Just got off the phone from the top TV station in Australia regarding their Current Affairs program which airs straight after the 6pm major news show.
I wrote to them sometime ago suggesting they do a segment on the escallting price of cheese, but heard nothing until today.
They are doing a segment on the rising cost of food and want to include non grocery outlets as well and have asked me if I want to be part of it. It took the whole part of 1 micro second to say yes.
They are coming to our store next Wednesday at 9am and are inteviewing me on the price increases we have experienced and how it is affecting costs and profits etc.
The only down side is that they want us to open at 9am and cook pizzas as if we were operating. Oh so Hollywood.
This is a great exposure opportunity for us and may lead to another segment about the size of Domino’s and Eagle Boys (remember the posts just prior to Christmas) but now including the value from the Independents - ME.
I will kep you posted on what transpires and will download the clip when it goes to air.
You may want to turn it into a marketing thing…why not just really open at nine. If you have a database send out invites. May or may not work but you could at least have some people sitting at the tables.
I’ve got half the staff at the shopping centre we are in coming in for free pizzas that I will be cooking up.
The program wants to film me making pizzas and baking / cooking them, plus they want some for themselves, so I thought while I’m at it why not bake up a whole bunch and give them away to whoever passes the shop. With TV cameras etc it is sure to gather a crowd.
All my staff want to come in hoping they will be on TV.
May we assume you are getting a make up artist and an agent now? Will you still be posting on the Think Tank when you are a star? It is important to remember your roots. Good Luck! Should be a great opportunity. Great idea on feeding the center and drawing a crowd. A crowd should generate some good energy.
We had somebody in our area many years ago who went through this. On Sunday morning there was a significant mention of them in the area newspaper. He opened at 11 a.m. and virtually our of food by mid afternoon. His business went up astronomically for the next 30 days. I would think that the only thing you would have to do is take care of the business after that but this guy got a big head, raised prices and stopped working his restaurant as hard, etc. He lost all the benefits of the big push. Have not checked for a long time but I suspect he is not even in business now.
No amount of make up would mask my ugly mush, and there is no way I would be paying 20% to any agent. It would be just like having a franchise.
There is no way I would ever get a big head etc as I am in way too much debt (business loan) to let anything slip, plus I have sales goals to achieve and my target is some way off yet. Plus I would never hear the end of it from Nick.
The only downside I see is that we get so much extra business that we will struggle to meet demand up until we get our new lease in place when we can then put in the secong oven and new prep bench and POS.
Debt really is a great motivator is it not? Been there and done that a few times. I think most of us work better under pressure when we know that we have to perform or else. The debt has to be repaid and mouths have to be fed. I know this has been said a million times but it is so true, that we learn more from these very difficult situations. Many, many years ago I opened my first restaurant (part of a very successful chain) and it turned out to the the slowest unit they had ever opened. I was in debt and sitting on a potentially big failure. So we jettisoned all unnecessary personnel and I went to a 7 day a week schedule for a year working double shifts all the while. It was very scary then. Now I look back on that year as one of my very best learning experiences. I have never forgotten the lessons I learned in that first year.
How I wish that some t.v. station had wanted to come to my restaurant during those times. No matter what you should get a boost from the exposure. You have to figure that there are going to be a large number of completely new potential customers visiting your business. I think you are really smart in deciding to put out some free pizzas to attract a crowd. The numbers of people, the energy, the talk around town; I will bet it will be great. Anxious to hear how it all comes out for you. I will bet that Nick will be watching closely as well.
I was in the shop just after 8am and they rolled up at 9.15am. We had to wait a while for the oven to switch off as they couldn’t have any noise.
Heaps of interviewing done with some really good leading questions which not only allowed me to talk about the huge price increases of late, but also sell ourselves on how we won’t lower our quality by saving a few bucks buying cheaper ingredients. I pushed the fact that we are absorbing the increases to the tune of around $700 per week so as to maintain our quality and stated we will not compromise it for cheaper ingredients.
They had me make some pizzas which was filmed. One good one was putting a heap of cheese on a plate, as well as the same with pineapple and ham on other plates and having me tallk about the cost increase % wise of each (these products used because Hawiian is the biggest selling pizza in Australia) and how much it has eroded into our profits.
They did some good shots of pizzas coming out of the oven and of me cutting them. I must say the ones we put through the oven were particularly great looking, plus the TV crew loved them.
All in all they were there for 2 1/2 hours but will probably be edited down to about 90 seconds or so, but any exposure is good exposure.
It goes to air next Monday so as soon as I can I will download the take.
We baked off around 15 pizzas to give away and as tastings in the shopping centre we are in and this went down well.
I hope it makes good points for you on many levels.
Especially you independants who have such awesome pies and have to take such hits to stay even marginally competitive price-wise.
My dream is to be an Indie some day, too…so even though I’m “just a PJ cook” right now, don’t think I don’t share the same passion as you kind folks for your Indie operations.
Hey PJ Girl, do I remember you saying you are in OK? How far from AR? I’m in a small town Decatur AR. Working on opening a shop in late April. Just wanted to say hi and I agree with pretty much most of what you post.
Opening shop is exciting and scarey at the same time…but, I love making pie and feeding folks! You’ll get there!
Sorry I didn’t get to read this until today, but if anyone else is going to be doing a bit with local TV, try this: A few years back, I was interviewed about rising prices and it’s effect on my business (in this case it was natural gas prices). I suggested making them a “Pie Chart”. I made up a pizza and had them film me cutting out about a quarter (labor), another piece (about 1/3 the pie) for CGS, and so on through the other expenses until there was only one small piece (a bit less than 10%) left. that was my “piece of the pie”. Then I explained that the only way for me to keep from making my slice from getting too small was to increase prices by a small amount. It was a great visual for the story.
NY Pizza that is the best thing I have seen to show how costs take their toll on profit. I think I will use that when my customers complain about the price increase that just happened.
NYPizza, you’ve got a real winner there. I’m going to get Excel working on that pie chart. I just have to figure uot how to produce a pizza graphic over top of the pie chart.
I LOVE this . . . general public love visual displays . . . bar graphs and pie charts are reputed the most clear and easily understood by the ‘masses’. You scored with this one!
[quote=“NicksPizza”]
NYPizza, you’ve got a real winner there. I’m going to get Excel working on that pie chart. I just have to figure uot how to produce a pizza graphic over top of the pie chart.
quote]
I hear you do really well with colouring competitions …
Well, this thread inspired me to get off my lazy duff (figuratively, since I remained firmly on my duff literally - but I digress lol). This afternoon I wrote emails to all the local TV stations in Denver suggesting that they run a news piece on how the rising cost of flour and cheese is going to affect the price of pizza - a product that around 90% of their viewers regularly consume, and my willingness, as a local pizza shop owner, to be interviewed at my shop for the piece. 2 of the 4 have already emailed me back saying that they think it’s a great idea & would like to set something up!
Pretty much every station has a web site where you can email in story suggestions - I’d suggest to anyone here who’s not overly camera shy to try the same thing.
If anyone here can tutor me on how to post a video on youTube, I’ll try to get the segment up there & provide a link.
Just a couple of tips for anyone thinking about doing this.
Get all the information you can about what you will be talking about. Know what you are going to talk about. Prepare yourself and then prepare yourself more.
Prepare a brief and learn it by heart so you can expand on it
Research media reports and quote situations that make your comments reliable and feasable.
Make a list of % increases per item and send it to the media before the interview date. This gives them something to start with that you are familiar with.
Present yourself in a manner (neat and tidy, fresh uniform or logo shirt) that does justice to yourself. You need to put yourself forward in a manner that shows you are a respectable and reliable person.
Take control before going to air by briefing the reporter/interviewer so you dictake the questions to be asked, or at least helf define the manner of the interview
If you stuff up then ask them to re-shoot that part of it.
As far as ours went well I must admit it came across very good. We were included in a segment that included the president of the independent Grocers association, an independent bakery/bread shop and ourselves. Tyhis was also backed up by spokespeople for the Australian Wheat Board and a motoring association (re bio-fuels from the corn growing in USA which is putting strains on wheat and livestock production).
I would have been happy with 1 or 2 minutes airtime but it ended up around 3 - 4 minutes of me talking about prices, showing me making pizzas and cutting them plus a great piece showing specific price increases.
They cut back to me on a number of occassions, so as far as exposure was concerned I couldn’t be happier (yeah, I could really ).
The only down side was that they stuffed up our name by saying “David Waterman’s pizza outlet, Pizzazz” instead of saying Pizza Pizzazz Currambine which is our trading name. None the less we got mentioned.
As soon as I get a DVD copy of the episode from the TV station I will post it so you guys and ladies can see my ugly mush. You never know I may get asked to star in a horror movie. :lol:
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