Pizza Shop Growth Is Up, But Are Your Operations Getting Better?

In this episode, I break down what I’m seeing inside the store right now as we move from growth mode into adjustment mode. Sales are up, momentum is real, and we’ve made solid progress from Period 1 to Period 3. But better sales do not always mean a healthier business. That is the real conversation here. 

I talk through the questions I’m asking as an operator right now. Where is the growth really coming from? Which days are carrying the week? How much of that top-line growth is tied to third-party delivery, and what does that mean for margins, profitability, and long-term sustainability? I also share why my next move is not chasing random sales, but making smarter adjustments that build a stronger pizza business. 

We get into first-party online ordering, loyalty and rewards, email and text marketing, bounce-back offers, ticket average, strategic bundles, weekday sales strategy, and why catering may be one of the biggest growth opportunities for pizzeria owners who want stronger sales and better margins. This episode is a real look at pizzeria operations, restaurant growth strategy, direct ordering, customer retention, and how to use your numbers to make better decisions every week. 

I also share what I’m posting inside Pizza Pro Circle, where I’m giving weekly scorecards, real store updates, lessons from the numbers, and honest behind-the-scenes insight into what we’re testing, what’s working, and what still needs to improve. If you are a pizzeria owner, operator, or manager trying to grow sales, improve profit, and build a stronger operation, this one will hit home.

Follow for more real-world insights on pizza leadership, pizzeria operations, and restaurant growth.

Join Pizza Pro Circle:
 https://www.skool.com/tyrells-group-9324/about

Check out my PMQ articles:
 https://www.pmq.com/category/contributors/tyrell-reed/

Tools I recommend:
 SPM Pro: https://spm.circle.so/checkout/spm-pro-group?affiliate_code=9ea4d9

WookAI: https://lddy.no/1oadh

Thrive POS: https://www.thrivepos.com/pizzaking

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

And that's really, you know, been the lesson for me. And I'm not, I'm not preaching at anybody. I'm just like talking to myself here. Like that's the lesson's for me. I'm not trying to make the business louder. You know what I mean? I'm trying to make this business healthier. I'm trying to make this business profitable. I'm trying to make this business sustainable. What's going on, everybody? Welcome back to the show. You know, I'm a little bit late. I tried to record this the other day, but it just didn't work out. But today, I really want to talk about where my head is at right now as I look at the store and the numbers, and you know, we've been growing, but I really want to understand what that growth really means at this stage, right? Because we've made some progress. And when I look back at where we started at period one and compared to where we are now here in period three, we are for sure in a much better place, right? Sales are up. We've built a lot of momentum in period two. We've done a solid job just holding that ground here into period three. And, you know, that that does matter a lot. And I'm super grateful for that. But at the same time, I've been reminding myself that better sales doesn't automatically mean that everything is fixed, right? That has probably been, you know, the biggest thing on my mind lately. You know, it's easy to look at a stronger sales number, even if it's not where you want to be, it's stronger than where it was, and feel like the business is getting stronger across the board. And sometimes that may be true, like sales cures all, that's what people say, right? But sometimes that's only part of the story. And as I've been looking closer at our operations, I've realized that the next step for me is not just trying to get more sales. The next step for me is to make the right adjustment. You know, and that's what this episode really becomes about. I'm I'm really starting to ask different questions now. Not just, did we grow? Did our sales grow? I'm asking, how did we grow? Where did that growth come from? What days are are carrying our week? We just came off a, you know, a week where it was up and down, you know, and and Sunday saved us. So like what what still feels weak underneath all this progress? That's what I'm asking. What needs to change if I want this growth to be healthier and more consistent? That's where my mind has been throughout all of this. One of the first things that stood out to me when I started to take a closer look was how much of our growth had been coming through third-party delivery and tied through, you know, these third-party platforms. And look, I'm not here to act like third party is all bad. We use it. It has helped us. It has. It brought people in, it's added volume, it's kept the staff and the team busy. We went through part, we've gotten our food out there. That part is real. But it also made me stop and think that, you know, like because more of this growth is coming through third party, then I gotta be honest about what that really means. The sales number may look great, right? It may look stronger on the top line. But as a longtime operator, I know that that growth can put serious pressure on the bottom line. Like third party growth can seriously eat your eat your margins up. So I have to have this shift in mindset because busy and better are not always the same thing, right? You know, the kitchen can be slammed, the tickets fly in, you know, the the week can look strong from a revenue standpoint, and still underneath all of that, there's some adjustments that need to be made, right? And that's really, you know, been the lesson for me. And I'm not, I'm not preaching at anybody. I'm just like talking to myself here. Like, that's the lesson for me. I'm not trying to make the business louder. You know what I mean? I'm trying to make this business healthier. I'm trying to make this business profitable. I'm trying to make this business sustainable. So, you know, that's why one of the real next moves for me is to focus intently on first-party orders. I want more customers coming through our first party system through our online platform. I want more customers inside of our rewards platform. I want more people on our text and email list. And I really want just more chances to bring them back directly to us. You know what I mean? And and that's and that's like the biggest adjustment that I'm that I'm thinking about right now. And and look, it's not because I want to do something flashy. If I wanted to do that, we could, we could be making all the funny content and doing all that. I just want to own more of the relationship with the customer. Like, I don't want to rent them. You know, we've done a lot of work to get attention, and now I want to do a better job of keeping that attention and turning it into repeat business that we could control. You know what I mean? Like, I want to be in good, I don't want to be it at the mercy of these third-party platforms. So for me, that means a couple of simple things. I have to give people a reason to order direct from us next time, right? That means using bounce back offers on pizza boxes or putting out putting out a mailer or doing something, you know, something like that. I need to make our rewards platform easy to understand, easy to join. And it also means using my text and my email platforms with purpose, like not just arbitrarily sending messages. It needs to be something that's direct. If it's if we're doing deals, it's gonna be direct order deals. I mean, something that people can come back for. Doesn't have to be fancy. It's just gotta be better than where it is. You know, another thing I've been thinking about is the shape of the week. Like when I look at the numbers, like I said before, I can still see that certain days need more strength, right? One strong day can can save the week and can help the week a lot. But I don't want to rely on just Friday night and Saturday night. You know, I want the week to feel more balanced. I want, I want Tuesday to matter more, I want Wednesday to matter more. I want I want Thursday to feel like it's got a damn job here. Like you got to do some work for me Thursday. You know what I mean? So that that's that's another adjustment that I'm that I'm working on and that I'm thinking through, you know, giving these days purpose. And whether that means we're having a you know a specific offer for days, if we got a Tuesday deal or a Wednesday deal, whatever that means, if it means we we got better follow-up with our existing customers to try to bring them back faster. Um it may mean, you know, being more intentional about how we how we handle our local outreach and start to push catering, which we'll talk about in a little bit too. I'm still working through exactly what that looks like, but just know that my goal is to keep improving on that front. Um I can't just hope that these days are gonna get better. I gotta give these days a reason to get better, and that's gonna be through the efforts that we put in and the adjustments that we make. So that's you know, that's really where I'm at right now. Not anything dramatic. I'm just paying attention and making the next move. Paying attention to the numbers, paying attention to the data, and then making the next decision and then and then adjusting. Another thing that I've been thinking about a lot is ticket average. Not every improvement has to come from going out and getting new customers and getting more orders. Some of it comes from just doing a better job with the customers that we already have and the orders that we're already getting. If that means putting together some strategic bundles or, you know, really focusing in on upselling and getting add-ons and, you know, making the online ordering flow correctly so that these things are seamless, you know, that's that's a reason to turn a single item ticket into something that is stronger with a pizza or the, you know, an appetizer or a salad or a dinner or like whatever that is. The reality is if so much of our business is coming through these third-party and extensive channels, that means every single order that we do good has to that we do get has to work a little bit harder and a little bit smarter. You know what I mean? I want I want that better order, that bigger order to be easier for people to buy, which really leads us to the catering, which, you know, if I'm if I'm being 100% honest, where I really want our growth to come from is from catering. You know, the more I keep thinking about it, the more I keep coming back to it as a real opportunity for this restaurant. Not like, you know, getting a random catering here or there. I'm talking about like really creating a lane for us and dominating and catering. It can help our weekdays, it can help our ticket average, it can help us get in front of, you know, schools and churches and offices and, you know, the local teams and the community center. So, you know, that's just something that we're that we're focusing heavy on. We we started our catering site, we have a funnel, we have direct follow-up. Um, we really just want to push that outreach a little bit more. You know, I don't want to just take catering orders when they happen. I want to be more intentional about how we build those relationships and how we fulfill those orders. We got a great system for that. You know what I mean? So when I step back, I look at all these things together, I keep coming back to the same thing. The growth is good. And I'm thankful for it, like I said, I'm encouraged by it. But now I want that growth to be more intentional. I want it to be cleaner, I want it to be more profitable, and I want it to come through direct channels. I want my weekdays to be stronger. I want to get our ticket average up, and I want to, you know, I want catering to be more front and center on what we do. You know what I mean? It's not, it's not a whole lot to do. I want the numbers to tell me the truth every single week. And that's why we do that, right? That's why we do Sportkart. That's why we why we talk through the numbers, you know, and that's you know, that's where I'm at right now. I'm not trying to do 50 new things. I'm trying to do a few things. I'm trying to make the right adjustments based on what the store is showing me, based on what the numbers are telling me. I want to find the weak points, I want to make an adjustment, I want to track the results of those adjustments, and then I want to rinse and repeat. That's the that's the season I'm in. And I'm and I'm really looking to just keep that simple and build what we're building. Which brings me to, you know, another thing that I'm really excited about, which is what we're doing inside of the school community, the Pizza Pro sort. I'm over there. I'm posting my scorecard every single week. I'm gonna give real transparency into what we're seeing and what we're doing in this operation. The wins, the losses, the misses, the numbers, the lessons, the adjustments we're making. I'm not just, you know, not just theory and not just once a week here on a podcast. This is something that I want to that I'm doing every single day. Not theory, not something that's polished up for Facebook or Instagram. I want to, you want to show the real work that we're doing. I want people to be able to see what it looks like inside of a real operation, what I'm tracking in real time, what I'm learning, what I'm trying, what's working, what's not working, what still needs to be worked on, what showed a little bit of promise because that's the kind of transparency that helps people. And we all know I'm just here to help. Sometimes people just need to see what an operator's week is actually looking like, right? You know what I mean? They need to see the decisions that we're making. They need to see how the numbers are affecting those decisions. They need to see that growth is not just coming from a perfect week. You know, it means that we're we're paying attention, we're making the adjustments. You hear me say that a lot. We make adjustments, not excuses. And stacking better weeks and better wins over time. That's what we're working on. So, you know, if you're into that and if you're looking for that kind of behind-the-scenes look, and you think that could help you, come join us in the school community. I'll put the link here in the description, and it's, you know, you'll see it anywhere on my pages. But you're gonna see my weekly scorecards. You're gonna see me breaking down what I'm seeing. You're gonna see me open more about the operation so that you can learn right along with me. This isn't, you know, just me teaching. This is me learning and sharing it in real time. So that's where I'm putting a lot of effort, that's where I'm putting a lot of time. And I would love for you to come over and join me. It's free too, by the way. So keep learning, keep building, keep growing, you know, keep coming back and keep stacking those wins. We appreciate you. We will see you at Pizza Expo next week. I'll I'll be recording at the Perfect Crust booth on Tuesday. So if you want to come on, even if you just want to come say what's up, come check me out. I'll be on the show floor all day Tuesday, a couple hours on Wednesday, then I got to fly back out here. So until then, I will see you guys. Appreciate you. See you next week.