Papa Murphy's Rolls Out Digital Ordering Platform

Take-and-bake pizza brand Papa Murphy’s Holdings Inc. is making good on its two-pillar approach to improve operations and sales.

The Vancouver, Wash.-based pizza company moved over to the olo.com digital ordering platform. 

In an earnings call with analysts, CEO Weldon Spangler said the move is “a foundational step to improving consumer convenience and providing an online ordering system that our franchise owners can get behind as a key tool to drive their business.”

Spangler says the platform provides “a seamless user experience for both customers and franchise owners.” Papa Murphy’s already had a chance to “pressure test” the system with two separate events subsequent to the full migration, Pi Day and Love at 425 Day.

These April events drove online mix of total transactions at participating stores to 51% and 37%, respectively, and “the system performed great,” Spangler said. 

The company’s new website is also seeing higher conversion rates, “which means we are turning more site visitors into pizza buyers,” Spangler said.

“Overall, we now have a stable online ordering platform that we are confident and can support our business needs. As such, we will aggressively push more of our business online, and we'll be looking at store layout and design to ensure our stores are supporting the needs of the operation.”

With the online ordering working as it should, Papa Murphy’s is moving ahead with other initiatives designed to improve the customer experience and operational efficiencies such as expanding home delivery.

“The transition to the olo.com platform also allows us to accelerate our delivery initiatives, a key component of improved convenience and relevance,” Spangler said. “… It's pretty simple. Pizza just tastes better when it's fresh out of the oven. And because our customer gets to bake our award-winning pie at home, the quality of our product doesn't degrade as it sweats in a warming bag. Our consumers get the same high-quality, great-tasting pizza, whether they pick it up themselves in store or have it delivered.”

Nearly a quarter of 1,500 locations have delivery capabilities through Amazon Restaurants, Grubhub, DoorDash, Uber Eats, City-Spree, Bite Squad and GrubSouth, an increase of nearly 120 stores since the beginning of the year. “We will aggressively expand our delivery footprint and expect to offer delivery in about half of our stores by year-end.”

Also in the pipeline is a mobile app relaunch, expected in the second half of the year, and a loyalty program is being investigated.

To help communicate Papa Muphy’s new initiatives, the company has signed on a new creative agency and that messaging, which emphasizes the benefits of DIY, will push out later this year. 

“We believe this positioning will improve our relevance to our existing customer base, as well as a new set of younger consumers,” Spangler said.