“He got too much money,” said Charles Barkley when Shaq bought an entire hookah bar on a whim. Chuck knows firsthand how $500 million rich Shaquille O’Neal utilizes his money in unique ways. Sometimes even Chuckster’s influence on Shaq shows. Like when O’Neal sat with Shawn P. Walchef to talk Big Chicken on his podcast. The sandwich mogul shared his marketing strategy for his fast casual chain which saves him big bucks. No marketing deals, nor licenses. O’Neal leverages his fame in a cost-effective manner.

With multiples bars, restaurants, and franchises in his portfolio, Shaquille O’Neal knows the primary concern of a serial entrepreneur. “A lot of times when we open up things like this we think about marketing and marketing costs.” He gets around it with a contrasting philosophy. “I always operated like I don’t have any money.” Barkley would have something to say about it, but O’Neal made it work.

“I always want to take advantage of free marketing. Like I just told my guy Josh [Halpern] every time there’s a convention here, I want somebody outside saying, ‘Shaquille O’Neal welcomes you to Las Vegas, try Big Chicken!’ That’s free. You want to know how it’s free? Take your a** to Kinkos, make it up, print it a thousand times and hand out a thousand sheets of paper.”

Shaq’s self-promotion saves Big Chicken a lot of money over another strategy. “Rather than, ‘hey convention people, can we put a guy on the front?’ ‘Yeah it will cost you $10,000.’ ‘Can we put a guy on the inside?’ ‘Yeah, you got to get the licenses.’ And this right here, those phones and those cameras is free. You promote yourself and you put it out, and my favorite slogan is ‘All it takes is once.’”

Shaq only needed to make an appearance once each to draw massive crowds to Big Chicken stores in Houston and Fort Worth. Its social media presence is usually bursting with O’Neal’s casual fan interactions. It’s not a marketing splurge and quite effective. While they do use social media promotion tactics, Shaq’s primary strategy is being himself. He might sound old school but that could be the Charles Barkley effect.

Chuck and Shaq have similar marketing ideas

Sir Charles’ business interests are limited compared to Shaquille O’Neal. But he’s equally passionate about them. So much that he broke a personal rule for it.

Unlike Reel-crazy Shaq, Barkley was against social media. He refused to join it until the middle of the 2023-24 NBA season. Since he is an investor in Redmont Vodka, the distillery’s marketing team convinced Chuck to get on Instagram. Which he did, and the TNT crew ate it up.

Shaq and Kenny trolled Chuck IRL over his new Instagram. But Barkley maintains that he’s not going to use the page for personal stuff. He’s got a marketing team handling it while he keeps his social media-free life.

And yes, Chuck uses the Shaq grassroot strategy of promoting Redmont in person too. They’ll deny they were influenced by the other but their similar ideas show otherwise.