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BUSINESS:
FAST FOOD
Anything,
Anywhere
But
convenience is just one of the factors stoking the craze. Pizza is also
a unique fast food. In fact, it is not just a food. It's a meal. From
the time it was developed in the Italian island of Napoli as a "pie
topped with tomato sauce and cheese" some 150 years ago, the pizza
has transformed rapidly. Today's pizza is like a canvas on which anyone
could create a hearty meal. The pizza also easily adapts to the country
it goes to-something that the pizza chains in India are exploiting to
the hilt. So if butter chicken is what pizza has to battle with in Punjab,
no problems. Simply serve butter chicken pizza. For north India, Pizza
Hut has toppings like paneer tikka and Domino's, chana bhatura. The south
is being lured with mutton banghoora and chicken Chettinad. Ahmedabad
not only has a 100 per cent vegetarian Pizza Hut, the restaurant also
serves "Jain pizza"-a pizza without the forbidden vegetables
such as onion, garlic or potato.
Points out
Pawan Bhatia, CEO of Domino's: "One of the big draws of pizza is
that it caters to endless tastes. You don't have to choose between butter
chicken and pizza, you can have butter chicken pizza." Pizza chains
have also introduced multifarious toppings like pepperoni, barbecued chicken,
anchovies and jalapenos to suit different taste buds. Some of the toppings
are being imported from as far as Mexico and Australia.
The arrival
of pizza chains has not only expanded the market but prodded established
players like Nirula's into action. Nirula's has introduced a thick crust
pan pizza to compete with the deep-dish variety from Domino's. Says Managing
Director Deepak Nirula: "We are upgrading our quality and adding
flavours."
With competition
hotting up, price cuts, discounts and freebies are only natural. Six months
ago, Domino's slashed pizza prices by 40 per cent. The price of a regular
pizza with three toppings was cut from Rs 225 to Rs 130. Pizza Hut plans
to introduce a scheme called "barah nahin to tera (if not served
in 12 minutes, it's yours)". For those ordering from home, there
may be an extra deal. For every minute of late delivery Domino's customers
get a Rs 30 discount. Pizza Corner's variant of the same is free pizza
if delivered more than 39 minutes after placing the order.
Then there
is Pizza Pizza Express, a British chain with two restaurants in Delhi,
which is eyeing the upmarket clientele. Says Director Alok Modi: "We
sell pizza as a dining experience, not as fast food. We want to create
an ambience and a quality experience for the thin crust pizza." The
mode of operations too differs. While Pizza Corner and Pizza Hut prefer
the franchise route of growth, the route at Domino's is organic-it leases
its own outlets and employs its own people. The advantage in organic growth
for Domino's has been the control that it can exercise over quality. On
the other hand, franchising is a faster route to growth.
Delivery-oriented
pizza firms spend up to 20 per cent of their costs on training staff to
be efficient and courteous. Says Bhatia: "This is a service industry
and the pressure is on individual delivery. We have a company running
on the shoulders of 1,400 lads in their 20s."
Topping
it all is the advent of the consumerist era, fuelled in equal measure
by an explosion of the middle class and the invasion of satellite TV in
the 1990s. Only a decade ago, an ambitious chain of pizzerias called Pizza
King folded up within a few months of its launch in Delhi, Mumbai and
Bangalore. Today, Domino's is opening outlets in cities like Lucknow and
Kochi. And in Pizza Corner, India has a home-grown pizza chain rubbing
shoulders with MNCs. Explains Bakhache: "The similarities between
roti and pizza make the cultural barriers to a switchover lower than,
say, hamburger." His dream? To open a swadeshi pizzeria in Rome.
His rationale: "If we can have the possibility of an Italian as a
prime minister in India, surely we can also dream of an Indian pizza joint
in Italy."
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The
Government should encash at least a part of its stake in LIC and GIC before
its too late, suggests INDIA TODAY associate Editor V. Shankar Aiyar
in 
