How pizza brands are battling it out for a larger market share

The Quick Service Restaurant (QSR) pizza segment is currently engaged in a high-stakes, multi-front battle defined by intense focus on technological advancement, value propositions, and sweeping brand overhauls. Players like Domino's, Pizza Hut, and Papa John's are employing digital and creative strategies to capture consumer spending, which is increasingly focused on convenience and price.

In India, Domino’s reported an 18.8% rise in revenue, supported by order growth of 24.6%. The brand’s like-for-like (LFL) sales grew 12.1%, led by a 21.9% increase in delivery LFL. The company said delivery revenue rose 27.1%, with deliveries now accounting for 72.9% of total sales.

Meanwhile, Devyani International, which operates KFC and Pizza Hut in India, reported a net loss of Rs 21.9 crore for the September quarter, compared with a profit of Rs 1.7 lakh a year earlier, citing weaker demand across its portfolio.

As we look at the global picture, performance indicators from the beginning of 2025 highlight a clear gap between the market leader and its main rivals. Domino's reported sustained momentum, achieving U.S. same-store sales growth of 5.2% in Q3 for FY2025. 

Pizza Hut, on the other hand, faced difficulty, reporting a 1% decline in U.S. same-store sales in Q3 2025.

Papa Johns North America comparable sales decreased 3% year-on-year. The brand’s most recent available figures also show North American same-store sales were still down 1.9% year-over-year in Q2 2025.

Privately held Little Caesars doesn’t report such results.

Domino’s ranks 10th in the 2025 Technomic Top 500 Chain Restaurant Report (estimated $9.5 billion in U.S. sales in 2024). Pizza Hut is 14th (2024 sales of $5.5 billion); Little Caesars ranked 22nd (estimated $4.4 billion) and Papa Johns came in 31st (estimated $3.7 billion).

On the other hand, the value war is being fought directly through loyalty program architecture and high-visibility promotions. Domino’s engineered a strategic advantage through promotional activities, including the Emergency Pizza offer, which gave qualifying customers a free pizza after an online or carryout order of $7.99 or more. The brand renewed the offer in 2024, which was originally launched in 2023.

Papa John’s reacted to these pressures by revamping its Papa Rewards program in late 2024 to enable customers to unlock rewards faster, a move that helped the brand add 2.7 million new loyalty accounts since the program was revamped in November last year.

Little Caesars, meanwhile, continues to amplify its core Pizza! Pizza! value proposition, leveraging its status as the NFL’s Official Pizza Sponsor to drive large-scale, co-branded campaigns.

Beneath the value competition, a technology arms race is intensifying. Domino’s established the competitive standard years ago by transforming its identity into ‘a tech company that sells pizza,’ with innovations like the Pizza Tracker and the ability to order across various digital devices.

Facing sales declines through 2024 and Q2 2025, Papa John’s has responded with a technological counter-offensive, announcing a strategic partnership with Google Cloud to integrate advanced Artificial Intelligence (AI) and machine learning. The goals of this large investment are ambitious: to enable AI to proactively suggest personalised orders via push notifications, dynamically adjust digital promotions based on user history, and streamline store operations through cloud-based point-of-sale systems. This represents a shift from focusing on digital convenience to utilising AI for digital prediction, aiming to tailor the purchasing experience before the customer even begins an order.

Concurrent with these shifts, two brands have undertaken brand identity overhauls.

In October 2025, while already enjoying market growth, Domino’s launched its first brand refresh in 13 years, a proactive move designed to future-proof its image and appeal to younger demographics. The refresh introduced a brighter colour palette, a new typeface, and an auditory component called a ‘cravemark’, a new jingle, ‘Dommmino’s ’, voiced by singer-songwriter Shaboozey, intended to reinforce ‘craveability’ across all digital and physical touchpoints.

Conversely, Pizza Hut’s shifts appear more reactive and centred on product differentiation. The brand rolled out a refreshed, all-red, italicised global logo and pivoted toward ‘edgier, culture-first marketing’ through its Adultzz Only campaign. This creative strategy was exemplified by a high-profile partnership with artist Anderson Park to launch the Crafted Flatzz menu item.

Domino’s, which once avoided third-party delivery apps, has changed its approach. The chain joined DoorDash’s marketplace earlier this year, following a 2023 partnership with Uber Eats. The DoorDash deal allows the chain to reach new customers while still using its own delivery drivers. The company reported a 2.5% year-over-year rise in deliveries for the third quarter, partly due to DoorDash. However, its carryout business saw even stronger growth, up 8.7% during the same period. Domino’s continues to push a strong value message with offers like its ‘Best Deal Ever,’ which lets customers order any pizza with any toppings for $9.99 online.

Pizza Hut is also expanding its delivery capabilities through Byte, Yum Brands’ in-house ordering platform that connects with third-party delivery apps. Launched in the second quarter, Byte is now being rolled out across U.S. Pizza Hut locations.

Meanwhile, Little Caesars is focusing on Gen Z consumers through its fourth-year NFL partnership. Its ads use playful, absurd humour, featuring players George Kittle and Saquon Barkley riding a ‘Deal Deer’, to highlight its value offerings. The brand is also extending its collaboration with the Call of Duty video game for the fourth year, introducing a limited-edition player skin.

These strategic redirections are being supported by significant financial investment and agency realignments to ensure message cohesion.

Both Papa John’s and Pizza Hut are reassessing their marketing strategies with recent changes in their advertising partners.

Pizza Hut has moved on from Interpublic Group’s Deutsch, which had only taken over as its lead creative agency last year. Meanwhile, Papa John’s is currently looking for a new creative partner after ending its association with The Martin Agency, a decision the company confirmed in early October. The agency review comes nearly a year after Jenna Bromberg took charge as chief marketing officer at Papa John’s.

Little Caesars demonstrated the power of media investment by appointing Mediahub to manage its U.S. media strategy in October 2024, an appointment that coincided with the brand’s substantial financial commitment of $138 million in U.S. media spending in the first half of 2024 alone.

The competitive pressure is forcing competitor chains to allocate substantial capital toward transformation and marketing amplification to ensure they can compete with the deep-seated digital advantage held by the industry leader.