How Did Little Caesar's Become a Big Big Pizza Chain?

From their ready-to-go pies to their Detroit-style deep-dish-za

Little Caesar's Pizza has plenty of cheesy goodness to go around. With over 4,000 locations in the U.S. alone

the chain has become the worldwide king of cheap pizzas. Or should we say, the Caesar of cheap pizzas

Today, we're unboxing the history of Little Caesar's Pizza. Pizza, pizza. All roads may lead to Rome, but our Caesar got his start in Michigan

Mike Gillidge returned home to Detroit after four years in Hawaii with the U.S. Marine Corps

Prior to enlisting in the service, he'd been a star shortstop for the Cooley High School baseball team

And upon his return to civilian life, the Detroit Tigers had a contract waiting for him

You have to be a dazzling high school player for those particular stars to align

Most of us are lucky to have a job at the video store lined up. They offered him a $5,000 signing bonus to play second base for their minor league teams

For a time, everything seemed to be going great for Mike. He traveled the country as he played for the Jamestown Falcons

the Tampa Smokers, and the St. Petersburg Saints. Along the way, he met former Delta Airlines ticket agent Marion Bayoff on a blind date

She was four years his junior, and the two hit it off like cheesy bread and ranch dressing

And within just a few months, they were married. But shortly thereafter, tragedy struck

Mike injured his knee, and he had to retire from playing baseball for good

He suddenly needed a new life plan, and for a while, he worked odd jobs as a bartender and a door-to-door aluminum awning salesman

Really? Door-to-door awnings? That's an optimistic business model. How many of those do you expect to move

He and Marion managed to save up $10,000, and the two took their savings and went to Garden City

where they planned to spend every last cent on their very own restaurant

Mike wanted to call it Pizza Treat, but Marion objected. Correctly, that's, uh, boy, that's just an awful name

She insisted they name the restaurant after her personal nickname for Mike, Little Caesar

Generally speaking, if your wife gives you that nickname, it means you're kind of a jerk

Oh, Little Caesar, huh? Yeah, sure. But for the Illiches, it meant inspiration

The couple ultimately compromised on the name, and on May 8th, 1959

they opened the doors to the world's first ever Little Caesar's Pizza Treat restaurant

It was a clunky name for a future empire, but it was a start

On their very first day in business, they sold a whopping 49 pies

That's a lot of pizza. Really, it's almost too much pizza, if such a thing existed

By the end of their first week, they'd sold 296, roughly 40 pizzas each day

Apparently, the people of Garden City loved it so much that Little Caesars opened its second location just three years later

Seven years after that, they opened up their 50th. It was truly becoming the Hadrian's Wall of Pizza Chains

As Little Caesars continued its march setting up cheesy outposts across state lines and up into Canada Mike and Marion looked for new ways to streamline production So in 1971 the two bought a mushroom farm and called it Little Caesar Mushroom Farms Inc Guess Mike finally let pizza treat go

At the farm, they would grow, package, and distribute their own mushrooms to all of their

Little Caesar's locations, with no more need for suppliers or pesky middlemen

Like Caesar said, you must seize the means of production. Caesar said that, right

And the farm functioned so efficiently that they soon started to make other products there

to streamline the pizza-making process even further. The farm has since developed

into a successful food distribution service all its own, with major clients all across North America

They even changed the company's name to Blue Line Food Service Distribution in order to make it into its own unique brand

separate from its pizza-based origins. But it's still just a Little Caesars in disguise

a truck driver disguise. Meanwhile, the pizza chain continued to expand throughout the 70s

Little Caesars Pizza, nobody loves it like it. Mike and Marion had found success from the start by offering the cheapest pizzas around

They were so big on cheap pizza that, according to Marion, she often had to stop Mike from giving away their pizzas for free

Look for our ad in the news and free press TV books for a free pizza

Kind of sounds like he didn't always have the best financial judgment. He was a door-to-door aluminum awning salesman

Luckily for us, Mike's need to self-sabotage prevailed. And in 1979, the company launched a new plan to actually give their pizzas away

It was one of the most outrageous deals yet. Customers could buy one pizza and they'd get a second pizza at absolutely no charge

They called it the Pizza Pizza Deal. Two great pizzas, one low price

Pizza Pizza. The deal would eventually end for the good of humanity. If we could buy one, get one pizza anytime we wanted, productivity on this planet would

cease to exist. But Pizza Pizza was here to stay. Except in Canada, where a pizza chain called Pizza Pizza already had that trademarked

Canadian Little Caesars went with Quality Quality, which does not have the same ring to it

It's got too many syllables. It's a mess from top to bottom. In 1987, Little Caesars finally conquered America by having locations in all 50 US states

In the years since, the company has expanded its operations into over 25 other countries as well

All the while, the chain has experimented with several different products and marketing campaigns

In 1982, they introduced their famous Crazy Bread. Sure, it's just breadsticks with some butter, garlic, and Parmesan cheese on top

but it's also the single greatest food ever invented. Little Caesars could probably stop selling pizza altogether and still do all right

Likewise, in 1985, Little Caesars launched Crazy Sauce, the basically marinara sauce that is meant to accompany their Crazy Bread

This soon led to the creation of the Crazy Combo, which is a combo that includes both the breadsticks and the sauce

Listen, bread and circuses don't have to be groundbreaking. They just have to be awesome and readily available

Speaking of readily available, around this same time, Little Caesars formed a partnership with the Kmart Corporation

giving them unprecedented access to hungry Kmart shoppers the nation over. By the 1990s trouble was brewing in Pizza Town By that point Little Caesars was counted among the big three of U pizza franchises alongside Pizza Hut and Domino

Together, these three corporations had 48% of the U.S. market share, though Little Caesars ranked the lowest among them

Still, what set Little Caesars apart from the others was, as always, its value

Value is how you say cheap when it's a compliment. While Pizza Hut offered a supreme dining experience

and Domino's had the fastest delivery service available without fracturing the theoretical

universe, Little Caesars had gotten rid of both dine-in and delivery to focus on a low-cost

carry-out-only experience. By offering a different specialty, the three companies managed to form a

sort of balanced, unstable alliance with one another. Although, in fairness, Pizza Hut's

supreme dining experience just means they keep the lights really dim while you wait too long

for your pizza. Each company knew where the other's turf started and ended, but they sat on a more

volatile powder keg than Europe on the eve of the Great War. It was only a matter of time before

their shaky pizza truce came to an explosive end. Historians today may argue who fired the first shot

in the Big Pizza Wars, but there is no denying that Little Caesars set the conflict in motion

In 1993, Little Caesars launched the Big Big Campaign, a continuation of their ongoing Pizza

pizza campaign, but with larger pies than ever before. Their sales during this time went up a

whopping 54%, putting the chain on a trajectory to overtake Domino's for America's number two spot

in the Big Three. Pizza Hut could not risk an upset in the status quo, and so they were the

first to return fire. The Hut soon released the Bigfoot Pizza, and they launched an all-out

marketing campaign in an attempt to hold their place atop the Big Three. They saturated the

airwaves with Bigfoot pizza commercials, and they even leased a $4 million Bigfoot pizza blimp

which eventually crashed into an apartment building on Manhattan's west side. Although

it was an awe-inspiring display of the Bigfoot's might, this was generally considered to be bad

publicity. Little Caesars responded to this campaign in kind, and they released ads mocking

their competitors' claims to Big Pizza. You think Bigfoot's big? Little Caesars' Big Big Cheese is

Bigger, more cheese, more pepperoni, 24 whopping slices. Big, big cheese, it's the mother of all pizzas

Only $8.88. Pizza, pizza. Meanwhile, Domino's was not about to sit on the sidelines

while his competitors sold the Noids' house out from under him. They were the last of the big three to launch their own gigantic menu offering

And just a few weeks after Pizza Hut's Bigfoot Pizza was released, Domino's unveiled the cheesetacular Dominator

It's hard to describe how good we all had at that then to someone who didn't live through the giant pizza wars

Just imagine the three biggest pizza chains in America locked in an arms race to feed a family of 12 for under $20

It's amazing that anyone survived. Ultimately, the Dominator would be the least successful of the three

Sorry, Noid. And Little Caesars would come out on top for a brief period of time

Much like the Pizza Pizza deal before it, the Big Big deal was never meant to last

And they ended the campaign after a hugely successful run. Then in 1997 the entire Pizza Pizza campaign followed suit and the company retired their 20 slogan to make room for a whole new concept Its name Hot and Ready Its purpose revolution For the first time ever

Little Caesars customers no longer needed to order their pizzas ahead of time. They could simply walk

into any Little Caesars location and walk out with a hot and ready pie for just five bucks

You know, the 90s may have been pizza's best decade, like the Chicago Bulls

Just like the Backstreet Boys, Little Caesars began to struggle at the turn of the millennium

While they managed to hold on to their number three spot among the big three, more value-focused competitors like CeCe's Pizza and Papa Murphy's

arose to take a bite out of the cheap pizza market. And Papa John's has risen up in recent years to elbow its way ever closer to a spot in the big three

You know, for people who like their pizza soaking wet. I've had over 40 pizzas in the last 30 days

Meanwhile, Domino's finally overtook Pizza Hut as America's top pizza franchise in 2018

The pizza landscape is a lot different now than it was in the 90s, but Little Caesars isn't afraid to reach back into its past successes for inspiration

In 2012, they brought back their Pizza Pizza slogan after a 15-year absence

Since then, Little Caesars has not only restored its former glory, but surpassed it

Over its many years, the privately owned company's continuing success has allowed Mike and Marion Illich to pursue other non-pizza interests

For instance, ever since he played second baseman for the Detroit Tigers, Mike's dream was to buy the team outright

His chance came in the early 80s, but Tom Monaghan, the founder of Domino's Pizza, swooped in and bought the team before he even got the chance to make an offer

That can't be an accident. Emotionally devastated but still wanting to buy a Michigan sports team

Mike had to settle for the Detroit Red Wings. Yeah, we've all been there, buddy

Under his leadership, the Red Wings became a successful and beloved hockey team

with ticket sales increasing eightfold over a five-year period. It was around this time that Little Caesars launched the mobile Love Kitchen

a traveling pizza truck that over the years has handed out millions of free pizzas to families in need

both in poor communities and areas impacted by natural disasters. The Love Kitchen's launch was so successful that it has received not one or two, but three

presidential awards for service. Yeah, that's right. How many presidential awards does Pizza Hut have

No, really, we're asking, is it more than annoyed? But while the Love Kitchen made its rounds across America, Mike kept his eyes on his

ultimate prize. In 1992, he finally returned to the Detroit Tigers, the team that had brought him on as

second baseman nearly 40 years prior, but this time as its owner

And it only cost him $85 million. Who says cheap pizza never did anything for anyone

Not that we would ever say that. Even with big money and big sports teams in their portfolio

he and Marion continued to give back to Michigan, with projects meant to help rejuvenate Detroit

and contributions to adopt to school programs in the Special Olympics. They even quietly paid Rosa Parks rent for the last 11 years of her life

Though Mike Illich passed away in 2017, Marion remains among the world's richest women

with a total net worth of about $4 billion. Now, that's some crazy bread