Making up for lost time

Papa John's will need significant localisation for a successful comeback

- Christina Moniz

Marketers need to know what their customers want. That is hygiene.

Today, that's not as simple as deploying a standard make-my-persona template and considering the job done. The customers' needs and wants are in a state of constant flux.

And if you are a brand that has vacated its space for eight long years, you have a lot of catching up to do. As a first step, you would be required to reconnect with your customers, and also subscribers and followers, as personally as possible. It is no longer about making a great pizza or putting it on the table piping hot.

The world's third-largest pizza delivery company Papa John's, which is plotting a comeback in less than two months, will meet a vastly different market from the one it exited in 2017 citing underperformance.

Apart from the two category leaders—Domino's Pizza and Pizza Hut that together account for over half of the ₹15,000-crore organised pizza market—there are local heavyweights such as US Pizza, Uncle Sam's, Smoking Joe's and La Pinoz fighting for a share of the pie.

Besides having a head start, the incumbents also benefit from their localised menu and a strong tech-enabled delivery backbone. Their large scale also allows their networks to benefit from centralised spending on technology.