Tender chicken breasts, fried until they’re golden brown. There’s nothing like it. But Lynn Biliti thinks her special coating can take your fried chicken to the next level. It’s called Chicken Crack, and right under the name it says… “A highly addictive fried chicken coating.”
“And it is,” Lynn says. “You’ll wake up at 2 in the morning wanting more fried chicken after you have this for dinner.”
There’s actually more to the name than that. We’ll explain that after a little more about the company.
The story behind Chicken Crack
It all started decades ago. Lynn’s mom used to make fried chicken for the family with a special homemade coating. Through the years, Lynn tweaked the recipe and fed it to her own family and friends. And then, 7 years ago, Lynn was laid off from her corporate H-R job.
“A friend of mine said ‘you need to package this and I think you have a winning product you can get it on the market,’ and I was like ‘ohhhhh.’ It’s so hard to reinvent yourself.”
But that’s exactly what she did. Lynn worked tirelessly shopping her chicken coating around to Michigan retailers… giving it away.
“We said ‘we won’t charge you, we just want to get it in people mouths’ and we sat back and waited and nothing. Nothing, nothing, nothing. And then we got lucky and a distributor picked us up,” she explains.
Hot seller
With her eye catching name and chicken logo, sales began to grow. She now sells 8 varieties. Besides the original Chicken Crack, there’s Lickin Chicken, with a little more garlic and black pepper. There’s Hot Chicken Crack, Cajun and Sweet BBQ. There’s Lemon Pepper and Fish Crack. Today, the mixes are made at a Michigan spice company and Lynn packages them in her Roseville facility.
“We may phase flavors in and out, so seasonal,” she says. “So phase out some flavors and turn around and give us something like garlic parmesan that would be great on wings for fall football season.”
Get Crackin'
Now back to that name. When Lynn and her siblings were young… “My mom used to tell us if we weren’t moving quickly enough to ‘get crackin.’” And when her mom would make that fried chicken…
“I remember my younger brother saying to her ‘get crackin.’”
But “Get Crackin’” was already trademarked, she says Chicken Crackin’ didn’t roll off the tongue, but “Chicken Crack” did… and it just made sense.
“It is a pretty addictive flavor,” she says.
Chicken Crack in now sold in close to 250 locations. You can find out where and more about the product at their website ChickenCrack.com
