Filipinos will have a new pizza craze as Little Caesars® Pizza, the third largest pizza chain in the world, opened its first restaurant in the Philippines in Metrosquare building in Ermita, Manila.
Dubbed as the “Best Value in America” for 11 consecutive years, Little Caesars Pizza’s delicious HOT-N-READY® pizza is available on classic pepperoni or cheese pizza flavors. Foodies also need not to call ahead and no need to wait for their pizza because HOT-N- READY means pizza hot out of the oven ready when they are.
The franchisee in Philippines is Palmtree ph Foods Corp., is owned by James Kodrowski. Kodrowski, also manages a group of companies that operate in the region. In addition to the store opening in Manila, Little Caesars Pizza in Singapore also celebrated its grand opening on January 24. As the brand continues to experience growth internationally, Little Caesars Pizza is offering franchise opportunities throughout Asia and is accepting inquiries from interested entrepreneurs eager to join a world-famous pizza brand. Start-up requirements and requests for information may be made at http://franchise.littlecaesarsinternational.com.
adobo Magazine had a chance to sit down with Paula Vissing, Senior Vice President of International for Little Caesars Pizza, over some pizza and good ol’ brand nostalgia.
Some of us remember Little Ceasar’s in Manila back in the 1990s. What can we expect this time around?
I talked to so many people as we were getting ready to get this store open who remember Little Caesar’s from their childhood and people are so nostalgic about it and they love the taste. So we’ve always been about making sure that we deliver great value and a great-tasting product. What’s different for us as I’ve said from when we here before, is the introduction of Hot and Ready and so that is our business model. No calling, no waiting. You walk in, you know, you’ll walk out of the store within 30 seconds with a hot pizza so great value, great-tasting, super convenient, and when we were here before, that last piece wasn’t really a part of our business model as it is today.
In the States, Little Caesar’s ads were iconic and memorable for their brand of humor. Can we expect the same here?
Yes. That great sense of humor and sense of fun, that we’ve always been about, you’ll absolutely see carried into Singapore and carried into the Philippines. We’ll make sure that any adjustments for that to happen for local markets that those get made but one of the really, one of the really great things that I love so much about this business, about Little Caesar’s, about our brand is we’ve always been really focused on family and we’ve always been really focused on fun and those things you’re talking about, they’re the way that they came through, by the people who remember them so fondly. There are new versions of those in markets that we offer today
So there are two things that that we want to make sure that we continue to hold true to us, as we continue to grow. The same kind of fun, advertising messages, or campaigns that you saw, you’ll absolutely see those kinds of things in the future. That’s still very much a part of who we are.
How many branches are rolling out next?
This is the first store [in Ermita, Manila]. We’re a private company so we really don’t talk about numbers. but you’ll see additional stores between now and the end of the year. Beyond that, we’re here—and we’re not going anywhere.
Are there plans to tweak the recipe to suit the local palate?
That’s a great question and the answer is no. So we work so hard as a company to really make sure that we are, [as our founders were,] committed to a great quality that’s continued throughout the course of the company and it’s prepared us for whatever challenges we experience around the world. But it’s important to us that we don’t compromise on quality as we go into a new country.
At some point in the future, you might see a new pizza come, you know, that maybe is uniquely Filipino, that would be a lot of fun but the quality of our dough, the quality of our pizza sauce, the quality of our cheese, those things we don’t change, we don’t compromise. Nobody here wants less anything than that right? You know, when you get down to it, people every now and then will try to come up with one-of-a kind specialties, but people generally will default back to the classics.
Visit the first ever Little Caesar restaurant in the Philippines in Metrosquare building in Ermita, Manila.
