 During the mid @-@ 1970s , Burger King was having issues with its operations , franchises and image . In 1978 , Donald N. Smith was hired from McDonald 's to help restructure the corporate operations of Burger King to better compete against his former company as well as the then up @-@ and @-@ coming chain , Wendy 's . As part of an operational overhaul he dubbed " Operation Phoenix " , Smith reorganized the corporate operations of Burger King . He also initiated a development plan for a new product line that would become the Specialty Sandwich line . Development began that year , and while the company found that the new product lines would add an approximate eight second delay to the production time of orders and would cost about $ 39 million in lost productivity , the product was introduced in 1979 . Despite these possible sales losses and time issues , the new products were successful and the company 's sales increased by 15 percent . 
