TechIntersect

I’m from Kansas, and naturally interested in all things connected to the State of Kansas. Most people probably do not associate the Pizza Hut brand with the land that brought us Dorothy and the Tin Man, but believe it or not, the very first Pizza Hut was located in Wichita, Kansas.

When I was a kid in the 1970’s, going to the Pizza Hut was a very special treat. Although we were in the heart of Pizza Hut country, we only went out to eat on very rare occasions- maybe once or twice a year- and our favorite place to go was Pizza Hut.

We loved the Pizza Hut,  because it meant we would all get a cool “Pizza Man” puppet with our meal.

It was basically an oddly shaped plastic bag with a “Pizza Hut Man” printed on it, but it was fun enough for us. It was torture to “save our drinks” for our meal, because in those days there was no such thing as a free refill and my folks wouldn’t spring for seconds. We would always be served our drinks right away, then two hours later they would finally bring us a piping hot pizza. At least it seemed like it took two hours. A visit to the Pizza Hut was an entire evening event. There was no such thing as a fast pizza. It seems like in the mid-eighties, Pizza Hut changed some kitchen processes & the wait for pizza preparation was greatly shortened. That change was a most welcome change, but I don’t feel the same way about the latest news to come out about Pizza Hut.

Pizza Hut is re-branding itself. Some packaging and even some store signs are going to be known simply as “The Hut”. This is from the same parent corporation that brought us “KFC” instead of “Kentucky Fried Chicken”. Ok, that’s fine. I understand the need to update. Why not take the Holiday Inn approach?

Can you imagine if Holiday Inn re-branded to “The Inn”? Guests couldn’t check in without visions of Mary & Joseph searching for lodging in Bethlehem.

My real question is, why aren’t these companies blogging about ideas they are considering? Why don’t they see blogging as a very effective alternative to marketing focus groups? There still seems to be a widespread notion among marketers that customers should be treated as mushrooms; that is kept in the dark and fed excrement. Why not engage us in a conversation about your ideas?

There is a danger in avoiding the conversation about your brand. Just because Pizza Hut doesn’t participate doesn’t mean the conversation won’t happen, it simply will happen without them. One indication to me that Pizza Hut doesn’t want a conversation is this press release which attempts to dispel rumors that the company is completely changing it’s brand. Dear reader, that is the purpose of a corporate blog. Instead of releasing a statement and thinking that the job is done, they could (and should) be blogging about this, engaging everyone interested in a conversation.

More and more companies are getting the idea, but it seems to me that we still have a very long way to go. Companies such as IBM have taken a pro-active stance even to the point of encouraging blogging about the company, and writing guidelines for employees who want to blog as IBMers. Companies who ignore blogging will pay the price.

I searched Google for a Pizza Hut blog to learn more about the branding change. Here is the top result on the search: Pizza Hut Team Member Blog. Here’s what I found there:

Pizza Hut uses Class 2 vegetables, as they are cheaper. But it causes problems with how our products look. While we are badgered about the thickness of a slice of cucumber, “supply chain” are happy for us to use one cucumber which has virtually black skin, and others which are almost yellow.

While for the majority of the products it makes very little difference, it just shows that their commitment to quality goes as far as “only if it’s cheap enough!”.

Not exactly the “officially sanctioned” message a corporate blog might post, is it? By ignoring blogging, Pizza Hut has allowed this concerned employee to be their top spokesperson. Such is the danger of ignoring the social media as a marketing tool.