Pizza Hut seeks second shop for $10-Mil. slice By Alison Fahey and Cathy Taylo

NEW YORK--Pizza Hut will slice off $10 million from its advertising pie and serve it up to a second agency.

Although BBDO is agency of record for the pizza maker’s estimated $120-million account, the Wichita, Kan.-based company said it now feels it needs another ad agency on its roster.
Last week Pizza Hut, through the Advertising Agency Register, began contacting shops about what it’s calling a $10-million account that involves select projects and kids marketing. Some of that business has been at BBDO and some of it represents incremental billings as Pizza Hut expands its efforts in that area.
“BBDO is doing an outstanding job, and its responsibilities continue to grow,” said Bob Perkins, Pizza Hut’s senior vp/marketing, in a statement released to ADWEEK. “However, our dramatic growth requires we expand our advertising resources to provide focus on this key segment of our business.”
Pizza Hut isn’t the first fast-food marketer to concentrate on certain demographic groups. McDonald’s and Burger King have also targeted the “‘tween market” separately, sometimes through shops that don’t handle their general ad account.
The review involves several advertising agencies and will be concluded by year’s end. Although the company would not identify any of the shops that have been contacted, one is known to be TBWA Advertising, New York, a sister Omnicom agency, but significantly smaller than BBDO.
Pizza Hut’s move to look beyond its big core agency for a smaller creatively driven shop also is somewhat of a trend these days, with the most visible case being Coca-Cola signing up smaller agencies like Wieden & Kennedy and Fallon McElligott to work with its Interpublic shops.
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