A Wren Says

The commercial came out of nowhere. The new Luxe Cravings Box from Taco Bell. It piqued my interest. Not at all interested in the food, but the name. So what does it mean to call this product luxe?

“Luxe” is likely meant to be a shorted form of “deluxe.” That would indicate value. For $7 you get a Beef Chalupa Supreme®, a Beefy 5-Layer Burrito, a Double Stacked Taco, chips with cheese sauce, and a medium fountain drink. In this economy, that amount of food for that price feels like a value. And the CMO, Taylor Montgomery, said that this fits into their desire to provide value and affordability to their customers.

For my part, I was interested in what was in the box because to me “luxe” is connected luxury. I’ve been doing digging into the definition of luxury. I’ll tell you right now, never once did Taco Bell come up as an example. If Taco Bell is using the term “luxe” in its marketing, how will that shift how other brands use the term?

If Taco Bell, or any other fast food brand, uses a term often connected luxury, how does that shift the landscape other fast food or value brands also shorten deluxe to indicated their value deals? Will brands that want to signal luxury shy away from the word luxe, because it is now associated with cheap deals?

Granted, this is a limited time offer, so perhaps it won’t matter long-term. It still does bring up the question of words and how they are used.