Pizza operators develop fast-casual concepts

As fast-casual restaurants have carved a unique niche in the overall foodservice segment, many pizza concepts have re-imaged themselves to follow their lead.

 

Decoratively speaking, a disappearing act is underway at many pizzerias. Red-and-white checked tablecloths are gone, followed by red candle globes and hackneyed Italian color themes. Replacing those elements are warmer organic colors, modern furnishings and trendy lighting.

 

Food offerings are less traditional, too. Premium salads come with organic veggies and baby greens, and sandwiches emerge from panino grills piping hot and stuffed with smoked meats, roasted peppers and three-cheese blends. Dessert, anyone? Peer into the gelato cabinet, where a dozen flavors are made fresh daily in house.

 

Options for thirsty guests range from high-end sodas, to craft-brewed beers and boutique wines. Sure, there's some Budweiser in the cooler, but the microbrew on draft is drawing more attention.

 

"The dining public today is much more sophisticated than they were years ago," said Jim Minidis, chief executive of RedBrick pizza, a 60-unit chain based in Palmdale, Calif. "They don't want ordinary coffee now that they know what Starbucks is like. They don't want ordinary chicken when they can have fire-roasted chicken. We're doing the same with pizza."

 

As its name alludes to, RedBrick bakes a variety of gourmet pizzas in its stoned-hearth, gas-flame ovens in about three minutes. It also serves a proprietary Fhazani sandwich, another hearth-fired treat made of folded pizza dough. To end the meal, customers can choose from 12 kinds of house-made gelato.

 

Most RedBrick stores seat between 40 and 60. Each booth has its own TV and barstools lining the kitchen counter allow customers to watch their food being cooked.

 

Minidis, a former Little Caesars Pizza franchisee, said the field for fast-casual pizza is so wide open his goal is to have 12,000 units by 2016.

 

Dan Dumont, a partner in RBP of Florida, RedBrick master developers in the Sunshine State, said he wanted to get into fast casual more so than pizza. But the opportunities with pizza were too great to ignore.

 

"Traditionally, pizza hasn't been an option in fast casual," he said. "No one had come up with a good way to get pizza of this quality level to the customer in less than 10 minutes. Jim found a great market segment to really identify a n eed for a product."

 

zpizza, a 54-unit chain based in Newport Beach, Calif., was a fast-casual concept from the start. But the company knew its market position said "pizza," and it saw that as negative.

 

"We did a brand audit two years ago, and the results showed we had a dual positioning: fast casual and pizza," said Chris Bright, president of zpizza. "We made the deliberate effort to focus ourselves away from pizza to fast casual because it allows us to associate with other fast-casual players and command a higher price point."

 

Still, the menu is dominated by pizza, including 17 signature pies designed to pique the interests of the non-pepperoni crowd.

 

"The founder has done a great job creating unique flavor profiles to appeal to the more affluent and educated consumer," Bright said. "We've also focused on our salads for the last five years. Our pear and arugula salad is proof of that. We use a sweet lettuce mix as opposed to the iceberg lettuce so common in the pizza segment."

 

Mazzio's Pizza wants to get in on the fast-casual action, too, so it's re-imaging its 169-unit chain. Greg Lippert, chief executive of the Tulsa, Okla., company told TulsaWorld.com that the company wanted more than the pizza segment could offer.

 

"Everything we have done is to address changing lifestyles and consumer expectations," Lippert said, adding that re-imaged stores will be named Mazzio's Italian Eatery. "We didn't force it — we've only addressed what they've been wanting. ... We didn't want to just compete with other pizza chains. We wanted more."

 

Mazzio's upscale twist is the Mia Pasta category, which lets diners pick from a variety of pastas, meats, vegetables and 11 sauces to create their own custom feasts. Service will move up a notch as well. Though customers will continue ordering at the counter, servers will bring food to their tables.

 

Papa Gino's Pizza also addressed service in its fast-casual reface by adding staff to monitor the dining room, said Michael McManama, senior vice president of brand development for the Dedham, Mass.-based company. Aiming for a level of "limited service plus," McManama said Papa Gino's is testing a "servizio," essentially an employee who keeps the dining room tidy and sees to guests' needs at the table. At peak times, two servizios roam the room looking to help.

 

In a bid to revive one of the nation's great pizza chains, Shakey's Pizza has introduced Shakey's Pizza & Grill in September. In addition to the 61-unit company's celebrated pizza and fried chicken offerings, it will offer Angus burgers, new sandwiches, tossed-to-order salads and premium microbrews. Most of the kitchen activity, including foods cooked on the new gas char-grill, will be visible to customers.

 

Like zpizza, Shakey's always employed a fast-casual service model, but its market position always has been in the family segment. Stores seat nearly 200 guests in large, open dining rooms that often include game rooms. Where the Pizza & Grill differs is in its separation of those elements in a way that benefits their respective audiences. A glass wall dividing the dining room and the game room helps control noise levels, said Tim Pulido, Shakey's CEO.

 

"We want kids to have fun, but we want the dining room to be relaxed," he said. "We think we've eliminated what I call the Las Vegas effect with the glass."

 

 

One core commonality between fast-casual pizza concepts is a lack of thick crusts. California Pizza Kitchen ASAP, a streamlined version of the 200-unit chain's casual dining brand, serves the same thin crust as its bigger brother, and this year the chain launched a Neapolitan crust.

 

Papa Gino's crusts are thin to begin with, but in early 2006, it rolled out an artisan crust similar to that now sold by Donatos Pizza, a 179-unit carryout-and-delivery-centered chain in Columbus, Ohio. The new crust followed the opening of its fast-casual prototype unit this year.

 

zpizza's Bright said thin is in both in terms of taste preferences and health perception. Despite its passing, the Atkins Diet taught Americans big bread is bad, and that, right or wrong, made thin crusts appear more healthful, he said.

 

Echoing the beliefs of many fast casual operators, several pizza executives said healthful offerings are essential to luring the fast-casual buyer. The segment's core demographic, men and women ages 25 to 55, is the nation's most health conscious group. They are better educated than most of their restaurant-going peers, they eat out often and have the income to support their habit.

 

But they expect fast-casuals to meet their nutritional aims by providing both sustenance and health maintenance. Whole-wheat crusts are a great start, but Bright said fast-casual pizzerias have to go even further by broadening salad offerings — an area where California Pizza Kitchen has excelled. Bright also said buzzwords like "organic and all-natural" appeal to fast-casual customers.

 

"We use an organic tomato sauce, and we focus on natural ingredients with our pesto sauces," Bright said. "Our pepperoni, meatballs and sausage are substantially additive free, too. We go to great lengths to work with our vendors to ensure their products are as natural as possible."