Skip navigation

5 must-know restaurant news stories: May 1, 2014

Nation's Restaurant News editors select the top industry stories of the day

Pizza Hut's PizzaHat
(Press release)
Pizza Hut is renaming its breadsticks, its most popular side-order item, as “Thoroughbread Sticks” through May 3 in honor of the Kentucky Derby, the famous horse race run in Louisville, Ky., the hometown of Pizza Hut’s parent company, Yum! Brands Inc. The breadsticks will be offered for $2 with the order of a large pizza. The Plano, Texas-based division has also created PizzaHats, a play on the Derby’s tradition of outlandish headgear, designed from Pizza Hut and WingStreet boxes, that will be displayed at the race and given away in social media channels.
 
—Ron Ruggless

Portillo's hot dog chain considers sale (Chicago Tribune)
The Oak Brook, Ill.-based company said it has hired Piper Jaffray & Co. as its financial adviser as it evaluates financial alternatives.

—Marcella Veneziale

Arby’s to donate $4M to Share Our Strength (Press release)


This week, Arby’s Restaurant Group said that its charitable arm, The Arby’s Foundation, would partner with Share Our Strength’s No Kid Hungry campaign to establish School’s Out, Food’s In, an anti-hunger campaign to provide meals to food-insecure children during the summer months. Arby’s commitment includes a $4 million donation over the next four years. Paul Brown, chief executive of Arby’s Restaurant Group, began the 25-city Hungry for Happiness mobile tour to raise awareness for the charity at Belmont Hills Elementary School in Smyrna, Ga.

—Mark Brandau

Restaurants specialize in exotic meats (USA Today)
Beef prices getting too expensive to manage? How about llama salad or mountain lion meatballs? Restaurants are getting creative with exotic meats.

—Lisa Jennings

Is there a 'world's best restaurant'? (FiveThirtyEight)
On the eve of the United States' highest profile restaurant awards, the James Beard Foundation Chef and Restaurant Awards, which will be announced Monday night, FiveThirtyEight examines the inherently arbitrary nature of a high-profile list of the "world's best restaurants"

—Bret Thorn

Hide comments

Comments

  • Allowed HTML tags: <em> <strong> <blockquote> <br> <p>

Plain text

  • No HTML tags allowed.
  • Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
Publish