Just more than a year has passed since Cheryl Bachelder took over as president and CEO of AFC Enterprises and to those paying attention the changes are already evident. New menu items. New customer feedback program. New marketing campaign.

Yet the day QSR sat down with the veteran foodservice executive to discuss her plans for the brand, Bachelder’s team scurried about the office preparing a third-quarter earnings release that went out the next day bearing the news that Popeyes’ profits dropped $2.5 million from the year before.

There is no easy fix at a brand that focused on food at the expense of all else for too many years. Bachelder is well aware of that fact. And she’s in it for the long haul.

Popeyes had been viewed as struggling for some time before you joined. When you took over as CEO what did you view as your top-three challenges?

The first one was to build this brand to its full potential. I’m talking in terms of the brand itself and its reputation. I felt we had an opportunity: to push harder on the Louisiana heritage and what it means; to push harder on the consumer preference for our food; and to distinguish ourselves. “What’s distinctive about Popeyes?” and make that clear to the customer.

We’ve done that in marketing through the launch of our “Louisiana Fast” campaign, which talks about our food as slow-cooked food for your fast-paced life. There is nobody anymore who stands in the kitchen and cooks red beans on the stove all day long or marinates chicken for 12 hours. Who’s got 12 hours at home?

The second opportunity I saw was to step up the quality of our guest experience at the restaurants. It has not been a towering strength for Popeyes. We immediately initiated a guest experience monitor, which offers guest feedback monitor (G.E.M.) at every restaurant in our system through IVR.

You call on your cell phone and type in your rating. You can leave your comments in a voicemail box. That report goes directly to the restaurant every month so that the restaurants see how they satisfied their guests.

What kind of customer participation are you seeing with G.E.M.?

Participation levels average about 30 surveys coming into each restaurant each month. That is way better than old-fashioned techniques like mystery shops, where someone shopped you twice a month and it could be that they caught you on a bad day.

This is far more representative, and, therefore, the restaurants respond to it far better. They also learn what they do well. They get positive feedback and they get their opportunity areas—and they can take action.

What I enjoyed about putting G.E.M. in the restaurants is that the scores started to move up immediately because it was so actionable. That manager knew exactly what his issues were last month and could start driving change. In fact, that’s been the comment of some our best franchisees: “I’ve hardly had to do anything.”