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Could mom n' pop pizza parlors end up being the last survivors of the economic meltdown? Anastacia Marx de Salcedo, writing in Salon, says so. She writes:The titans -- national hawkers of furniture, shoes, clothing, computers, auto parts, electronics, jewelry and embarrassingly themed steakhouses -- are toppling, fatally bloated by mergers, acquisitions, leveraged buyouts and roll-ups. But amid the colossal corpses strewn on the corporate battlefield, a ragtag army of small businesses soldiers on: the pizza industry, 76,355 restaurants strong across America.
But pizza still belongs to the mom n' pop joints, as corporate chains just can't get ahead in the pie biz. Major chains account for just one third of the pizza business in the U.S., and that number has been falling for years. Why? For one, their crust stinks. Either make it from scratch, or don't bother. Secondly, pizza is in thrall to regional preferences, which chains can't meet. Thin crust in the East, deep dish in the Midwest, wood oven with creative toppings out West.
If we double our annual pizza consumption, pizza industry spending would rise to $172 billion a year, more than 150 times the $1 billion allotted for small businesses in the Obama stimulus plan, says Marx de Salcedo, someone tongue-in-cheekly. But eating moregood local pizza is never a bad idea.
