Direct Menu Mail Strategy?

[system]

Royce I hear you on that one. Way back in the day when I delivered in HS…we lived in a small town that had 3000 peeps and a giant lake/res that split the whole area. It was a 30+ mile round trip to the far side and yes you tried to take multiple orders but you always got another after you were out the door. Gas was only $0.99 a gallon and my car got 32mpg…add the $2 delivery fee and tips of $3-5 for the long drive it was worth it back then. As far a the shop making money…makes me wonder. A large pizza with sticks back then was $10-12. I made minimum wage… $4 or so. So thats 20% of the sale just in delivery labor. I guess it all averages out in the end. I wonder what they charge for it these days???

 

[NYFLPizza]

royster13:

When you run a delivery 7 or 8 miles, are you actually making any money or just creating cash flow?..

I can see why you’d think this, but even with being a bit of a hike, I don’t think it hinders other deliveries to the point where we may lose customers because of a longer wait time. We do our best to keep the average time around 30-45 minutes. We don’t do a ton of deliveries so I never staff more than two drivers and they’re almost always able to handle things. When things start to get hectic, I make sure that the dish guy can run a delivery if necessary. Heck, I’ve even had my wife run a delivery to make sure we keep times where we promised

 

[Rick_G]

I think his point was that with an 8 mile one way you are looking at dedicating roughly 25-35 min of labor to the delivery of that order so you subtract a half hour of whatever you pay your driver right off the top of that order.

 

[vernonpurcell]

Roger:

I definitely wouldn’t do all 20,000 at once. That would be a service nightmare! I generally get a 5% return on my mailings and I do 1,500-2,000 a week. I couldn’t imagine sending out 20,000 at one time. There’s no way I would be able to handle an additional 1,000 orders in one week. Like mentioned above, consistency is key. Keep doing them week after week. Some weeks will be better than others but keep at it and you will see your business grow. Good luck!

Hi Roger.
I am involved in a flyer distribution company and have a passion to start my own pizza store.Which I now have my store space.
The figure you are quoting is a 5% return so how many orders would you recive from your 1,500 - 2,000 a week. It may seem like I am asking a dumb question, but some people mis place the decimal point.

 

[bennyspizza]

royster13:

When you run a delivery 7 or 8 miles, are you actually making any money or just creating cash flow?..

we charge a dollar a mile one way.I think delivery is a convenience,so they pay me for the driver to take it to them ,and for the pizza.I wouldnt consider going that far for our $2 delivery fee.

 

[Roger]

vernonpurcell:

Roger:

I definitely wouldn’t do all 20,000 at once. That would be a service nightmare! I generally get a 5% return on my mailings and I do 1,500-2,000 a week. I couldn’t imagine sending out 20,000 at one time. There’s no way I would be able to handle an additional 1,000 orders in one week. Like mentioned above, consistency is key. Keep doing them week after week. Some weeks will be better than others but keep at it and you will see your business grow. Good luck!

Hi Roger.
I am involved in a flyer distribution company and have a passion to start my own pizza store.Which I now have my store space.
The figure you are quoting is a 5% return so how many orders would you recive from your 1,500 - 2,000 a week. It may seem like I am asking a dumb question, but some people mis place the decimal point.

vernonpurcell,

Say I mail out 1,500 flyers with coupons, on average I will get around 75 orders. It’s not always the case but about the average. There are some weeks where I may only get around 30 coupons back (2%) but others where I do even better than 5%.

 

[RobT]

Frequency is the key. You need to send numerous times to get the phone to ring and maximize the response.

 

[royster13]

And I think frequency is a better investment than discounts…Panago a chain in Canada changes up the front of their menu 8+ times a year to keep it fresh…

 

[vernonpurcell]

I am starting from square one, so I will put out 15-17,000 for the first six week, then drop down to 10k a week. I have a flyer distribution company that can deliver 60k a week without any cost to me. Before I do this I was just wandering I could expect from a programme like this, bearing in mind the cost will be zero for me, as I have other flyers already going to these address.
Any ideas on the results from a programme like this.

 

[royster13]

Vernon how large is your market area?..You should divide it into 6 or 7 sections and do 1 section each week and repeat…Never a good idea to drop all at the same time…Also it may be a good idea to miss weeks with holidays…

 

[vernonpurcell]

Hi Royster13
The post office say there are 50 k homes, but maybe I only get to do about 42k due to the fact that we do not get into security appartments. What would a dominos do when first launch a store?

 

[royster13]

Dominos would probably do everything 2 or 3 times very quickly early on…But I do not think that is a good strategy for an indy…Are you just opening?..Are you an indy?..Different type of operations need different plans…

 

[vernonpurcell]

Hi royster13
Yes I am an indy, I will be competing with the national chains, most indys only rely on passing trade, and a lot of them are so gruby,they sell low quality products, so their takings are not like the nationals,my first store is going to rely on home delivery, thats why I will concentrate on the flyer delivery to start with. But unsure with the results I could achive 5% make me shiver. Pizza Hut charge 7.99, 9.99 & 11.99 for a cheese & tomato, while at the other end 9.99, 13.99 and 15.99, all of these are buy one get one free. 11.66 being the average cost across the board. Leaflet drop for 5 days @ 2,500 per day @ 5 sales per 100 =125 sales X average price 11.66 1457.5 X 5 days = 7287.00 =7days a week 7287.00 divide by 7 days = 1041.07 per day.
These figure seen too easy to achive, am I not seeing something, mabye.

 

[pizzasam]

@vernon - I gather from another thread you are a fellow Brit. If you intend to start a pizza store in the UK you will find a 5% return rate is very high. Although I’m in no way expert yet, it is widely regarded a 1%-2% is about what you can expect, so you will need to find other ways to get infront to your target order.

 

[vernonpurcell]

Hi Pizzasam,
Yes I am a brit.
I think the results would be more like 0.5%, (1/2%) if I can achive this then I am on a winner, depending how many clients I can retain from the flyer drops.

We will be investing in new style heated delivery bags, that will keep the pizza to 65 degrees C,and our vans will be volountary inspected by the health department, before this becomes law.

We do you operate from?
Do you drop flyers , what is your return?