California Pizza Kitchen Wants 1,000 Pizza Vending Machines in Three Years
A pizza from a vending machine takes 90 seconds. California Pizza Kitchen is betting on a thousand of them.
The chain has partnered with retail services firm T-Roc Global to install and operate up to 1,000 automated retail machines across 30 U.S. markets over the next three years. The kiosks will go into airports, universities, hospitals, hotels and office complexes, places where a decent sit-down meal is hard to find. CPK will fill each market with a cluster of at least 20 machines before pushing further.
The chain already runs machines at airports in Boston, Atlanta, Dallas and Dayton, Ohio, and will switch on 15 more at universities later this year.
"Our automated retail strategy, now accelerated through a partnership with T-Roc, introduces CPK to entirely new occasions and venues where consumers desire quality food on the go," said Michael Beacham, president of California Pizza Kitchen Global.
The machine is on its third design. TurboChef technology takes a pizza from frozen to hot in 90 seconds, and the switch to frozen ingredients killed the spoilage problem that limits most food kiosks. The frozen format also made room for items beyond pizza, including Kung Pao and Bolognese Spaghetti, mac and cheese in classic, BBQ chicken and burnt ends varieties, and the chain's butter cake.
T-Roc handles the logistics with 32 warehouses, a van fleet and thousands of technicians who stock and fix the machines.
"Consumers increasingly expect their favorite brands to meet them where they are, and technology is making that possible in entirely new ways," said Brett Beveridge, CEO and founder of T-Roc Global.
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CPK has relied on nontraditional formats while working through a rough stretch that included a 2020 bankruptcy, a franchising program that never took hold and a shrinking restaurant count. The company paused its vending plans last December while an investor group led by Consortium Brands acquired it.
Founded in Beverly Hills in 1985, CPK runs more than 120 restaurants in 10 countries and sells frozen pizza in more than 10,000 grocery stores.