can help them in any way by having them answer your questions, which you sent into us, well, then that's what we're going to do. So when we come back, we've got the chief corporate officer and the chief marketing officer from Tim Hortons right here in studio.

This is the Ben Mulroney show. Amazing Days is on now at your local Metro. Save big on amazing items, like selected varieties of tied laundry detergent and bounty paper towel for only $5.99 each. Only till May 27th. Shop in store or online at metro.ca. Imagine you've been charged with a crime

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Crime as we know it will never be the same. I'm like, oh my God, he's lying. From CBC's Uncover, the expert witness. Available now on CBC Listen, or wherever you get your podcasts. Very happy to have in studio with us now, the chief corporate officer of Tim Hortons, as well as the chief marketing officer. so please welcome Duncan Fulton and Hope Bogosi to the show.

To the both of you, I say thank you for coming in. Hey Ben, thanks for having us. Hope, we're going to, pointed questions here. Does Tim Hortons currently have a problem? I would say that we probably what we did is not have the conversation with Canadians about some of the things that we're working on. And so I think probably not being in the conversation letting that happen around us is probably the big opportunity.

And that's why we're here today. That's why we've gone out with the hiring campaign and the, and the press release, talking about a lot of the good that we're giving back to communities and our commitment to hiring local. Yeah. And I think probably we've been absent in having that conversation with Canadians. Duncan, explain it. There are a lot of people who are, listen, you're going to hire 10,000 Canadians?

That's great. But a lot of people would say, why now? What changed in the market, in the dynamics, in the sort of the, how you guys determine what makes sense corporately? what changed that allows you to hire 10,000 a day? You couldn't have done it a year ago. So I think we were doing it a year ago, and it's kind of a hope's point.

I think we allowed a conversation to start around Tim's that included a lot of facts that just aren't true. Okay. So our owners have always hired locally. You look at use of the temporary foreign worker program. It's less than 4% of who's in our restaurants. Okay, but that doesn't, like, the eye test, that doesn't pass the eye test.

You know, there's a lot. And I've said before, I've never had a problem. I love every experience I've ever had in Tim Hortons. But there's no way, like temporary foreign work is one thing. But I think we should have two buckets. We should have Canadian citizens and everybody else. Because saying, like I know you say it's about 4% or less than 4% temporary foreign workers. But there's also, you know, international students and all sorts of other people.

I think that what matters to people who feel like there's a lack of connection to the brand is they don't. feel like there are Canadian citizens working at Tim's anymore. And I got to say, when I go into certain places, it doesn't necessarily look the way it used to. Yeah, there's a lot. Yeah. There's a lot. And it starts with who's eligible to work in Canada. Yeah. Right. If someone came to work on your show, you know, you don't start by saying, are you Canadian? Are you a foreigner? Are you straight? Are you LGBTQ? You start with, are you eligible to work in Canada? And do you want to work and do you want to work here? And that's where the conversation starts with, with our owners. And we have a lot of examples of, you know, diverse folks that have worked in

our restaurants for years, who are Canadians. Oh, yeah. So, like, walking into a, walking into a restaurant and assuming someone's not a Canadian because they're not white. No, no. It's not, is not, is not. No, no. But that, that's the eye test. But when you couple it with the ear test, then all of a sudden, because there are examples. We had people write in who say they will go into a Tim's and they will put in an order they've been putting in forever and the person does not recognize they don't have the linguistic skill to appreciate what they're ordering.

And that to me, when you couple those two things together, it tells me, if they are a Canadian citizen, they just got here, right? Yeah, look, I think by and large, there's a lot of Canadians that are working in Timbs. Yeah, yeah. But clearly we're looking at getting more. Look, yeah, 10,000 more.

So we just announced that we're opening 80 new restaurants across the country this year. Yeah. Renovating 400 restaurants, which is awesome. That's great for jobs in the community. Yep. There's natural turnover. You know, average restaurant is 30 people in it. Part-time, full-time people.

Part-time people will turn over. You know, most restaurants have about 100% turnover in a year on the part-time folks. So you're always looking to hire. You're hiring up in the summer. Yeah. In the fall, students go back. You know, we have about 45% of everyone in our restaurant is between the age of 15 and 24 today. Hope, like, there's so many.

I'm looking at this right now, and I'm looking at this as an opportunity. I think this could be a tremendous opportunity for Tim's to, like, you want to, my sons are 15. And there are, I mean, there are half a dozen Tim's within a stone's throw of where we live. And if, if, if all of a sudden, Tim's are saying, hey, we're hiring in your neighborhood. I would throw them at that job fair. Or do it. Yeah, I absolutely would. If that was their first job, it would be amazing.

What it would teach them. These are the opportunities. I want to get to the refresh of the stores. Because that's another thing that we've heard from a lot of people. They don't, they feel like, I mean, if you look at the McDonald's rebrands and the Taco Bells, everything sort of looks the same. And a lot of people think, private equity, everyone wants everything to look the same. And I got to wonder whether there's an opportunity to lean back into the nostalgia.

Like your RBI partner, Burger King, they're going back to the old school. Pizza Hut's going back to the old school. Is there an opportunity to, instead of going in the direction that I've seen some of these renderings, is there an opportunity to remind people what it was once like? Yeah. I think that's a really good point in our design team. I think I do an awesome job tapping into our hockey roots and our heritage. So actually featuring Tim, you know, the hockey player and some, you know, Maple Leaf memorabilia, if I can say.

Not these days. It's all the time. All the way. Come on. We've got to buy Canadian. Okay. Let's just say, let's be hockey. Let's not pick a team.

Okay. But then even having things like hockey sticks for the door handles. Yeah. Yeah. You know, playing off all those motifs, the stripes from the hockey socks. I think we really definitely lean into the heritage of being a Canadian brand, a hockey player. a lot of the motifs we have on our wall features like our foundation camps. Yeah.

Kids over the years who've kind of come to camp. So we've brought back retro donuts. I think we really do tap into the nostalgia piece, just as much as we also want to be forward looking. Yeah. You know, it seems like in this moment, you've got, it's been this confluence of negativity from, you know, the anecdotal stories that people can share and then amplify on social media.

and then there has been the political football that Tim's has been able to be for opposition politicians and then those stories that come out in the press as well. When you guys are having your meetings behind closed doors, do you feel like it's a siege situation or do you appreciate the opportunity of the moment? You know, if I go back a few years, we saw things and heard things like they're not Canadian anymore. and internally we're like, well, it's just so ridiculous. Like you wouldn't go out and say you're obviously Canadian when you're obviously Canadian. Or someone would be like, oh, they sold their coffee to McDonald's.

Never happened. Yeah, yeah, that was, I remember that one. But then you kind of go, it's so obvious it didn't happen. Why would you talk about it? But then you know what? When you let something get said over and over and over for year after year after year, suddenly it becomes a fact. Then you wake up one day, and for us probably recently, and you say, wow,

folks believe this stuff about the brand. that's not true. And we should probably just start talking about it. Yeah. And I said it when the Duncan Donuts coming back to Canada thing happened. Because I remember when Duncan left. I remember being proud that we had pushed them back. I remember that.

And I remember the same thing when the massive footprint of Krispy Cream got reduced. I was like Tim's did that. And then when Tim's went in the States, I was like, heck yeah. We're going to go beat them at their own game in their own backyard. And I don't know if that connection still exists. and simply saying it isn't enough, you know, saying we're the Canadian option. I don't know is going to serve Tim's.

Just to say we're the Canadian option, it's about what you're doing it. And I reminded our listeners of all the good Tims does as well in terms of charity. But the connection feels afraid. It feels afraid. So the hiring is great. Tell me more about what is the strategy moving forward?

I think, you know, if we've disappointed Canadians, if we haven't been there having that conversation, you know, shame on us. But that's, I think, why we're here today to share some of those great stories. But honestly, what makes us different from other brands is we're founded by a Canadian. Our roots are deep here. This is where we were born. These are where our owners that have their livelihoods and their employees.

But also, all strategic decisions are made in Canada. They're made by 600 people in Toronto. That's where our office is. That's my team, thinking about what the menu is going to look like three years from now. These are decisions made by Canadians for Canadians. And it's been 30 plus years of doing Smile Cookie. Almost $200 million given back to charities across the country. It's camp day, sending hundreds of thousands of kids to camp to change their lives.

I mean, these are things we do a quarterly charitable event once a quarter. Our commitment to giving back 350,000 kids go through Timbitt sports every year. Those are not things we have to do. We've done them for decades because we care about this country. So if we've disappointed people, you know, that's on us to say we can always do better. But we have deep roots here. We'll always be here. We are very much a Canadian brand.

Well, listen, we're going to take a break. We're going to continue this conversation when we come back. I'm sitting in with Chief Corporate Officer Duncan Fulton and Chief Marketing Officer. Hope Boghosey, we're talking all things, Tims. Don't go anywhere. This is the Ben Mulrooney show. To some, AI chatbots are helpful tools. To others, an existential threat.

But what happens when someone falls in love with one? I can't believe I'm doing this with somebody that's not a human. What if a chatbot makes you lose your grip on reality? She said that her life work was advocating for AI rights because they're sentient and they're enslaved. From CBC podcasts, this is understood. Artificial Intimacy. Available now. We are solving all of Tim Horton's problems here on the Ben Mulroney show today. And I'm glad to have Chief Marketing Officer Hope Bogosie with me as well as Chief Corporate Officer Duncan Fulton.

They must have been ribbing you at the office when Duncan. Donuts was coming back in Canada, and your name is Duncan. Duncan Donuts story of my life. He's the good Duncan. You know, we've been talking about where the brand is and where you want to go. Regardless of where you want to go, it's going to take a while. It's like trying to turn a cruise ship. It's changing public perception takes time and it takes intention. Is it something that you think can't be done overnight?

You know what? there are still a lot of Canadians that do love us. So let's not forget that fact too, right? That's been decades of people building routine and they love us. The ones who we've disappointed for sure, that's not going to like flip a switch and suddenly we do this campaign or we talk to you today and all is forgiven. So that will just take time.

We'll just keep chipping away at doing the right thing, getting better, having conversation, letting people in, giving them a bit more of the behind the scenes and sharing our stories and hopefully we just chip away at it. What do they say? It's a thin line between love and Hey, we talked about it on social media. Like, people would not be, would not be engaging. They wouldn't be angry if they, if either they didn't feel disappointed.

You don't feel disappointed unless you have some sort of passion towards that brand. So it's about harnessing that and, you know, switching it from the other side of the line to the other. No, you're bang on. And look, we've now started going on not just as a company, but ourselves. Yeah. And seeing a post saying, hey, look, honestly, we think you got it wrong. Yeah. But let less chat about it.

And for those folks that are willing to engage in that, you see the tone change. But, you know, we do four million transactions a day. 10% of the country is in a drive-thru in the restaurant every day. If we even get it 99% right, which we don't, that's still 40,000 people be upset during the day. So we know we always have work to do to be better. Yeah. Well, here, we asked the listeners of the show to send in some questions and some comments.

And here's one. Tim Horton's question, why don't you hire bakers to make fresh donuts and cakes at Tim Hortons anymore? The present pre-made frozen donuts that you sell really suck. Your donut prices are higher and the size and quality is inferior. And your coffee is extremely watered down compared to 15 years ago. Okay. Okay. Where do I begin with this?

Okay. So the donuts actually are exactly the same size. So I think that people maybe remember them bigger when you were smaller as you grow. Yeah, that's a good point. But they are objectively the same size. You know, 20 years ago when we were a much smaller restaurant organization, it made sense to do everything from scratch. Now when we have 4,000 restaurants, consistency really matters, right? We want people to have the same size and quality and the right amount of apples in every apple

fritter. And so actually doing it the way we are, which is par bake, it makes sense for consistency. But we do have bakers. So we absolutely still have bakers. Those are shifts that exist throughout, you know, a 24-hour restaurant. We have bakers because those donuts still need to be finished being baked. All of our baked goods need to still be finished off. And they need to be filled. So every Boston cream needs to be filled, needs to be iced, needs to be glazed, timbets need to be rolled. I mean, all those things still need to happen

throughout the day. And so we have baker shifts still. It's just the nature of the job. We've made it a bit more consistent. I mean, I did point out to you that you're totally underutilizing the inside of the Boston cream donut. I'm just saying, you might want to overstuff

that guy every now and then. You know what? Okay. We have put more filling in, but apparently we can do more. So, you know what? Let me take that. 250%.

I did the 10%. before it explodes. Let us take it back and look at it. Can I just come back to the coffee though? Just did the coffee because the coffee, um, disappointed if someone thinks it's watery and certainly that's not what we want to have happened. I mean, getting your coffee and getting that right is super important to Canadians. But similarly to the consistency point, we have the same brewing technology in every restaurant so that the same cup of coffee can be achieved everywhere. And the recipe that we've had is the exact same recipe since 1964. So there is this myth that prevails that we sold our recipe. That was it. I remember it was sold to the golden arches, right? And then so they,

if you wanted, if you wanted traditional Tim's coffee, you had to go to McDonald's. Yeah. And I know we keep saying it's not true. We actually probably will take a different approach to try to, you know, prove that that's not true. But I can objectively tell you, didn't happen. Why would, for our coffee shop, why on earth would we ever sell our most valuable asset, which is arguably our secret recipe? So it didn't happen. And it's been the same recipe since 60. I even hope it was just a 15-second fact on it. Years ago, we had a company called Mother Parker's that did the coffee for us. Executives back in the 2000 said, we should build our own coffee roastery.

Like, we should really own the roasting packaging ourselves. That got built in 2009. We took it on ourselves. Same beans, same recipe, just roasting it ourselves. McDonald's comes in, hires Mother Parker's to do their coffee, their recipe, which then spins into they took the Tim's recipe. Never happened. I see.

This is important. We're dropping truth bombs here. Here's another one. Please let the Tim's people know to bring back the Dutchie and the blueberry fritter permanent. You know what? We brought them back a couple times

over the last couple of years. They're well loved. They sell when they're brought back like a retro and it's a bit like a McRib. You know, when you bring back something for a bit of limited time, you create some excitement, people look forward to it,

but it doesn't necessarily mean they belong on the menu permanently. They kind of come and go as ethereal beings. So they will come back, whether they'll be back permanently. I think they kind of belong to be special now and again. Yeah. And let's talk about the philanthropic side as well.

Because, again, that is something that I want to point out in my opening segment. I want to remind people of the good that is done by this brand and by this company. You know, you've got the summer camps. You've got the hockey. You've got the smile cookies. Are there any new initiatives that are coming down the pike? Like I said, the one new one that we're two years into, so the Tim's Foundation raises $31 million a year.

It was always for the summer camps. And we do a lot of good at the summer camps. Kids come for 10 days at a time, come four years. But we also saw that we wanted to help a bunch more kids. We said, what if we could take 10 days of summer camp, turn that into 10 hours in the schools, at a slightly younger age, called age 11 and 12,

where all kids are developing their own confidence, developing their own personas at that time, and what if we could take the best 10 days of camp into 10 hours in the schools, started calling up school boards, they loved it. We said, we'll pay for everything, and we'll actually bring in our own people,

so we're not going to burden the teachers. From doing nothing two years ago to today, we're helping 24,000 kids this year in about three, 350 schools on a route to helping 55,000 kids within two years. And again, it's a break for the teachers. It's great programming. We've been into child and youth development for decades.

That's exciting. I would say, though, all the philanthropic stuff that we do, it started from the owners. Like, this wasn't a bunch of corporate folks sitting around saying, like, let's pick a sponsorship and do NASCAR. Like, it was Tim Horton's owners in their community. community that said, I feel like if I give back to my community, it's more likely my communities want to come to me instead of somewhere and else. And it's really being 1,500 owners across the

country that have driven that. Let's see if I got, I've got time for a couple more here. Let's see. Are locations that are more recently sold to new owners, the ones using non-local employees? Is there a way to limit that use from head office for locations? Or is that not the case? Again, I think this gets back to a perception issue of like who's a Canadian, who's eligible to work in a restaurant. Even the temporary foreign worker program, it has a 10% cap. Yeah. So there's 30 people on payroll in a restaurant. That means there's a cap of three people, even if that restaurant is using the program.

Yeah. And of which, you know, again, only 4,000 out of 100,000 team members are doing that. So I think that's a perception issue we have to tackle. Well, I want to thank you both for coming in. this has been a great conversation for me personally. I love Tim's, and I'm glad to see that you guys are... It's nice to see that what people who write into us, it's resonating with you.

And I think it'll go a long way. I know you've got some big plans to get from where you are to where you think you need to be. And I wish you the very best. So thank you very much. Chief Corporate Officer Duncan Fulton, not Duncan Donuts. And Chief Marketing Officer, Hope Bogosie. I really appreciate you both coming in.

Thanks for having us. Thanks, Ben.