If you had kids and do road trips you'd know exactly how unwasted that ad is.

when your 20 miles away from the town with the next KFC?

Um, yes. Never doubt the memory of kids when it comes to food.

Thing is 250 yards down the road there is a subway so they might be triggering the munchies and driving footfall to a competitor.

Yes. Its fostering brand awareness.

And look now you remember KFC and now just told hundreds/thousands of people on the internet about KFC.

I always find this a dubious and unsupportable metric for advertising's efficacy.

How that translates into dollars is what matters and I think the hand waving of "any publicity is good publicity" has long been a way for marketing folks to avoid talking about measurable results.

Sure, but I was just thinking about what I want to eat for dinner and you've just added KFC to the potential list. The emperor may not be wearing his full regalia in this regard, but he's certainly not naked.