Pizza franchise launches moped fleet to grab bigger slice of urban market

CITY CONGESTION is the enemy of a piping hot pizza, which is why the expanding Four Star pizza delivery franchise is launching a new fleet of mopeds next month.

"We're going to have bespoke delivery bikes in Dublin, Cork and Galway to allow us to cut through the traffic," says Jason Sheehy, managing director of the chain, which is opening six new stores over the next four months and aims to double its store numbers in Ireland over the next few years.

Only 20 per cent of the business is carry-out. "The way the traffic has gone in Dublin, it could take you half an hour to travel two or three miles," he says. And, as everyone knows, a reheated pizza can be a soggy, disappointing affair.

Irish people's hunger for pepperoni-strewn 16-inchers, the distinctly un-Hawaiian ham-and-pineapple variety or indeed pizza of any kind is seemingly insatiable.

Four Star's 31 Irish stores sit alongside an even greater number of outlets of Domino's, Apache and Godfather's, the chain that is being taken over by the mammoth Pizza Hut: that's more pizza than even Joey from Friendscould devour. Not so long ago, Domino's identified its store in Tallaght as having the highest turnover of all of its UK and Ireland stores.

Four Star Pizza had sales of more than €20 million in Ireland in 2007, but even more encouraging for Sheehy is the fact that sales in the first quarter of 2008 have been up 10 per cent year-on-year. Traditionally, the start of the year is quiet on the pizza front.

Mopeds aside, online ordering is swiftly becoming the most exciting item on the menu because it increases the value of the average order (around €18).

"People tend to buy extra side orders or ice-cream when they're ordering online. We think it will account for 20 per cent of the business in five years' time," says Sheehy, who has recently returned from the mouth-watering World Pizza Fair in Las Vegas.

Sheehy will soon oversee the opening of new Four Stars in Ranelagh, Finglas, Swords, Midleton, Navan and Mullingar. Another eight stores are at the planning stage and will open in 2009.

"Our expansion plan now is to focus on the North, because we are finding that properties are relatively easy to come by there. We're looking for a rent that reflects a fair return for the franchisee over the long term."

The once "aggressive, and in some cases excessive" high rents in the Republic have softened, but margins have been under pressure from the dramatic rise in the cost of ingredients such as flour, mozzarella cheese and meat toppings.

"It seems that raw material costs are starting to stabilise now," he says. "Putting up prices is something we would do reluctantly."