rebranding, the "hut" syfi and more

how much did it cost, is it cost effective, does anybody care?

not sure I understand the question.

Pizza Hut is re-branding to simply “The Hut” to distinguish themselves from selling more than just Pizza. Also, take out/delivery pizza business is down because of the economy with people going for frozen box pizza or making their own. I think it’s stupid because people are cutting back on eating out across the board, so it doesn’t make much difference. I also think it knocks the franchise down a notch in perception of quality.

Here is an image of “The Hut”
061909-003-thehut.png

Why would I buy pasta or subs from “The Hut”?

Last I knew when you read 5 books you got a free personal pan pizza. Then you got a star on your button. Most stars wins at recess.

That’s the last time I ate at Pizza Hut.

We used to call it Pizza Slut… original I know… the only ones making out in these things have to be the consultants…

Pizzeria Uno also just switched to UNO’s… useless.

could be the less is more thing, my prediction is GM will re brand to be just G or M (at a cost of 12 million dollars in media consultants).

HAHAHAAHA That is awesome.

I have seen a growing trend with a lot brands but especially food that these companies are thinking that they need to rebrand or create a new image to survive in this economy. I don’t know if it is because they feel this is the beginning of new times or like so many other thing not that it is time for change.

With the rebranding of the “Hut” I think it is a complete disconnect from their brand. "The Hut’ tells me nothing. If you really think about the name “Pizza Hut” the main descriptor in that name is Pizza not hut. Why would you take this part out of your name? I understand they are trying to serve more than just pizza, but The Hut does not get me anywhere close to telling me this is a place for pasta and bread sticks. Not only that but who has ever called Pizza Hut the Hut. If this was a popular name kind of like Mickey D’s for McDonalds than I could understand, but it is not and I think it does nothing but confuse their customer.

One interesting piece of knowledge is that Pepsi owns them. I wonder if Mr. Arrnell had anything to do with this.

Wow I think this might be a record for the most times the word hut as ever been written in a post

Oh and the syfi rebrand is just plain stupid.

Up here the only Pizza huts are part of Taco bells, so I always just call it Taco Hut.

I’ll take my payment in cash, that will be $180,000. :laughing:

scab, undercutting the “union” :laughing: the fee 12 MILLION dollars (insert Dr. Evil laugh)

Why would I buy pasta or subs from “The Hut”?

Well you have to wait till they merge with Starbucks and get rebranded “Java the Hut” :slight_smile:

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I don’t mind The Hut. People will adopt it just like everything else, no need to be so literal. In fact I believe when being less literal and descriptive in the name makes a stronger brand in the long run, while the opposite sounds cheap and one trick ponyish. Being straight forward is good when entering new markets. I assume Pizza Hut are quite established internationally, and now want to be seen as more special and exclusive.

An example that sprung to mind (although not really the same thing, I’m aware of that) was Kentucky Fried Chicken, who many years ago officially became KFC. But then I went to wikipedia to read the following:


Starting in April 2007, the company began using its original name, Kentucky Fried Chicken, for its signage, packaging and advertisements in the United States as part of a new corporate re-branding program

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That’s a business I would support!

PackageID… Pizza Hut or The Hut is part of Yum!Brands (the world’s largest restaurant chain). I used to call them Ken-Taco-Hut, but now they’ve got A&W, and Long John Silvers.

Here’s a link explaining some of the reasoning for TheHut

http://www.idsgn.org/posts/pizza-the-hut/

Down towards the bottom there’s an update saying that its only a temporary marketing move, not a complete name change. That explains why Pizza Huts website is just the way it was a month ago.

In general i dont like it, but will it make a difference to me… no. Pizza slut (we call it that to yo, and their regional nemesis little sleazers) will be and always was my favorite take out pizza place.
I dont like it because unlike KFC, i never knew anyone who would call it “the hut”, whereas everyone called kentucky fried chicken kfc anyways so they just took what was given to them.

Although i agree engio that if it were a brand new chain that is makes sense not to be so literal, but they have been pizza hut for a long time.

I understand what they are saying in that idsgn link, and i understand about the texting, but they are giving themselves a nickname, which usually doesn’t go over well. The thing that worries me most is that they are talking about natural tomato sauce and whole grain crust… for one, i love the way their pizza tastes now, if it can taste just as good but be healthier than great, but what does that have to do with their name change? I dunno, some of this stuff just boggles my mind, i guess brands need to have hope in something.

It sounds like some geek kid trying to give himself a cool nickname. It doesn’t work like that. Pizza Hut is not cool enough where anyone is like “dude I’ll just meet you at the hut”, and I’d probably get it confused with the Sunglass Hut at the mall. Like someone said before, stuff like that has to come naturally from the public, you don’t give yourself a nickname, if you do it’s because nobody else has a connection with you enough to give you one, and then when someone’s referring to the new self-nicknamed person, nobody knows who they’re talking about!

Mention KFC in Japan and you’ll just get a blank stare in return. It’s known as Kentucky, despite the fact that KFC is the signage.

The Japanese are surprisingly bad at associating initials with names.

I think that’s an accurate assessment of the state of Kentucky.

In this case is Pizza Hut the equivalent of Ohio?