PMQ Special Report
War and Pizza

War and Pizza
.....a special pizza industry bulletin
Monday, September 17, 2001
Despite Attacks ...National Pizza Sales Steady .....Waiting for Trends

The purpose of this news release is to inform our readers of any trends or events related to the events of 9/11 that will have an immediate or substantial impact on our industry. If you have any information that would be useful and helpful to your fellow operators please post a message at the think tank at www.pmq.com/cgi-bin/bbs/index.cgi.

Immediate Public Relations Suggestions from Big Dave:
  1. Buy local cable TV before it's taken.
  2. Get American Flag Decals
  3. Provide Pizza Dinner with portion of sales going to charities or relief workers
  4. Provide gift certificates, food or beverages for Red Cross or other groups to give to those who make donations.
Big Dave phoned in earlier today with these suggestions for our readers based on his experience during the Gulf War Crisis. "It is very important that if you do something to help that it comes from your heart. It would be disastrous if the public perceived that you were somehow cashing in on this crisis. Forget for the moment that you will benefit in anyway from this emergency and focus on helping. You will be rewarded for your efforts as I was during the Gulf War. Now is the time to attach yourself to the heartstrings of America. When George Bush made the first attack on Tehran I had already bought a good schedule of local cable TV, including of course CNN. Every 22 minutes viewers saw an unselfish tribute to the American men and their families. Sales went through the roof without mentioning anything about pizza.

Blood Banks need Pizza

When we asked earlier today for a sales analysis of the past week sales from Domino's Pizza, Holly Ryan of their public relations department said, "We are not even tracking our sales at the moment, "We are extremely busy trying to help with the relief effort, making pizza, donating them and making sure they get delivered to New York and Washington blood banks and relief workers."

What about your area? "What better time to offer free pizza support." Carla Todaro of La Nova Pizzeria also said that La Nova's had been very busy providing pizza to those that are providing support for the effort.

What happened with Sales?

Based on the early feedback as listed below, it appears that sales ended up for the week at about what would have been expected if nothing had happened. Don't be lulled into thinking that things cannot get very busy though. Previous trends....

Buffalo, New York
Carla Todaro of La Nova's Pizza
"Sales are about the same but deliveries were up. Carry out orders were down."

Western States Analysis
Papa Murphy's
Mark Strickler, VP of Marketing
"It's been business as usual. No changes is either direction.

Kentucky, Indiana, Ohio:
Rob Weeda Presto Foods
Rob Weeda, VP of Presto Distributors, has talked with several operators and has seen the sales reports.
"It was slow Tuesday and Wednesday and the thing that hurt the most was the cancellation of events that would have been pizza occasions. However, as far as net sales impact. No change from expected."

Oklahoma and Central US
Dave Poth
Mazzio's Pizza Corporate
"There was in increase in deliveries on Tuesday and Wednesday with sit down traffic noticeably up for the weekend. Perhaps because of no sporting events. Overall sales were about normal."

New York City
Jeremy Vladis
Firehouse Pizza
"We had an extremely busy week, one of the busiest of the year. Twenty percent of Manhattan restaurants were closed. We've given food everyday to different relief groups. There were more people than usual that wanted to come someplace where they're were other people. They didn't want to be alone."

Vesuvio Foods
"...last week was way up for pizza, especially delivered pizza and way down for white table cloth".

Vesuvio Foods is an Italian Foods specialty Distributor for New York. George Agusta, marketing director of Vesuvio Foods was introspective during our interview. "It really makes you question why we all work these 70 plus hours a week when it can all end in an instant. It makes you questions why we don't spend more time with our kids. We had a major account in the World Trade Center, a 5,000 square foot pizza/restaurant/deli. Fortunately the owner, who was Muslim, survived and we are grateful for that. Despite all the chaos in Manhattan we made the deliveries to our customers, we took good care of them and we are proud of it. Vesuvio even endured tunnel inspections of their trucks that caused as much as a three hour delay each way.

"Business for last week was way up for pizza, especially delivered pizza and way down for white table cloth. That trend we've always seen, during down stock markets and recession, pizza grows and I'm sure that will be the coming trend."