History of KFC - Wikipedia

On September 24, 1952, American fast food restaurant chain "KFC" [Kentucky Fried Chicken] opens its first franchise in Salt Lake City, Utah. From the article:

"The Sanders Court & Café generally served travelers, so when the route planned in 1955 for Interstate 75 bypassed Corbin, Sanders sold his properties and traveled the US to market his chicken concept to restaurant owners.[20] Independent restaurant owners would pay four cents on each chicken sold as a franchise fee (later increased to five cents), in exchange for Sanders' "secret blend of herbs and spices", his recipe and method, and the right to advertise using his name and likeness.[4][21] In 1952 he had already successfully franchised his chicken recipe to Pete Harman of South Salt Lake, Utah, the operator of one of the largest restaurants in the city.[22]

Don Anderson, a sign painter hired by Harman, coined the name "Kentucky Fried Chicken".[23] Sanders adopted the name because it distinguished his product from the deep-fried "Southern fried chicken" product found in restaurants.[24] Harman claimed that in his first year of selling "Kentucky Fried Chicken", his restaurant sales more than tripled, with 75 percent of the increase coming from the sale of fried chicken.[25] In Utah, a product from Kentucky was exotic and evoked imagery of Southern hospitality.[23]

As a franchise-led operation, KFC's success depended on the work of the early franchisees, and Harman has been described as the "virtual co-founder" of the chain by Sanders' biographer.[26] Harman trademarked the phrase "It's finger lickin' good", which was eventually adopted as a slogan across the entire chain.[21] In 1957 Harman bundled 14 pieces of chicken, five bread rolls and a pint of gravy into a cardboard bucket, and offered it to families as "a complete meal" for US$3.50 (around US$30 in 2014).[23] He first test-trialled the packaging as a favor to Sanders, who had called on behalf of a Denver franchisee who did not know what to do with 500 cardboard buckets he had bought from a traveling salesman.[23]

By 1956, Sanders had six or eight franchisees, including Dave Thomas, who eventually founded the Wendy's restaurant chain.[4][27] Thomas developed the rotating red bucket sign, was an early advocate of the take-out concept that Harman had pioneered, and introduced a bookkeeping form that Sanders rolled out across the entire KFC chain.[21][27][28] Thomas sold his shares in 1968 for US$1 million (around US$7 million in 2013), and became regional manager for all KFC restaurants east of the Mississippi before founding Wendy's in 1969.[27][29]

In 1956, Sanders moved the company headquarters from Corbin to Shelbyville, Kentucky, which offered superior transport links through which he could distribute his spices, pressure cookers, take-out cartons and advertising material to franchisees."