Pizza World: Rise up and Unite!
What if the Pizza Industry, corporate chains, franchisees, independents and industry suppliers funded a national television campaign designed to increase the overall sales of pizza? Michael Cohen asks this question in his editorial on page 16. Right now, about 5 percent of all food consumed by Americans is restaurant supplied pizza. Why couldn't we make it 6 percent? Our industry is fortunate to sell the world's most perfect food and we're finding new ways each day to make it better, healthier and more hip. Read Michael Cohen's story and give us your opinion. We'd really like to get some industry opinion on this subject.
Free Break-Even Analysis Tool
Our resident CPA Mike Roberts will convince you in this issue why it's so important to do a break-even analysis from time to time on your pizza operation. And he has a free gift for the asking; an Excel pizza program to make your next breakeven analysis a breeze.
PrEtTy WEird
"Pretty Weird." That was the name of the commentary by publisher Pete Lacheppelle, which appeared in the April issue of Pizza Today magazine. The commentary used an analogy in an attempt to explain why Pizza Today banned PMQ from their trade shows. The implication was made that PMQ was banned as the result of unethical behavior on the part of our magazine.
PMQ has always been, and will continue to be, a straightforward publication. We don't use analogies, metaphors or disinformation to confuse our readers or to diffuse a difficult situation. Here's the deal, if a business wants to ban the competition from their property, that's fine and that's fair. No argument.
For nearly four years Pizza Today was happy to accept over $10,000 in exhibit booth fees from PMQ. They also appeared to be happy with the regular stories we published, which reviewed the best ideas of their pizza expos. They were pleased to receive the hundreds of exhibitor and attendee leads we directed to them over the last four years.
It's fine with us that the new management of Pizza Today has decided to end this cooperative relationship, but let's get the facts straight. Banning PMQ from the Pizza Expos was a calculated business decision on their part. You don't need a long-winded analogy, filled with erroneous and misleading points to rationalize this one.
Leaving on a positive note, I would like to thank the sponsors, members, and supporters of the U.S. Pizza Team for a great show here and in Italy. Just wait until next year.
