• Little Caesars has unveiled a new TV spot, shot at the Motor City’s iconic Fox Theatre, touting its Detroit-Style Deep Dish Pizza.
• Little Caesars first added a Detroit-style pie to its menu in 2013, eight years before Pizza Hut jumped on the trend.

Little Caesars didn’t invent the Detroit-style pizza—that honor goes to Buddy’s Pizza—but it was the first national chain to put it on their menu. After all, the company, founded in 1959 by Mike and Marian Ilitch, is based in Detroit.

Now the company is giving itself kudos for its version of the Detroit-style pie, called the Detroit-Style Deep Dish Pizza, with a new commercial filmed at the city’s iconic Fox Theatre, located within the campus of the brand’s world headquarters.

Created in partnership with ad agency McKinney, the commercial spoofs the PBS series “Antiques Roadshow,” as a man seeks an appraiser’s opinion on “what could be an authentic Detroit-style deep-dish from Little Caesars in Detroit.” The appraiser values the pie at $100,000, and the pizza’s owner reacts with a jubilant dance.

Related: What are the elements of an authentic Detroit-style pizza?

In real life, the Detroit-Style Deep Dish Pizza sells for just $8.99 and is available for delivery and using the brand’s Pizza Portal pickup station.

The Detroit style has become one of the fastest-growing pizza styles in the country, as new chains offering the style keep popping up from coast to coast. Pizza Hut unveiled its own version of the pie in early 2021. But Little Caesars debuted its Detroit-style pizza in 2013, jumping far ahead of the trend as far as the big chains are concerned.

“The Detroit-Style Deep Dish is one of our favorite menu items because it’s part of our history,” said Greg Hamilton, chief marketing officer at Little Caesars.

According to Little Caesars’, the large, eight-slice Detroit-Style Deep Dish pizza boasts “a crispy-on-the-bottom, soft-and-chewy-on-the-inside crust with crunchy corners and caramelized cheese edges.”