Toppers Pizza featured in Fort Worth Star-Telegram

Toppers Pizza was recently featured in an article called “Franchising moving ahead again, after slump during recession" in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. The article focuses on franchising as a whole and the recent increase in franchises throughout the Fort Worth area. Toppers Pizza franchisees Heidi and Jim McGregor were highlighted in the article as great examples of entrepreneurs bringing new concepts to the Fort Worth area and Scott Gittrich, CEO, was also featured along with a fantastic picture of Heidi and Jim. The article will be a good way to promote the new opening of Toppers Pizza in Fort Worth as well as build awareness of the brand throughout the area. Click here for the full article, or begin reading below.

Franchising moving ahead again, after slump during recession
by Scott Nishimura

Heidi McGregor sells medical equipment, and her husband, Jim, owns an ambulance dealership in Fort Worth. On the road extensively, they were looking for another business to develop.

They settled on a pizza franchise, buying the rights to the first two Toppers Pizza franchise restaurants in Texas.

This summer, the McGregors, who live near Texas Christian University, plan to open their first restaurant nearby at the former site of the Moon Bar on West Berry Street, just in time for the return of students. And they're scouting the burgeoning West Seventh Street-Camp Bowie Boulevard area for the second.

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Toppers featured in Chicago Tribune

Toppers was recently featured in the Chicago Tribune. The article, written by Erin Chan Ding gives a comprehensive overview of the Toppers Pizza chain, including its college-aged demographic, menu items, company sales, number of locations and even how much it costs to invest in a franchise. The article goes on to profile Greektown owner Robin Pearce. It also includes perspective from a pizza customer and a local pizza store owner. It includes quotes from Pearce, president Scott Gittrich and director of franchise development Scott Iversen. A portion of the article is included below and can be read in its entirety by clicking here.
Chain bets on Chicago's pizza appetite
Wisconsin-based Toppers enters city with Greektown location, plans more

In a formerly empty Greektown storefront, one of Chicago's newest pizza places opens Saturday, serving up a cheeky attitude, laid-back decor and quirky fare aimed at pleasing the college kids and 20-somethings it's aiming to attract.

Slogans for Toppers Pizza dot the windows, declaring: "Spank Your Buds" and "Bad Pizza Sucks.'' Its menu says, "For a Free Taste of Big-Chain Pizza Just Eat the Cardboard Under Ours."

"Yeah, we're kind of sophomoric," said Scott Gittrich, president of Toppers Pizza Inc., a chain based in Whitewater, Wis. "We talk smack with our customers. We talk smack with each other. We've just always been like that."

Reveling in its own irreverence, Toppers has served its carb-laden food to Midwestern 18- to 24-year-olds for the past 20 years and now has big plans for more units here. But there's a big question to be answered: Can a place that sells mac-and-cheese or potato pizzas survive in a town known for its pizza prowess?

"The reason we think we can make it in Chicago and that we will make it is that there are several million proven pizza lovers in Chicago," said Gittrich, 48, who started Toppers in 1991. "We have a distinct place in the market. We don't do it the way other people do it. The way we talk to our customer, our menu, the way we interact with our customer is simply different."

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Toppers Featured in Franchising World Magazine

Scott Iversen, Director of Marketing for Toppers Pizza, was featured in this month’s edition of Franchising World in an article he wrote called “Using Foursquare to Drive Sales for Franchisees. In the article, Iversen discusses best practices for businesses to become involved in using Foursquare. View the full article below: