LEA amplifiers create a family atmosphere at KFC Mexico

LEA Professional amplifiers are being installed across KFC’s 502 restaurants in Mexico to make them more of a family destination.

The fast-food chain wanted to offer consistent audio content across its network, with the ability to manage it centrally.

KFC tasked Signo Corporation with assessing the state of the audio systems across the company’s network, and then developing a scalable solution to accommodate its growth plans.

Signo teamed up with audio sales specialist Intéligos, which recommended LEA Professional. Daniel Agüero, president of Signo, says: “LEA’s products are high quality, and its technology is simple to understand, giving KFC the ability to control, monitor and troubleshoot all locations from a single place through the company’s cloud connectivity capability. These were key selling points.”

In the first phase of the project, 70 restaurants were each equipped with a LEA Connect Series 354 amplifier. The four-channel amplifiers offer 350 watts per channel, and are easy to install either through the built-in wifi access point or via an ethernet connection.

“We hesitated sending a lot of product into each store,” says Agüero. “We wanted to keep it simple by assigning a standard package of one LEA CS354 amplifier and a set of Sonos speakers for each location.”

Signo can troubleshoot and fix an issue in any restaurant from its Mexico City office. By leveraging a built-in Amazon Web Services IoT Core, Signo can send each of KFC’s amplifiers into the cloud, where they can be accessed and controlled securely, without using a VPN to access a local area network. “We can also easily modify music content across locations as well as schedule amplifier on/off times to coincide with store operating hours, which can help save energy and extend the life of the products,” says Agüero.

With baseline continuity and control achieved, KFC plans to utilise the cloud to regionalise content across its stores, based on local music and content preferences.

When Signo embarked upon the project 18 months ago, all KFC stores played different music – and in some cases, not at all – at different sound levels. “We told the store managers to focus their attention on serving customers,” says Agüero. “We are the experts in sound and music, and you are the experts in chicken. Together, we make a good alliance.”