Plano Debuts Bold Restaurant Redesign Featuring Open Kitchen, Drive-Thru and Sustainability Upgrades
Pizza Hut didn’t mess around when it redesigned its restaurant to be more modern and customer-pleasing. “Radically reimagined” is a fitting label for the debut U.S. site in Plano, Texas, just outside Dallas. The groundbreaking establishment features a guest-facing pizza preparation zone, pizza pickup cabinets, self-service touchscreen kiosks and the first Hut ’N Go drive-through lane in the United States.
The new concept comes as Pizza Hut, like many domestic pizza restaurants, struggles to maintain or increase profits. IBISWorld, an online source for various types of industry data, attributes part of the challenge to health-conscious Americans who want to reduce the calories, sodium, fat and/or carbohydrate content of their diets. But there’s a bit of a bright spot expected this year: IBISWorld predicts that U.S. pizza restaurants will post a 1.4% revenue growth sport and reach a total of $50.1 billion in revenue.
Pizza Hut is angling for a larger piece of that pie – pardon the pun. A Pizza Hut news release stated that after testing the new restaurant concept abroad in 80-plus markets containing roughly 2,000 restaurants, the company determined that the new design offers an enhanced guest experience while also driving more transactions and in-restaurant traffic compared to its other formats.
New Plano Pizza Hut
The Plano restaurant delivers one major change by featuring a bit of theater in its open preparation area. Customers can observe as employees build their pizzas, a “wildly successful” practice at foreign locations that increased sales, Shannon Garcia, president, global franchise markets and global operations, told CNN. “This showcases why experience matters. It’s not just about ease and reducing the friction, but this front-facing experience does correlate to a different experience for consumers that also drives an increase in business and transactions.”
Other changes associated with this new restaurant model include:
- Crisply modern exterior and interior design, which extends to the dining room – customers can eat inside or do takeout.
- The Hut ’N Go drive-through lane that serves in-a-hurry guests from a list of ready-now, premade items. Motorists order from digital menu boards and roll up to the pickup window to complete their transactions. Restaurant Business reports that with Hut ’N Go, Pizza Hut is clearly trying to draw customers from traditional fast-food brands.
- Heated cabinets for easy, speedy pickup of takeout/delivery locations, as reported by QSR Magazine.
In the news release about the Plano restaurant, which replaced a 25-year-old Pizza Hut restaurant at the same site, the brand also patted itself on the back for sustainability practices. Ranking high in that regard are upgraded lighting along with energy-efficient ovens and venting.
What Pizza Hut Execs Say
“From its physical layout to its modern design and digital-forward capabilities, this new restaurant showcases Pizza Hut\’s legacy of innovation and unique ability to meet changing guest needs in ways that are distinctive to our brand,” Pizza Hut CEO Aaron Powell said in the news release. It’s crucial “that our guests enjoy a seamless experience with us that feels personalized to their tastes and needs. This restaurant format harnesses the power of these priorities,” Powell added.
Joseph Call, global chief development officer for the pizzeria franchise, said that testing overseas has proved the concept’s worth. “We\’ve seen how this restaurant design brings the brand to life with a distinctive, modern exterior; an effortless blend of physical and digital touchpoints; and increased human interaction around the joy of pizza,” he said in the news release.
Now and Then
Most U.S. pizzerias have taken hits as inflation-weary diners stay home or go with value-priced menu options, CNN reported. Jonathan Maze, editor-in-chief of Restaurant Business Magazine, told CNN that Pizza Hut has a “weird history” because it started off as a full-service restaurant until Domino’s surged and “started the commoditization of the pizza business.” As a result, he said, consumers developed little brand loyalty, which has hurt brands recently.
Pizza Hut, which launched 66 years ago in Wichita, Kan., now has more than 19,500 restaurants. It had 6,537 U.S. sites in the third quarter of this year after shuttering 140 stores and opening 71 throughout this year, according to QSR Magazine. Pizza Hut experienced a 1% decline in same-store sales in its most recent quarter, CNN reported. Pizza Hut is a subsidiary of Yum! Brands Inc., which also owns KFC, Taco Bell and Habit Burger & Grill.
