We had high hopes a year ago when Burger King ended its 7-year-or-so relationship with ad agency Crispin Porter. Yes, Crispin’s “unconventional” ad work for the burger chain had generated attention over the years. Some high(low)lights:

• As Slate’s Seth Stevenson recounted, “there was the exhumation of BK’s old King character—which, in Crispin’s 2004 update, became embodied by a man wearing a creepy plastic mask. The ginger-bearded King would show up in various contexts, look scary, say nothing, and generally propagate disquietude.”

• Stevenson also reminded us of the thoroughly unappetizing Subservient Chicken: “this viral sensation involved a giant chicken in black lingerie, practicing ritual submission in front of a webcam in a seedy room.” Ick.

• The “Whopper Sacrifice,” which, as recounted by NYTimes’ ad reporter Stuart Elliot, “incurred the wrath of Facebook by offering Facebook users incentives to ‘de-friend’ their friends on the social-networking web site,” was another gem.

All in all though, it wasn’t the kind of attention BK really needed. In an attempt to appeal to the market segment that the agency believed would fuel massive growth—young male “superfans” who are heavy fast-food eaters—the ads almost uniformly managed to offend or otherwise disengage pretty much every other person in America. As a result, BK’s sales plummeted over the years, so much so that it’s no longer the #2 burger chain in the country—Wendy’s overtook it late last year.

With a new agency installed, however, BK seemed to be headed in a more appetizing direction as of the summer of 2011. The new ads, while not exactly differentiating, at least featured juicy red tomatoes, crisp-looking lettuce, and sizzling burgers without any of the weird campiness that had characterized its previous advertising. True, the new “fresh and healthy” tagline was a tad unbelievable—the featured product was none other than the 820-calorie California Whopper—but at least it wasn’t outright offending anyone.

In the intervening time between last summer and now, BK said it did some research among consumers who reportedly told the chain, “We love the Whopper … but you guys have to catch up in some important product categories specifically salads, smoothies and wraps.’” Subsequently, a new campaign launched earlier this week pushes those exact menu items.

As reported in Ad Age, “Burger King will use a host of expensive celebrities, including Jay Leno, David Beckham and Steven Tyler, to push salads, chicken snack wraps, smoothies, frappes and other menu additions in the hope of climbing out of a prolonged slump.”

“The platforms themselves have been out for quite a while,” senior VP-North America Marketing Alex Macedo told Ad Age, referring to the featured menu offerings, and that’s why BK opted to go with celeb endorsers.

As Macedo explained, “The big challenge is how do you really grab people’s attention? And most of all, how do you get them to taste the product? We chose celebrities to get people’s attention faster and to show the diversity that we have with our brand.”

Though the ads claim that “exciting things are happening at Burger King,” the only sense of any real enthusiasm for anything going on at the restaurant comes from the employees in the commercials reacting to the celebs placing an order. Jay Leno makes a quiet passing comment to, “look at that salad,” as the cashier hands it to him and Mary J. Blige belts out a song in homage to the ingredients in the chicken snack wrap, but Jay’s muted reaction is about as revved up as anyone seems to get about the food now that Mary’s ad has been pulled (at least for the moment) due to a “licensing issue.”

More importantly, these less-than-ringing celebrity endorsements supporting a “we’re all caught up” message, don’t exactly reflect a strong, compelling, motivating positioning. Great to establish BK is at least equal in menu options, but there’s no particular reason offered to go out of the way to BK for a smoothie instead of McDonald’s.

BK still has a ways to go.

When we read about McDonald’s plans to do a “McMake-over” of its restaurants a couple weeks ago, we couldn’t help but scratch our heads.

For starters, the design the company has chosen to roll out requires an investment of upwards of $1 billion to change-out of plastic tables and red mansard roofs with Wi-Fi, plasma TVs, and bar stools around the McCafé.

As reported in the USAToday, “For the next generation of McDonald’s customers, the notion of what a McDonald’s restaurant looks like inside and out could be turned on its head. Goodbye, fiberglass tables and industrial steel chairs. Adios, neon-yellow, bright-red interiors. Hello, wooden tables, comfortable faux leather chairs and interiors newly painted in muted oranges, yellows and even subtle greens.”

Even the iconic Golden Arches—one of the most recognized logos on the entire planet—supposedly gets toned down in the new design.

According to Robert Passikoff of Brand Keys, the physical look of a restaurant is the fourth most-important part of a consumer’s decision-making process when deciding where to go to eat. If this is true, we certainly wouldn’t say it’s an attribute to be ignored. At the same time, we’re not sure a company will see the biggest return on the investment of $1 billion in the fourth most-important part of the decision-making process, particularly when “physical look” probably encompasses many thinsg aside from design aesthetics, such as accessibility of the parking lot and cleanliness of the exterior grounds and interior restaurant.

No, most of McDonald’s burger chain rivals—Burger King and Wendy’s—aren’t currently taking design direction from Starbucks and Panera Bread the way McDonald’s seems to be. We suppose it’s a more distinctive, upscale look amongst the competitive set, which we think is what McDonald’s is trying to communicate—that the Golden Arches is moving upscale.

The real question is—particularly given the $1 billion price tag—how does it do when it comes to motivating diners to frequent the restaurant more often and/or spend more?

David Palmer, an industry analyst for UBS, believes that “McDonald’s will have a much better chance of luring the most profitable customer (who orders pricey Angus Burgers instead of Big Macs) while retaining the entry-level visitor,” claims UBS industry analyst Palmer says.

We wonder though, are the most profitable customers really the ones who order the pricey Angus Burger? Are the Angus Burgers even the most profitable menu items? Regardless, is a Starbuckian décor really going to tip the scales in the decision-making process substantially more than the previous design? More than any other design option that the chain considered?

The McDonald’s version of earth tones and highfalutin’ coffeehaus may not be everyone’s thing either.

The USAToday pondered, “With this change, McDonald’s risks looking so different from the McDonald’s most Americans have grown up with that a key part of its customer base — namely, families with young kids — could feel less welcome.”

“Flashy decor may not sit well with Middle America,” added Scott Hume, editor of the restaurant industry blog BurgerBusiness.

As one franchisee pointed out, the new design does little to build on the brand equity McDonald’s already has.

Jim Carras, the man in charge of McDonald’s restaurant development efforts in the U.S., told the USAToday that the new overall redesign “allows us to broaden our menu. Customer experience can match menu variety.” We just can’t help but scratch our heads that spending a $1 billion to make restaurants look like a knock-off of Panera was the best, most profitable way to go about doing that.

When we read about McDonald’s plans to do a “McMake-over” of its restaurants a couple weeks ago, we couldn’t help but scratch our heads.

For starters, the design the company has chosen to roll out requires an investment of upwards of $1 billion to change-out of plastic tables and red mansard roofs with Wi-Fi, plasma TVs, and bar stools around the McCafé.

As reported in the USAToday, “For the next generation of McDonald’s customers, the notion of what a McDonald’s restaurant looks like inside and out could be turned on its head. Goodbye, fiberglass tables and industrial steel chairs. Adios, neon-yellow, bright-red interiors. Hello, wooden tables, comfortable faux leather chairs and interiors newly painted in muted oranges, yellows and even subtle greens.”

Even the iconic Golden Arches—one of the most recognized logos on the entire planet—supposedly gets toned down in the new design.

According to Robert Passikoff of Brand Keys, the physical look of a restaurant is the fourth most-important part of a consumer’s decision-making process when deciding where to go to eat. If this is true, we certainly wouldn’t say it’s an attribute to be ignored. At the same time, we’re not sure a company will see the biggest return on the investment of $1 billion in the fourth most-important part of the decision-making process, particularly when “physical look” probably encompasses many thinsg aside from design aesthetics, such as accessibility of the parking lot and cleanliness of the exterior grounds and interior restaurant.

No, most of McDonald’s burger chain rivals—Burger King and Wendy’s—aren’t currently taking design direction from Starbucks and Panera Bread the way McDonald’s seems to be. We suppose it’s a more distinctive, upscale look amongst the competitive set, which we think is what McDonald’s is trying to communicate—that the Golden Arches is moving upscale.

The real question is—particularly given the $1 billion price tag—how does it do when it comes to motivating diners to frequent the restaurant more often and/or spend more?

David Palmer, an industry analyst for UBS, believes that “McDonald’s will have a much better chance of luring the most profitable customer (who orders pricey Angus Burgers instead of Big Macs) while retaining the entry-level visitor,” claims UBS industry analyst Palmer says.

We wonder though, are the most profitable customers really the ones who order the pricey Angus Burger? Are the Angus Burgers even the most profitable menu items? Regardless, is a Starbuckian décor really going to tip the scales in the decision-making process substantially more than the previous design? More than any other design option that the chain considered?

The McDonald’s version of earth tones and highfalutin’ coffeehaus may not be everyone’s thing either.

The USAToday pondered, “With this change, McDonald’s risks looking so different from the McDonald’s most Americans have grown up with that a key part of its customer base — namely, families with young kids — could feel less welcome.”

“Flashy decor may not sit well with Middle America,” added Scott Hume, editor of the restaurant industry blog BurgerBusiness.

As one franchisee pointed out, the new design does little to build on the brand equity McDonald’s already has.

Jim Carras, the man in charge of McDonald’s restaurant development efforts in the U.S., told the USAToday that the new overall redesign “allows us to broaden our menu. Customer experience can match menu variety.” We just can’t help but scratch our heads that spending a $1 billion to make restaurants look like a knock-off of Panera was the best, most profitable way to go about doing that.

We had high hopes a year ago when Burger King ended its 7-year-or-so relationship with ad agency Crispin Porter. Yes, Crispin’s “unconventional” ad work for the burger chain had generated attention over the years. Some high(low)lights:

• As Slate’s Seth Stevenson recounted, “there was the exhumation of BK’s old King character—which, in Crispin’s 2004 update, became embodied by a man wearing a creepy plastic mask. The ginger-bearded King would show up in various contexts, look scary, say nothing, and generally propagate disquietude.”

• Stevenson also reminded us of the thoroughly unappetizing Subservient Chicken: “this viral sensation involved a giant chicken in black lingerie, practicing ritual submission in front of a webcam in a seedy room.” Ick.

• The “Whopper Sacrifice,” which, as recounted by NYTimes’ ad reporter Stuart Elliot, “incurred the wrath of Facebook by offering Facebook users incentives to ‘de-friend’ their friends on the social-networking web site,” was another gem.

All in all though, it wasn’t the kind of attention BK really needed. In an attempt to appeal to the market segment that the agency believed would fuel massive growth—young male “superfans” who are heavy fast-food eaters—the ads almost uniformly managed to offend or otherwise disengage pretty much every other person in America. As a result, BK’s sales plummeted over the years, so much so that it’s no longer the #2 burger chain in the country—Wendy’s overtook it late last year.

With a new agency installed, however, BK seemed to be headed in a more appetizing direction as of the summer of 2011. The new ads, while not exactly differentiating, at least featured juicy red tomatoes, crisp-looking lettuce, and sizzling burgers without any of the weird campiness that had characterized its previous advertising. True, the new “fresh and healthy” tagline was a tad unbelievable—the featured product was none other than the 820-calorie California Whopper—but at least it wasn’t outright offending anyone.

In the intervening time between last summer and now, BK said it did some research among consumers who reportedly told the chain, “We love the Whopper … but you guys have to catch up in some important product categories specifically salads, smoothies and wraps.’” Subsequently, a new campaign launched earlier this week pushes those exact menu items.

As reported in Ad Age, “Burger King will use a host of expensive celebrities, including Jay Leno, David Beckham and Steven Tyler, to push salads, chicken snack wraps, smoothies, frappes and other menu additions in the hope of climbing out of a prolonged slump.”

“The platforms themselves have been out for quite a while,” senior VP-North America Marketing Alex Macedo told Ad Age, referring to the featured menu offerings, and that’s why BK opted to go with celeb endorsers.

As Macedo explained, “The big challenge is how do you really grab people’s attention? And most of all, how do you get them to taste the product? We chose celebrities to get people’s attention faster and to show the diversity that we have with our brand.”

Though the ads claim that “exciting things are happening at Burger King,” the only sense of any real enthusiasm for anything going on at the restaurant comes from the employees in the commercials reacting to the celebs placing an order. Jay Leno makes a quiet passing comment to, “look at that salad,” as the cashier hands it to him and Mary J. Blige belts out a song in homage to the ingredients in the chicken snack wrap, but Jay’s muted reaction is about as revved up as anyone seems to get about the food now that Mary’s ad has been pulled (at least for the moment) due to a “licensing issue.”

More importantly, these less-than-ringing celebrity endorsements supporting a “we’re all caught up” message, don’t exactly reflect a strong, compelling, motivating positioning. Great to establish BK is at least equal in menu options, but there’s no particular reason offered to go out of the way to BK for a smoothie instead of McDonald’s.

BK still has a ways to go.