So a nearby pizzeria with its own delivery drivers that has a degree of operational competence can get that pizza in a car immediately, which means that the customers get better pizza, which means they order more pizza from that store.

Uber Eats and DoorDash don’t seem to manage to get pizzas into a car immediately.

I was a little annoyed at the time, but now that you've put it like that, it makes a lot of sense.

I went from hot pizza arriving in 15 minutes to cold pizza arriving in 40+ minutes, if at all. After a few times, I realized the delivery person was now a random doordasher that didn't know the neighborhood, and didn't even have the benefit of seeing my doordash instructions on how to find my townhouse since they were hired by the restaurant.

This is what I was thinking. I don’t live/work in CA, but restaurants in NY who self-deliver also have to consider the high cost of Insurance for delivery drivers compared to the availability of third-party delivery agents.

...and saw the wage increase as a useful distraction to blame.

You don't need a robot pizza machine, you need an operating model where rent doesn't hold your bottom line hostage (based on my very limited understanding of the business fundamentals). Rent goes up? Class 8 Semi pulls up to pull the trailer to somewhere else with hookups.

Edit: thanks for the learnings y’all!

There’s even a startup company that will rent you space for running it.

https://cloudkitchens.com/locations/san-francisco-bay-area/

You’re not missing anything. Just bear in mind that demographics drive restaurant delivery businesses intensely and a big part of the business is related to regional demographic trends (and those vary globally quite a lot).

Pizza Hut has for many years in a lot of locations maintained more of a restaurant focused approach, often serving AYCE buffet as a destination with proper booths and table service. They have a bunch of retro styled locations in the States that still offer that experience. There’s a pretty neat one that I like in Fredericksburg, TX. The full list of classic locations that I know of is here: https://rolandopujol.substack.com/p/the-retrologists-guide-t...

You want a gas conveyor oven which actually takes a lot of space and needs ~3 meters in front for assembly and 2 meters behind it. Walk in fridge and freezer are at least another shipping container in size. Then there's clean up and other prep space..

For us, wages were more than rent and probably our competitors rents. 2/3rds of wages would be drivers at slow times going to something like 4/5ths during the Superbowl.

It does matter where it's made; a location more distant from customers will mean they get pizza that's less fresh.

> In 2019, Pizza Hut brought back its 1974 logo, banking on its nostalgic appeal. I figured that would be the end of it, just a simple marketing tactic soon forgotten. There were no plans announced to bring back the logo in stores, much less redesign the restaurants to look like old Pizza Huts from the chain’s heyday.

> But with no fanfare whatsoever, that’s exactly what’s been happening. Pizza Hut has been taking legacy stores and converting them into “Classics.” The formula includes ...

> So far, these stores appear to be limited to smaller markets, where these legacy stores have survived, the bones of the old buildings intact.

> They have generated incredible curiosity and fascination, and when I post photos of them on my Instagram page, they invariably lead to hundreds of comments and excitement and joy that’s impossible to measure. (Here’s a look at the phenomenon on my friend Heath Racela’s Substack.)

... but yea... for pizza, the dine in experience is almost completely gone. Dominos, Little Caesars, Gumby's (for the college town), Pizza Pit, Pizza Hut, Papa Johns. Papa Murphy's takes it to another level without even having ovens (take and bake... which incidentally _also_ allows them to qualify for SNAP https://www.papamurphys.com/faqs/).

You have to look for places like Pizza Factory or Pizza Ranch for a dine in experience (and many other local places that have only one or two places... but very few national chains anymore).

... And then there's Pasqually's Pizza which straddles the line. https://www.pasquallyspizza.com/our-story/ (CEC Entertainment, LLC is Chuck E. Cheese)

The best bet would be to pool resources to operate a single kitchen with multiple individual pizza companies as tenants. Each could run their own prep stations but use shared ovens. But you're back to rent dominating costs even if it's lower than having your own kitchen and oven(s).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7OTpHqq6bFg # Comparing Chuck E Cheese pizza and a rebranded CEC frozen pizza

https://www.lastsqueaktonight.com/ # Last Week Tonight's alternative episode when they discussed HOAs. it's a full and funny history of the pizza chain and includes the virtual brand

  > Perhaps Yum Brands has the data

  > Pizza Hut, owned by the Taco Bell parent company Yum! Brands, said the company was "aware of the recent changes to delivery services at certain franchise restaurants in California."
  > "Our franchisees independently own and operate their restaurants in accordance with local market dynamics and comply with all federal, state, and local regulations while continuing to provide quality service and food to our customers via carryout and delivery," Pizza Hut told BI.

Costco charges $10 for a whole pizza (which you pick up, no delivery). Given their business model, I suspect that number is pretty close to the actual cost of production.

now its italian prices so might need adjustments but lets see

50 cents yeast 1 euro flour 50 cents salt 2 euros tomato passata 1kg 50 cents basil

The rest mozzarella

Now you might want to go over budget a bit and get some olive oil that is expensive, but you just put half a tablespoon per pizza so…

Making pizza is really good business with high margins

Real-world cost optimizers like Costco have some robots (the pizza saucing machine is cool) and they still end up with a cost around $10 per pizza.

Making pizza has high margins when you charge $25 or more per pizza. Not $10. Pizza Hut charges less than $25 but that includes delivery. From a random web link (https://www.vettedbiz.com/pizza-hut-franchise/) franchises average around 15% margins, which is not great.

Pizza places have been charging for delivery for a few years now. They don't just absorb it by increasing pizza prices anymore. My guess is their volume has gotten so low or extremely variable that it's hard to plan for the correct number of drivers each night, and the marginal cost of another driver is so high now that they can't just have extra drivers hang around doing nothing, and it's probably harder to keep drivers because they're being poached by all the delivery services.

Strategically, it makes a lot of sense. There are at least a half a dozen popular delivery services with thousands of drivers.

Maybe Pizza Hut has gotten out of the delivery business because nobody in their right mind would order delivery from Pizza Hut, since they almost always have better options.

Maybe they are focusing more attainable markets: people who wandered in off the street, people who wanted Taco Bell but were really high and forgot, third option not found.

When I was delivering pizza, it was usually 30 minutes allotted for delivery: 15 minutes to make the pizza, and 15 minutes to get it into the customer’s hands. With transit time, I would have been doing good to get 2 deliveries an hour.

You didn't deliver multiple pizzas on a single trip?

I'm like wtf, that's all? why haven't that been done already.