Pizza

Leadership

Former Scooter's Coffee exec John Owen named CEO of Blaze Pizza

With career roots that include McDonald's and Subway, Owen brings deep franchising experience to the fast-casual pizza brand. He replaces Beto Guajardo at the helm.

Financing

How Pieology's attempt to rescue restaurants contributed to bankruptcy

The fast-casual chain ultimately blamed its sales decline on the pandemic. But the parent company's acquisition of 29 underperforming franchised locations went awry, forcing the closure of 17 units before this week's filing.

The Bottom Line: A decade ago, several fast-casual chains emerged in the race to become to pizza what Chipotle was to Mexican. None of them made it.

The fast-casual pizza chain founded in 2011 was once one of the promising franchise brands in the niche, before the pandemic.

Goode Partners made a strategic investment in the Florida-based wood-fired pizza brand with plans to help it grow within and outside of its home state.

The pizza chain completed a “strategic refranchising” of a joint-venture operation in Washington, D.C., and Baltimore to Pie Investments, which will open another 52 locations in the market by 2030.

The Round Table Owners Association is accusing the pizza chain of “intentional mismanagement” of the marketing fund since Fat Brands bought the company in 2021, leading to falling sales.

A group led by Consortium Brand Partners is set to acquire the casual-dining pizza chain for less than $300 million, Reuters reported.

The 70-year-old fast-casual brand is opening a new prototype in Los Angeles designed to embrace nostalgia around its storied past.

Pizza is one of the casual-dining chain’s core products, but customer satisfaction had been declining over the years. A “familiar, but refreshed” version hit the menu last week.

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