WENDY'S ANNIVERSARY Ads feature founder

Marketing experts have criticized the recent ads that feature the 'unofficial' spokesman.
COLUMBUS (AP) -- The original Mr. Wendy is back.
Pictures of Wendy's founder Dave Thomas, who died of liver cancer in January 2002, will be featured in a new series of advertisements celebrating the fast-food chain's 35th anniversary, company officials told The Associated Press.
The first television and print ads were to be aired Friday and more TV spots will air for a month beginning Monday, said Bob Bertini, spokesman for Wendy's International Inc.
The ads will reference Thomas' business philosophies such "Just be nice" and "Don't cut corners."
"[Thomas] believed that customers deserved something better," said Don Calhoon, Wendy's executive vice president of marketing. "He believed customers deserved to have the food the way they wanted to have it and not the way the restaurant wanted to serve it. That lives on today and will never change."
Thomas' emphasis
Thomas pitched Wendy's hamburgers, fries and other fare in more than 800 television ads over 12 years, emphasizing the quality of the chain's offerings with a folksy, straightforward delivery.
After his death, the company switched to a campaign that focused on the quaint appeal of Thomas and Dublin, the upscale Columbus suburb where Wendy's is based.
More recently, the company's ads featured Mr. Wendy, an "unofficial" spokesman who often embarrassed his wife by promoting the Wendy's menu everywhere he went.
The humor-based campaign, which the company will abandon, distracted from Wendy's emphasis on the quality of its food, said Rao Unnava, a marketing professor at Ohio State University.
"This is just something to link back with Mr. Thomas and from then on they will have a campaign focused on the quality of food," Unnava said of the new campaign. "That will happen in the January-February time frame."
In both September and October, Wendy's lowered its yearly profit outlook, settling on $2.19 to $2.25 per share. Company officials and experts have cited everything from increased competition to fallout from hurricanes.
Unnava and some analysts said the Mr. Wendy campaign also contributed to the slumping profits.
'Misses the mark'
JP Morgan analyst John Ivankoe called the campaign "lousy" and said in an October report that it "misses the mark."
Calhoon said the company announced recently that the campaign had run its course but that Wendy's has never changed its advertising message.
"The strategy will continue to be the same: it's always about the quality of food at Wendy's," he said. "Creative execution can go any number of ways and we continue to work on that as we speak."
The advertisements featuring Thomas are an extension of Wendy's Founder's Week, which started after Thomas died.
The week is a series of events for Wendy's employees commemorating Thomas' values and philosophies. Some employees even wear the short-sleeved white shirt and red tie that Thomas wore in most of his TV ads.
Calhoon said the 35th anniversary presented a unique opportunity for the company.
"It only seemed appropriate and timely to honor Dave and that heritage externally as well as internally," he said.