The fast-casual pizza revolution is at the cusp of becoming the fast-casual pizza evolution.
Established brands like Blaze Fast-Fire’d Pizza, MOD Pizza and Pie Five Pizza Co. are changing up their menu offerings and in some cases modifying their service models to maintain consumer interest in an increasingly competitive market.
Steve Crane, CEO of Pie Five’s Dallas-based parent Rave Restaurant Group Inc., said the fast-casual segment was experiencing pressure after Pie Five reported its eighth quarter of same-store sales declines, which fell 16.2 percent in the fourth quarter ended June 25.
“Pie Five has been challenged by the rapidly changing consumer base that is affecting much of the restaurant industry, and especially the fast-casual segment,” Crane said.
While fast-casual pizza chains are dwarfed by conventional pizza giants with thousands of units, like Pizza Hut, Domino’s, Little Caesars and Papa John’s, they are making their marks with distinctive menu items that the larger brands don’t offer.
MOD Pizza, owned by Bellevue, Wash.-based MOD Pizza LLC, has been distinguishing its culinary offerings at its 260 units, according to spokesperson Charlotte Wayte.
MOD Pizza’s culinary team helps the brand keep items fresh, Wayte said, like the seasonal roasted vegetables introduced each quarter, including the roasted cauliflower and kale that debuted in early October.
Brian Figler, MOD Pizza’s culinary manager, and Keith Karas, vice president of supply chain manager, recently traveled to central California to approve this year’s crop of tomatoes, she said, which are packed expressly for the brand and used in its housemade tomato sauce.
The brand is also offering desserts not found at other fast-casual brands, including the No Name Cake introduced this past summer. Figler created the dessert, Wayte said, a chocolate cake with a vanilla buttercream center, covered with a chocolate glaze.
MOD Pizza has 260 units and continues to expand, opening its first restaurants in Georgia in June, Utah in July and Nevada in August. In October, the brand will open its first Florida restaurant, and it has plans for Delaware and Montana in November.
No Name Cake
At Pasadena, Calif.-based Blaze Pizza LLC, parent to the 215-unit Blaze Fast-Fire’d Pizza chain, spokesman Josh Levitt said the brand is focused “on how to make our already fast service even more guest friendly.”
Blaze Pizza, which entered Nation’s Restaurant News’ 2017 Top 200 ranking this year at No. 191, with $183.7 million in U.S. systemwide sales for fiscal 2016, is also focused on differentiated menu offerings.
“In early October, we will add roasted butternut squash as a pizza topping, and also add a Roasted Squash & Quinoa Simple Salad, both as seasonal offerings,” Levitt said.
Blaze Pizza’s beverage program will also be expanded with Matcha and Blueberry Hibiscus agua frescas launching systemwide in October.
At Rave, which has closed more than a dozen Pie Five units over the past year, pulling its company restaurants out of the competitive Chicago and Minnesota markets, executives said a new prototype that opened in August is testing ideas such as a broader menu with chicken wings and larger pizzas, modifying its order-service model and testing delivery at 25 of its 84 restaurants.
“After considerable consumer research, we’ve identified key initiatives that have the potential to increase store sales and traffic trends,” Crane said.
The new prototype Pie Five, opened in Plano, Texas, was serving as a laboratory for some of the company’s efforts to stem same-store sales declines, he said, which fell 16 percent for the fiscal year.
Because Rave is publicly traded and reports sales figures for its brands, stock analysts look to Pie Five’s numbers to get their fingers on the pulse of the fast-casual pizza segment. Rave also owns the Pizza Inn buffet and express brand.
Crane said the new Pie Five unit also features other changes in test, including sales of wine by the bottle and by the glass, and craft beers on tap,
The unit is also testing in-house delivery, which will be expanded to the system by the end of 2018, Crane said.
“I’d say we’re delivering now in 25 units roughly,” he said. “Clearly consumers want Pie Five and would use us more often if [we] add that to the top of the funnel.”
Christina Coy, Pie Five’s vice president of marketing, said in a statement: “We were thrilled to learn from our consumer research that our fans would order from Pie Five more often if we offered delivery and online ordering…. Our pizzas are custom-made and ready in just five minutes, which means we're not only able to offer unlimited toppings at one great price, but we can deliver your pizza faster than any traditional pizza place."
Crane said the new restaurant also allows opportunities to expand the menu, which, in addition to personal-sized pizzas, includes an option for a 14-inch pizza that serves two and other items like chicken wings, which are being tested at three locations.
“We are offering five different flavors and serving both bone-in and boneless,” he said of the wings, adding that consumer research indicated patrons would visit more often if more menu options were offered.
Crane said the new initiatives are aimed at increasing the average ticket, which executives anticipate can add 10 to 15 percentage points to incremental sales.
In the test prototype unit, Crain said, wings now make up 7 to 8 percent of sales, the larger format 14-inch pizza is at about 5 to 6 percent of sales, and craft beer is 3 to 4 percent.
Tim Mullany, Rave chief financial officer, said the Plano prototype is also allowing the brand to test new service initiatives.
“We’re doing things here that we don’t do at our other locations, like an order-first process,” Mullany said.
Customers now place their orders at a register at the beginning of the line rather than the end, as in other Pie Five units.
“The order is taken before the pizza is made rather than after,” he said. Customers are then given a number so they can sit at a table instead of waiting at the counter. A staff member delivers the finished pizza to the patron’s table.
The company has also redesigned the Pie Five interior to make the kitchen more visible to guests, Crain said.
Customers appear to be welcoming the changes, Mullany said.
“We are enthused from the early data we are getting,” he said.
Contact Ron Ruggless at [email protected]
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Clarification Oct. 16, 2017: This story has clarified the title for Keith Karas at MOD Pizza.
