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America Is Falling Out of Love With Pizza (msn.com) 141

Posted by msmash from the disappearing-slices dept.
The restaurant industry is trying to figure out whether America has hit peak pizza. From a report: Once the second-most common U.S. restaurant type, pizzerias are now outnumbered by coffee shops and Mexican food eateries, according to industry data. Sales growth at pizza restaurants has lagged behind the broader fast-food market for years, and the outlook ahead isn't much brighter.

"Pizza is disrupted right now," Ravi Thanawala, chief financial officer and North America president at Papa John's International, said in an interview. "That's what the consumer tells us." The parent of the Pieology Pizzeria chain filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in December. Others, including the parent of Anthony's Coal Fired Pizza & Wings and Bertucci's Brick Oven Pizza & Pasta, earlier filed for bankruptcy.

Pizza once was a novelty outside big U.S. cities, providing room for growth for independent shops and then chains such as Pizza Hut with its red roof dine-in restaurants. Purpose-made cardboard boxes and fleets of delivery drivers helped make pizza a takeout staple for those seeking low-stress meals. Today, pizza shops are engaged in price wars with one another and other kinds of fast food. Food-delivery apps have put a wider range of cuisines and options at Americans' fingertips. And $20 a pie for a family can feel expensive compared with $5 fast-food deals, frozen pizzas or eating a home-cooked meal.

[...] Pizza's dominance in American restaurant fare is declining, however. Among different cuisines, it ranked sixth in terms of U.S. sales in 2024 among restaurant chains, down from second place during the 1990s, Technomic said. The number of pizza restaurants in the U.S. hit a record high in 2019 and has declined since then, figures from the market-research firm Datassential show. Further reading, at WSJ: The Feds Need to Bail Out the Pizza Industry.
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America Is Falling Out of Love With Pizza More

America Is Falling Out of Love With Pizza

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  • Carbs (Score:2, Interesting)

    by SumDog ( 466607 )
    Carbs are bad, mmm kay

    • Re:Carbs (Score:5, Insightful)

      by The-Ixian ( 168184 ) on Friday January 09, 2026 @03:41PM (#65913140)

      Depends on whether or not you burn them off, I suppose.

      Personally, I love carbs.

      For me, pizza delivery is just getting too expensive to justify.

      I have started to just make my own pizza, which is a lot cheaper and quite a bit better.

      • I have started to just make my own pizza, which is a lot cheaper and quite a bit better.

        But this is true for pretty much all restaurant food. If it weren't, well, they wouldn't be making money.

        Everything can be delivered now, not just pizza, and everyone wants exactly what they want (sharing a pizza with the same toppings is so 1990s). Changing tastes and lots more competition (and pizza delivery has long been a highly competitive area) for the delivery market. That and the decreasing middle class, who was (and is) the primary delivery pizza market (the low income get frozen pizza or go hung

      • Re:Carbs (Score:4, Interesting)

        by buss_error ( 142273 ) on Friday January 09, 2026 @04:33PM (#65913298) Homepage Journal

        For me, pizza delivery is just getting too expensive to justify.

        I don't mind the 20% added charge to deliver. I mind the charge to deliver AND the 25% "tip for the driver" to deliver it, which includes the delivery charge.

        Sort of like charging sales tax on top of the $5 a pack cigarette tax stamp. A double dip - not that I smoke. Charging a tax on top of a tax. Same with charing me a fee to send me a bill telling me how much I need to pay you, but now it's another $10 because you sent me an email telling me what my water bill is. Or worse, garbage bill that doesn't change every month. I already know how much to pay, It's on automatic. Same with the cell phone bill. I don't need you to tell me until it changes and then you can send an email and not charge for that.

        I have started to just make my own pizza, which is a lot cheaper and quite a bit better.

        And doesn't take an hour and a half to come.

        I tried to start a business with "extra toppings" in the freezer section (cheese, mushrooms, sausage, etc) but couldn't get the chain stores to stock it. They wanted at least 6 months of product for no charge first, no limit on quantity. I can't afford that. Pretty sure it was a "go away" tactic because they started selling a store brand line of "plus toppings". Or maybe they already saw the need and filled it and I was just a coincidence.

        • Sort of like charging sales tax on top of the $5 a pack cigarette tax stamp. A double dip - not that I smoke.

          It's only double dipping if you think the tax's purpose is to make money, rather than the actual purpose of distorting the market in an attempt to reduce smoking rates. It's the same with alcohol by volume taxes, sugar taxes, etc. You should love this, it's the government nudging the free market rather than using the "r" word and regulating the industry.

          This is nothing at all like the fuckwits who charge a delivery fee and expect a tip for the driver as well. That's just a company being a piece of shit and

      • The only correct way to eat pizza is directly from the oven onto the table.

        Pizza is nor really a dish that is delivery friendly. Despite everyone claiming so.

        • WTF are you talking about? The prior art here is vast and indisputable. Everybody claims it so because it is so. Pizza is damn near magic. It's good when immediately eaten hot, cold from the fridge the next morning, sitting open on the counter for a while, or in an enclosed cardboard box inside a warmer bag for an hour.

          Declaring oven directly to table as the only viable path is culinary snobbery that is completely divorced from the reality of the experience. For shame.

          • Since so many pizza joints won't turn their ovens up to where they are supposed to be, the only way to enjoy their pizza properly is to take it home and put it in the oven for some more cooking so the middle is actually done instead of dough.

            • I've received disappointing pizza, but having to finish cooking it? 55 years old, never seen it. Not once. Is that really a thing? Maybe others will chime in here.

      • "For me, pizza delivery is just getting too expensive to justify."

        It was about 5 years ago that I was stuck at an auto dealership that was working on my car and thought of ordering a pizza. I called, got quoted a price, and figured out a different way to eat. It was fairly breathtaking.

        And lately, my favorite pizza place, Pizza Hut, is not the great experience it once was. The local place barely has sit-down service, which is just not what it used to be. I get carry out, the pizza itself is good, and

    • Re:Carbs (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 09, 2026 @03:59PM (#65913210)
      There's a pattern here that people are missing.
      The parent of the Pieology Pizzeria chain filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy.
      The parent of Anthony's Coal Fired Pizza & Wings and Bertucci's Brick Oven Pizza filed for bankruptcy.

      The local pizza shops are doing OK, but they are all owned by a big company run by crooked con-men who are running them into bankruptcy.

  • I see no evidence to support this in my local community.

  • Wegovy,Ozempic.. somewhere between 5% and 12% of the US population on these weightloss drugs now.

  • OK. (Score:2)

    by msauve ( 701917 )
    >pizzerias are now outnumbered by coffee shops and Mexican food eateries

    That's only if you consider Taco Bell to be Mexican food.

    • Re:OK. (Score:4, Insightful)

      by 93 Escort Wagon ( 326346 ) on Friday January 09, 2026 @03:45PM (#65913152)

      That's only if you consider Taco Bell to be food.

      FTFY

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ffkom ( 3519199 )

      That's only if you consider Taco Bell to be Mexican food.

      To be fair, US "pizza" often has little in common with the Italian original. I was honestly shocked when I had a first taste of what was named "pizza" on a US airport... such a horror.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by msauve ( 701917 )
        "Pizza" is just a name, there are many varieties. Judging based on airport food isn't fair, all of that pretty much sucks. The US has lots of tasty pizza if you go to the right places, and can have a wider variance than traditional Neapolitan "pizza."
      • I spent 30 days traveling Italy from Brenner to Brindisi. Most of the food is amazing. The pizza is not so great. American pizza is much better. I like the charred pizza in Connecticut, NOT the Hew Haven stuff with too little cheese. I found the best pizza in places like Albany and Westchester in New York. Pizzeria Bianco, when it was a small shop in Tucson, was okay, great dough. Diavola in Geyserville was pretty good. It's better to make it at home with toppings I like, like prosciutto or green ol

  • Cost (Score:5, Insightful)

    by CyberSnyder ( 8122 ) on Friday January 09, 2026 @03:34PM (#65913106)

    Pizza used to be cheap. Now, it's $20 or more, delivery fees are $5.99 instead of free and the driver expects a tip on top of the delivery fee. On top of that, quality has gone down. So we've gone from pizza every week or two to rarely doing take out. But they've priced themselves in the range of some much better choices.

    • I generally agree, that's the reason *I* don't buy much pizza any more. And if I do get one, it's usually from Costco. It's cheapass mediocre pizza, but it's super duper affordable. It's still better than little seizures.

      We had a halfway decent, not too terribly expensive pizza place nearby. But unfortunately they had too much oven and not enough business, so they didn't run the oven at full temperature, and the middles of pizzas were usually uncooked if there were a lot of toppings. Only a pepperoni could

    • Pizza used to be cheap.

      Didn't anyone do their annual re-watching of Home Alone this Christmas? Delivered pizza has always been kind of expensive.

      If you're willing to go pick it up yourself, chances are you probably have a local shop offering a deal.

      • I've actually been tracking this! In 2016, it cost me $40, with tax and tip, door to door for 1 large pepperoni + 1 extra large cheese + cheese bread from papa johns. In 2020 it was $49, in 2023 it was $53, and in 2026, last night, the same order cost me $67. (I tip 20% the entire time.)

        • That's 67.5% papa johns pizza inflation in 10 years. That's roughly 5.3% increase per year. Which is more than the food inflation in the US over the same period.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by dfghjk ( 711126 )

            you should compare it to food inflation since it includes taxes, tips and delivery fees. Much of the increase is not related to the food itself.

            but the increase is disturbing and consistent with my experience. Two large pizzas for me is always more than $70.

      • Didn't anyone do their annual re-watching of Home Alone this Christmas?

        Frank: Pizza boy needs $122.50, plus tip.
        Kate: For pizza?
        Frank: Ten pizzas times 12 bucks.
        Leslie: Frank, you've got money. Come on!
        Uncle Frank: Traveler's checks.
        Kate: Forget it, Frank. We have cash.
        Peter: You probably got the checks that don't work in France.

      • Pizza is still fairly cheap, at least for the chain restaurants. It hasn't gone up in prices nearly as much as most other fast food. What I suspect to be the culprit is that whereas in the past if you wanted delivery your option was pizza (and maybe one or two other choices if lucky) with the rise of Uber Eats, Door Dash, etc. you can get anything delivered.

        I still prefer going to some of the local pizzerias if I'm in the mood for it. There's one fairly close to where I work and it's a great place to hav

    • Pizza used to be cheap. Now, it's $20 or more, delivery fees are $5.99 instead of free and the driver expects a tip on top of the delivery fee. On top of that, quality has gone down. So we've gone from pizza every week or two to rarely doing take out. But they've priced themselves in the range of some much better choices.

      That's just for delivery. And all the big chains have apps with deep discounts. A one-topping large pie at Domino's is $7.99 if you use the app or web to get the discount. And most of the big chains now have car-side pickup, which means they bring it out to you in the parking lot. So pizza is actually the cheapest option to feed a family if you just use your head. Because 8 bucks won't even get you a single combo meal at most places now.

      Pizza chains are simply having to face more competition now. There's mo

    • Pizza used to be cheap. Now, it's $20 or more, delivery fees are $5.99 instead of free and the driver expects a tip on top of the delivery fee. On top of that, quality has gone down. So we've gone from pizza every week or two to rarely doing take out. But they've priced themselves in the range of some much better choices.

      Pizza is dirt cheap if you make it yourself. Only takes a few minutes of human effort.

  • pizza downfall? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by gary s ( 5206985 ) on Friday January 09, 2026 @03:36PM (#65913118)
    I dont think they are falling out of love with pizza, but you now have options. With uber, door dash and other services you can get food delivery from pretty much anyplace. Historically Pizza was the dominant delivery food,but now anything is fair game. I suspect some of the downfall might be the junk they call pizza now. Gone are the neighborhood pizza shops that are back filled with corporate cheap pizza.

    • I dont think they are falling out of love with pizza, but you now have options. With uber, door dash and other services you can get food delivery from pretty much anyplace. Historically Pizza was the dominant delivery food,but now anything is fair game.

      I suspect some of the downfall might be the junk they call pizza now. Gone are the neighborhood pizza shops that are back filled with corporate cheap pizza.

      One more factor to throw into the mix. Schools often offer pizza on their lunch menus. Because most schools don't have kitchens anymore and instead just have places to heat up food, the food quality is bad. My kids complain about the lunch pizza. They will not eat it unless there are no other options. Perhaps we have been educating our kids to despise pizza because they think of the bad pizza they get in schools.

      • Re:pizza downfall? (Score:4, Insightful)

        by Powercntrl ( 458442 ) on Friday January 09, 2026 @07:45PM (#65913794) Homepage

        Perhaps we have been educating our kids to despise pizza because they think of the bad pizza they get in schools.

        If school pizza was ever any good, that would've had to have been even before my time. The stuff they served in FL schools in the early 90s was rectangular, had an extremely flat, doughy crust, and the cheese seemed to be made of plastic. It was quite obvious that they were trying to pass off something that clearly wasn't pizza as pizza, and that did not at all put me off from getting the real stuff outside of school.

      • I just blame sysco (and a couple of similar competitors.) When practically one supplier is delivering all the premade bullshit for practically everyone today they unilaterally find ways to add fillers and other bullshit that destroys the flavor we once knew and loved.

        So much stuff today is just mass produced tasteless garbage with as many fillers as legally allowed. The flavor we had just a few decades ago was way better than what it is today. The same can be said if you go back a few more decades.

        More bigg

  • Cardboard (Score:5, Interesting)

    by methano ( 519830 ) on Friday January 09, 2026 @03:37PM (#65913122)
    Probably doesn't help that a lot of pizza these days taste like cardboard as the industry tries to squeeze profits out of the fading attraction.

  • You mean the shit franchises are in trouble. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by TigerPlish ( 174064 ) on Friday January 09, 2026 @03:40PM (#65913130)

    you mean, the shit franchises are in trouble. Pizza Hut, Little Greasers, Papa John's, Anthony's, etc.

    but not the locals. We got 2 new ones in 2 years.

    I grew up with Pizza Hut as a sit-down restaurant that also delivered. Now it's all deliveries. Anyone remember 70's - 80's Pizza Hut? checker tablecloths, red soda glasses.. stained glass lamps, and good pizza? All of that ceased to exist near the end of the 90s. Enshittification isn't just a computer thing.

    i also worked at a pizzeria in my teen years, a then-brand-new one in my hometown. It's still there. They endured, persevered, grew. tip o' the hat for Faccio Pizza!

    No, sir. The good pizzerias are still around, but they don't have the billboards, they don't have the TV ads. They just have word-of-mouth.

    • The local pizzeria in my town closed down because they a) fucking sucked and b) had five people working in a business which could run with two.

      Shit food is a bit of a theme for this town. We do have one basically competent restaurant but they're super overpriced. They're next to the bar, which I presume is what keeps them alive.

  • Trying Too Hard (Score:3)

    by Trip Ericson ( 864747 ) on Friday January 09, 2026 @03:42PM (#65913146) Homepage

    I'm a bit of a pizza snob myself, and I feel like I live in a pizza desert. I'm near DC, and there's a ton of pizza places. The problem? All of them are either crazy expensive, or they're trying to create a high-end type of feel for pizza.

    But to me, and I suspect to a lot of others, pizza isn't a high-end food, it's a comfort food. I grew up in a rural area where there was a single local pizza place that had what I would describe as "generic New York style" pizza. To me, that is what pizza should be. I cannot get that kind of pizza here, and not for lack of trying, as I've tried a lot of pizza places.

    Meanwhile, the big name chains don't have that feel either. Dominos is good, for example, but it's definitely something that doesn't scratch the pizza itch. I have to be in the mood for Dominos, not generically for pizza. Same for the other chains.

    When I visit where I grew up, the pizza is always top notch, and quite a bit cheaper. My wife and I go out of our way to get it on many of our visits. But here? I end up on frozen pizza much of the time when I want pizza because it's cheaper and just as fast as delivery much of the time, and if you're picky, just as good as local delivery. (And my wife started making pizza, which is also really, really good.)

    It wouldn't surprise me if things like this are driving down the interest in pizza. In chasing the top end, they're abandoning the much larger low end. At least, that's what it looks like to me.

    • Yep (Score:3)

      by abulafia ( 7826 )
      Urban pizza joints have been in trouble for a while. A restaurant's expenses are dominated by high fixed costs - mostly rent and insurance.

      When customers expect your primary product to be cheap and your fixed costs are jumping, you have a problem.

      Most of the cheap joints in San Francisco are long gone - there are a few left, seems mostly to be the ones that own their buildings.

      And you're still going to pay at least $10 for a slice and a drink.

  • Today, pizza shops are engaged in price wars with one another and other kinds of fast food. Food-delivery apps have put a wider range of cuisines and options at Americans' fingertips. And $20 a pie for a family can feel expensive compared with $5 fast-food deals, frozen pizzas or eating a home-cooked meal.

    Price wars typically result in lower prices for the consumer, and if you're eating frozen pizza - that still counts as pizza.

    • Let's see: 5x$5 = $25  > $20. Yep ! Just another MSmatch. Did you also notice Her use of the noun "AMERICAN" instead of "us" ? Perhaps She works from home ...

  • wtf is this silliness? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by WolfgangVL ( 3494585 ) on Friday January 09, 2026 @03:45PM (#65913154)

    On what planet does a whole pizza compete with "5 dollar fast food deals"?

    The problem is like everything else, some clowns are trying to sell pizza off as a swanky meal when we all know and expect pizza to be an affordable family splurge.

    Next you're going to tell me raman is goin out of style because people stopped buying $20 bowls of noodles and the bougie raman outfit next to the jewelry store is going out of business.

    $30 worth of pizza delivered used to feed the family.

    Now I cant order a pizza for less that 50 bucks and what get delivered is a sad shitty pie and the box demands I give over even more money to your driver because the 8-10$ delivery fee I just paid doesn't actually cover the delivery.

    We live in a world where everything is online. I can price out every single delivery option available in 5 minutes, and they're all competing with what I've already got in the fridge. You want to sell me pizza? Stop pretending your a swanky upscale bistro and sell me and my family a still hot slab with proper the amount of cheese and toppings for an affordable price.

    I can throw together cheese burgers for 5 in 10 minutes for around 25 bucks- I'll pay a little more to not get off my ass, but not if i means cold pizza an hour from now for $65.

  • Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Friday January 09, 2026 @03:46PM (#65913156)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • So no, America loves pizza but the inferior ones are being weeded out.

      Well, it looks like the chains that are failing are the ones that tried to turn pizza into a haute cuisine. You always run the risk of customers tastes changing or belt tightening during economic uncertainty, when you overcharge for a fancier version of something widely available as peasant food. It's why Starbucks keeps going through boom/bust cycles - overpaying for coffee with flavored syrups is only something people will do when they have a lot of extra money burning a hole through their pocket.

    • Best one i've had in miami was inside an italian supermarket. Literally in the center of it. It's in North Miami, "Laurenzo's." 50-60 year old place. They have a fantastic brick oven made in Modena, and know how to use it. My shop used to lunch there often.

      If the business has a conveyor belt oven, it's shit. and even if it has a real oven, you need skill to operate it and make good pizza.. and most here dont.

    • I takes real skill to ruin pizza. The worst I ever had was at a place called the Rock and Coals, who made a big deal out of their coal-fired ovens. It was burnt on the edges and cold on top. Awful.

      Then again, it was one of those sports bar places with football games blaring on huge TVs. Obviously, people go there for the alcohol, not the pizza.

  • Home made (Score:4, Interesting)

    by RitchCraft ( 6454710 ) on Friday January 09, 2026 @03:51PM (#65913176)

    I make my own pizza for much, much less than pizza joints can offer. Over $20 for a large pizza, plus delivery, plus tip. I can make three or four of my own for that cost. Mine tastes better too, but I'm probably biased.

    • On top of that there's a lot of popularity with home pizza ovens like the Ooni [ooni.com] which the high heat is usually the big factor in the difference between a pizza shop and at home.

      Of course but there's so many methods and tutorials for getting good results in a home oven or a grill that it's by no means necessary to have something like that but nice that it's an accessible option if one wants. I got gifted a Detroit style pizza pan and that works very well in the regular oven.

      • I just use my oven set to 425. Pie goes in for 16 minutes on a metal tray topped in tin foil lightly sprayed with olive oil and placed on the bottom rack. Slightly crispy on the bottom when finished. mmm .. mmm ... good.

        • My Wife got me a Breville oven. It's next level. 425 for 12 minutes on the pizza setting. Comes with a 13-inch non-stick pizza pan. I used them so much she got me 2 new pans this Christmas. Do you ever mess with flours? I've been mixing in one third bread flour and getting better bubbles and much better rise with sicilian style.

  • That's because your pizza SUCKS (Score:3)

    by the_skywise ( 189793 ) on Friday January 09, 2026 @04:01PM (#65913224)

    Pizza Hut has degraded its food quality so badly that its barely edible. Growing up and in college that was my pizza of choice but after not having pizza from them in over 5 years I decided over Christmas to try it again as "maybe it got better?". No. It was still the same tasteless, oversalty, slop they've been pushing for years.
    Likewise for Papa Johns which continues to lower their pizza quality to cut costs which I'm sure their CFO here is well aware of and approved.

    The problem isn't just pizza though, all the big restaurant chains are following the same MBA approved march to death.

    Mexican restaurants are doing well because they're mostly mom and pop shops actually COOKING their food and not relaying processed garbage.

    • Re:That's because your pizza SUCKS (Score:5, Funny)

      by h33t l4x0r ( 4107715 ) on Friday January 09, 2026 @04:42PM (#65913308)

      Mexican restaurants are doing well because they're mostly mom and pop shops actually COOKING their food and not relaying processed garbage.

      Mom and pop got picked up last month in an ICE raid. No menudo for you.

      • Who needs a Mexican restaurant to get menudo? I live in Colorado, just north of the New Mexico state line, and if I want menudo, I just go to the supermarket and buy a can of Juanita's. Quite good and much faster than making it from scratch.
    • Pizza Hut was always called the grease pit in my house, we stayed far away. You mean they could actually make it worse?

      • Pizza Hut was always called the grease pit in my house, we stayed far away. You mean they could actually make it worse?

        Sorry. Disagree. Pizza Hut used to make good pizza, particularly their style of deep dish. The bottom was crisp yet still chewy. The pepperoni was what you'd expect: greasy and burn your mouth hot. The cheese created the strings you see in commercials. The whole thing was firm but still had that droopy pizza quality.

        For whatever reason we stopped ordering from Pizza Hut then tried again many, many years later. To answer your last question, yes, they made it worse. Their dough is no longer made on site an

        • I grew up in New Haven eating pizza from Pepe's and Sally's (legendary pizzerias) as well as Pizza Hut and if you asked me back then I might have picked Pizza Hut deep dish, it was that good. Also the pac-man table games in the waiting area... such a good memory. I wish I was there right now.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by leonbev ( 111395 )

      The New Haven pizza places still seem to be doing well. I think that Dave Portnoy and his fanbase have turned it into a pilgrimage for hardcore pizza fans.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by hazem ( 472289 )

      Pizza Hut has degraded its food quality so badly that its barely edible.

      I grew up in the 80s and remember Pizza Hut being a kind of nice place to take your family out or even go on a date (for a college kid). It was a sit-down restaurant with nice table service, good food, decent ambiance, and even a pretty good salad bar!

      The last Pizza Hut I ate at was crap and it's now a tax prep office.

      • In the Pacific Northwest circa 1978, I have fond memories of me and my high school friends hanging out and eating pizza at Shakey's and Pizza Haven. I thought it was incredible then... I'm betting my current taste buds would disagree, it was probably just the atmosphere.

  • It takes 30 minutes, tastes just as good, and doesn't cost $50. And I can put all the extra cheese I want on it.

  • All pizza is not the same (Score:4, Insightful)

    by MpVpRb ( 1423381 ) on Friday January 09, 2026 @04:47PM (#65913328)

    Pizzas made at home or made by a restaurant that cares about quality are great.
    Pizzas made by national chains or frozen pizzas suck mightily and are getting worse as manufacturers switch to cheaper ingredients

    • Newman's Own frozen pizzas are decent. Not great, but better than a shit chain for sure.

      There's another one I've had that's almost but not quite as good too, called Roncadin.

  • The expenses of running a restaurant force many to buy materials from the big suppliers (Sysco/Performance Food/etc.)
    Once a place stops being unique, it stops being an option for me.
    I have dozens of local choices for pizza, all serving the same dough/sauce combo.
    It is the same pizza with a different chair and table. No wonder folks lose interest.

    There are great pizza places still around, you just have to look a little closer.

  • Just look into the wholesale chain, it's all the same suppliers using the same factory and using frankenfarm ingredients. It's slop all the way down. AI slop has gotten into your food supply.

  • I never understood the appeal of pizza. As a food item it's somewhat acceptable, but it's possibly the worst take-out food you could come up with if you tried. The large surface area and thin height makes it probably the #1 candidate for "lose heat fast". So by the time you get it delivered it's luke-warm and soggy.

    Am I missing something, or is it just a case of lowest common denominator?

  • News for nerds... (Score:3)

    by RobinH ( 124750 ) on Friday January 09, 2026 @05:27PM (#65913424) Homepage
    ... stuff that matters... wait, why is this on Slashdot? I mean yeah, I eat pizza, but so does like, everyone else pretty much.
  • Shit pizza like pieology needs to go away. Pizza ain't going anywhere.

  • What is attractive about a pizza chain? It's not that Americans don't like pizza, but the pizza is terrible from chains. Little ceasers cardboard pizzas make me sick. Dominos is ok, I haven't sat down at a pizza hut for years. But all serve up not healty pizza. And I've never had delivered pizza.

    If you are a foodie and want good pizza stick to artisan or thin crust with fresh ingredients. Or go to Italy. Or make your own pizza with 00 pizza flour with durum wheat.

    If you want to funnel carbs into your body s

  • Am I living somewhere abnormal? (Score:3)

    by thegreatemu ( 1457577 ) on Friday January 09, 2026 @05:35PM (#65913450)
    I see two concepts repeated over and over in the comments: (1) pizza has gotten really expensive and (2) I can make better pizza at home.

    Around here pizza is by far the most affordable on-demand way to feed the family. I mean sure if you just order "at menu price" its nuts, but does anyone really do that? Domino's *always* has a less than $10 3-topping large pizza deal happening, or two-or-more $7 2-topping mediums. Ditto Papa John's. I would be astounded if Pizza Hut doesn't have something similar, and Little Caesar's Hot and Ready are also less than $10 for a large. I admit I have no idea what the delivery surcharge is because I always pick it up. But I have never used any of the delivery apps either. Point being feeding two adults and two kids pizza is less expensive than McD's by far. Is it really so different everywhere else?

    As for taste and quality, sure the big chains aren't great. But I worked for Domino's last millenium, and they have significantly improved their quality since then. Not as sure about the others. But I'll take a chain pizza over a fast food chain burger any day. And I do make plenty of pizza at home, but it's different. My oven sure as hell doesn't get to 900 degrees. No combination of pizza stone, air rack, whatever fancy pan I've tried can make a reasonable facsimile of crust baked in a proper pizza oven. So all these people claiming their homemade pizzas are better: did you build yourself a brick oven in the backyard? Otherwise I call BS.

    • Around here pizza is by far the most affordable on-demand way to feed the family.

      I think the issue is the "on-demand" part there. Pizza was predominantly a take-out / delivery meal. With people less and less excited about on-demand food to order they are suffering a lot from the reduced demand.

      We never order pizza anymore, it's so much cheaper and better to make our own, and when we do order food, well since COVID pushed the world to on-demand there are so many options to choose from so if we're going to go with an on-demand expense then we may as well spend $5 extra and get something a

    • My dominos sells a Large 14-inch $25.99 for a wisconsin 6-cheese for PICKUP.

      I can understand it if you're an hour or two around NYC, but the rest of the United States, pizza is expensive ASF. These corporate companies look at market prices and they try to undercut only a little bit to make them attractive. If all the pizza in your area costs $40 bucks for a large pie delivered by private car, then everyone else is going to cost the same.

      If you have some fool slinging pizzas in the back of a BF N

  • Another metric that's downstream of changing demographics. It's like those heatmaps that are just 1:1 correlated with population density.

  • We're not falling out of love with pizza (Score:4, Informative)

    by Kevin108 ( 760520 ) on Friday January 09, 2026 @07:00PM (#65913720) Homepage

    What the PJ CFO actually explained was, that with the proliferation of Door Dash, Grubhub, etc., pizza is no longer the strongest delivery option out there, so that has impacted sales. People can get a hamburger or a chicken sandwich with the same ease as pizza, so many people are choosing other items these days. Americans have been eating 3 billion pizzas a year. Some niche or overpriced chains might be affected, but don't let anyone convince you that pizza is in danger.

  • Plain cheese "large" is $15-20 depending on on where you get it and when. And, I'm talking the major chains, not the absurdly overpriced "boutique" hipster horseshit. You want toppings? That will run the price up in a flash.

    One pie is too small for four people so you're looking at two pies. Boom you're at $30-40. Or more! It's too fucking high and we haven't even touched on delivery and tipping.

    I've just discovered that Papa John's is running a 3 topping large for $10, as an attempt to avoid bankruptcy. $10

    • $15-$20 for just cheese? What city? I'm genuinely curious because that price is just so outside of my experience I'm surprised it exists.

      So, I figured I'd do a quick search on where my non-American brain thinks things might be expensive. New York City. First hit came up as Nuevo York Pizza, and there it is. $21 for a cheese pizza. But... 18" round? Holy fuck. That's double the area of what I would call a large.

      Where I'm from (Canadian) $21US buys a large meat pizza that would feed four. Ham, Pepperoni, Beef

  • Dominoes tried to gain inroads here in Germany 10-15 years back. Their way overpriced Pizza tastes like shit. They took a beating and now there are only a handful of joints left, if they haven't retreated again entirely. Germany is awash in local Pizza and Doener Kebab joints that deliver - at notably cheaper prices - way better quality and taste than any American joint I've ever been to, with the exception perhaps of Pizza Hut, which was OK but still was a tad pricier and not quite on par quality wise befo

  • In a word, the pizza chains are killing pizza.

    They're too busy chasing cheap ingredients sourced from cheapest vendors, hiring workers at the lowest fairs, trying to scrape every extra penny as profit so they can publish reports that make wallstreet happy.

    All that does is enshittify their products so of course nobody wants that crap or that hassle. We haven't eaten from a chain pizza place in about 5 years at least, always preferring small mom and pop places that are trying to stand out with better ingredie

  • *looks at gut*.....fake news.
  • It's simply a litty artisanal takeover.

    The constructed narrative that pizza is "losing popularity" is a corporate delulu. Pizza ain't fking dying; it’s reaching a fever pitch in the artisanal variety across the farthest reaches of the USA.

    The true culprits? Ooni, Gozney, and Ninja (and a bunch of other copypastas)

    THE PRICE GAP
    * People are tired of paying "gourmet" prices - $30-$40 for a single XL chain pie after fees and tips .. for a lukewarm, mass-produced product (PLZZZZ)
    * For that same $40, a

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