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 Pizza - November/October 2007  |
Pizza with Pizzazz
Fresh or frozen, rising crust or thin crust, plain and simple or strange and exotic–it’s hot. And one New England chain has its own pizzeria! “A rolled edge Italian crust, 4 real cheeses and your family’s favorite toppings. Ready to heat and eat in 20 minutes.” The message is getting around about Safeway Signature fresh pizzas, in store placards, ad circulars and the Internet. “Enjoy pizzeria pizza fresh from the oven in 20 minutes or less,” adds a message on packaging for the line, which also stresses that the pizzas have self-rising crusts-a major selling point for frozen pizza these days-and doesn’t spare adjectives for the toppings. These are really big pizzas–more than three pounds each–and retail for $7.99 at supermarkets that are part of the Safeway, Pleasanton, CA, family. Introduced just a couple of months ago, they come in Five Cheese, Sausage, Pepperoni and Supreme varieties. Refrigerated pizza sales were up 60% to $10.5 million for the 52 weeks ended 9/9/2007, according to Information Resources, Inc. (IRI), Chicago, IL, with overall sales up 23% to $56.3 million. But that may not count pizzas actually produced in-store–Safeway’s are “previously handled frozen for your protection.” And it certainly doesn’t count Wal-Mart, Bentonville, AR. The discount giant offers 16-inch fresh cheese and pepperoni pizzas under the Wal-Mart Deli brand for $6.98, packed in rather plain boxes not unlike those Safeway used for Milena’s–a brand that has since been replaced by Signature. But Wal-Mart is also using the same kind of packaging and the same slogan (“Take It & Bake It.”)–only under the Sam’s Choice Deli brand–for eight-inch S’mores dessert pizzas, at $2.98, with milk chocolate, chocolate syrup, graham crackers and marshmallows on a dessert pastry crust. Frozen pizza sales in private label dwarf refrigerated, at $197.1 million over the past year, according to IRI. But they were off 2.2% whereas the category as a whole was up six percent. This is despite the fact that major chains aggressively target the leading brands, DiGiorgio and Tombstone. But there are other brands out there now, and more specialty pizzas competing for freezer space. One new target: brick oven-style square pizzas, as at Giant Eagle, Pittsburgh, PA. At the other extreme from the huge fresh pizzas at Safeway and Wal-Mart are mini-pizzas marketed as appetizers. Under the Central Market Classics Solution banner, Price Chopper, Schenectady, NY, offers pepperoni mini-pizzas 12 to an 8 oz box at $2.99. The same premium brand is used for offbeat full-size pizzas like Spinach & Pesto at $5.19–the same as for rising crust pizzas under the Price Chopper Premio brand. Frozen pizzas aren’t usually sourced in Italy, but one exception is a woodfired stone-baked Apple & Gorgonzola Cheese variety under the Private Selection brand at Kroger, Cincinnati, OH. Part of a $5.29 line that also includes thin crust BBQ Flavored Chicken, Grilled Chicken Caesar and Margherita, it comes with a fat on-pack magilla: Savor authentic Italian flavor with Private Selection Woodfired Pizza. Each Pizza is crafted in Modena, Italy, with premium hand-placed Mediterrganean ingredients atop a hand-stretched crust made of wheat grown in Puglia, “Italy’s Breadbasket.” Private Selection Woodfired Pizza is stone baked, delivering restaurant quality straight from your freezer. And it’s ready in just eight to ten minutes. Under the Kroger brand, the number one supermarket operator touches the other category bases: self-rising crust pizza in Four Cheese, Three Meat, Pepperoni and Supreme varieties at $3.99, versus $5.48 for DiGiorno; and Kroger Deluxe in Supreme, Pepperoni, Extra Cheese and Sausage & Pepperoni at $3.29 versus $3.85 for Tombstone. There are also family-size fresh pizzas under the Angelino’s brand at $6.99 in the deli department. Mainstream retailers have gotten into organic pizza. One example is Nature’s Place Mediterranean Style at Hannaford, Scarborough, ME, a 10-inch pizza topped with tomatoes, onions, mushrooms, roasted eggplant and black olives. Also part of the Nature’s Place line, priced at $5.99, is Spinach & Feta–conventional pizzas are only $3.99. As you might expect, Trader Joe’s, Monrovia, CA, has come up with some strange pizzas, including Pesto (13.3 oz, $4.69), BBQ Chicken (13 oz, $2.99) and even 400g Formaggio di Capra (goat cheese, $4.29). But perhaps the strangest is Philly Cheesesteak. “Sometimes you just get the hankering for something simple, something comforting. Like pizza or cheesesteak,” the chain says in its Fearless Flyer. “We considered this and thought, why limit ourselves to one? We’ve combined our two loves into one doubly comforting pizza. “Not unlike Rocky Balboa, this pizza has integrity and character. We’ve topped this pizza with thinly sliced and seasoned USDA Choice roast beef, roasted onions, red and yellow peppers and four savory cheeses-pepper Jack, provolone, mozzarella and imported Parmesan. It’s like the Philly cheesesteak sandwich you remember, but on a pizza.” But even Trader Joe’s doesn’t have its own pizzeria. Big Y, Springfield, MA, does–and makes a really big thing of it at the chain’s website. The New England retailer offers a range of frozen and fresh (in bubble top containers) Take & Bake pizzas, but that isn’t enough. Here’s how Big Y promotes its fresh Authentic Pizza Shop “Pizza Any Way You Like It:” Our pizza is out of this world! Here’s how we do it... We mix our dough fresh daily, and we never freeze it. We then top it off with our sauce that comes from tomatoes that are grown specifically for Big Y. The tomatoes from our fields are packed within 4 hours of being picked. The manufacturer, Stanislaus, strives to minimize cooking temperaures and can the tomatoes as fast as possible to produce a “fresh” tasting sauce! Whole milk mozzarella in a secret blend comes next to bring you one of the highest quality toppings available. Top this off with one of our fresh toppings such as sweet sausage or tangy pepperoni and you’ll taste the best pizza around. Sauce! Our Sauce Comes from tomatoes that are specifically grown for Big Y. The tomatoes from our fields are packed within 4 hours of being picked. Last year we topped our hand made pizzas with over 250,000 gallons (that is 3,981,600 oz!) of our special sauce! Our sauce is also sold separately in our pizza shops! Dough! Our dough is mixed fresh daily in our Pizza Shops, it is never frozen! Fresh dough is also sold separately in our Pizza Shops. If you have never used fresh dough before, please talk to our staff, they will be happy to demonstrate dough handling. Recommended suppliers
Products described or shown in this article are not necessarily available from these suppliers. For more suppliers see current Private Label Directory & Buyer’s Guide. |
