Papa Johns gets cheeky to power its comeback
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Good morning. Papa Johns is an old-school brand in a tough sector. Founder John Schnatter got his start in an Indiana pizzeria owned by relatives of my colleague Kristin Stoller. Chief executive Todd Penegor first ate it at Michigan State in 1987. “It’s a brand I love,” says Penegor, who joined last August to “restore the soul of a brand” that’s seeing sales decline at home.
When you’re half the size of Pizza Hut and Domino’s in a U.S. pizza market that’s competitive—the average consumer already eats 288 slices per year—and being squeezed by third-party apps, the question is how.
Penegor is taking inspiration from Wendy’s, where he doubled the stock price during his eight year stint as CEO through innovation, technology investments, a focus on franchisees and cheeky branding. Says Penegor: “We weren’t a king. We weren’t a clown. We were Dave Thomas’s daughter, Wendy, and we created a voice on Twitter that was a little snarky that allowed us to make fun of the competition where we had unique quality differences.” (Here’s our recent podcast with Wendy’s new chief Kirk Tanner.)
Papa Johns does seem cheekier these days. From its garlic bath bombs to new Meet the Makers ads with TikTok star Jacob “Doughtoli” Bartoli, the brand is generating buzz. Penegor is also trying to catch up to more tech-savvy rivals with moves like a new partnership with Google Cloud for AI-driven customer service.
But the key is to get the core right. “If I go and look at an ingredient product label, I read six simple words,” says Penegor, arguing that rivals’ labels have “a lot of big words that, for a kid from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, get hard to read.” When going after competitors like Domino’s, a little spice can’t hurt.
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Contact CEO Daily via Diane Brady at diane.brady@fortune.com
This story was originally featured on Fortune.com