• by Todd Wasserman , Staff Writer, June 6, 2023

Wendy’s has brought back its Summer Strawberry Salad for a limited time.

Made fresh daily, the Summer Strawberry Salad features strawberries, grilled chicken, applewood-smoked bacon, and Tuscan cheese blend on a bed of fresh spring mix lettuce blend drizzled with a Champagne vinaigrette.

Wendy’s says the salad is “back by popular demand,” and the Summer Strawberry Salad joins other salads, including Taco Salad, Grilled Chicken Cobb Salad, Parmesan Caesar Salad and Apple Pecan Salad.

The salad’s price in 2021 was $6.99, but Mashed thinks it is “now more in the realm of $7.99, with pricing varying by state.”

According to Brand Eating, Wendy’s introduced the Strawberry Fields Salad in summer 2014. But TheStreet noted that the Strawberry Chicken Salad was introduced under that name in 2020

Wendy’s first introduced salads in 2003. Called Garden Sensations, the salads offered fancy lettuce varieties in deep plastic bowls, with grape tomatoes and mandarin oranges.

Within a short time, sales of salads jumped to 10% of Wendy’s sales mix, from 3% a year earlier. McDonald’s soon launched a national ad campaign for $3.99 salads served in bowls featuring Paul Newman’s dressing and 16 varieties of lettuce.

Before that, Wendy’s installed salad bars in its restaurants in 1979, but pulled them some time thereafter.