Pizza Hut US president resigns

This story was originally published on Restaurant Dive. To receive daily news and insights, subscribe to our free daily Restaurant Dive newsletter.

Dive Brief:

• Pizza Hut’s Global CEO Aaron Powell with take responsibility for the chain’s U.S. units following the departure of U.S. President David Graves, according to a company statement emailed to Restaurant Dive.

• Powell will “directly oversee Pizza Hut U.S. as part of his global responsibilities and help drive our ambitious growth agenda forward,” while the company searches for a permanent replacement.

• Graves joined Pizza Hut in 2020 from KFC and served first as chief brand officer, then president of its U.S. division starting in October 2021, according to his LinkedIn profile. As CBO and president, Graves sought to implement a brand turnaround and bring some of KFC’s marketing success to the pizza chain’s long-term turnaround strategy.

Dive Insight:

In its statement confirming Graves’ departure, a Pizza Hut spokesperson praised “the strong leadership David Graves has brought to the Pizza Hut U.S. business during the last 4+ years and the positive impact he had made in helping modernize the brand and positioning it for the future.”

Last year, Pizza Hut began keeping a larger portion of its U.S. store system open later in hopes of capturing more traffic in that daypart. In October 2022, Pizza Hut launched its Melts category, an early entry in the handheld pizza snack category. Other recent initiatives to boost sales included partnerships with third-party delivery aggregators and a reverse delivery promotion timed to the holidays that was likely intended to boost driver morale.

Pizza Hut’s sales have nevertheless lagged behind the rest of Yum’s system, according to the company’s annual results for 2023. In Q4 2023, Pizza Hut U.S.’s same-store sales fell 4% year-over-year, closing out 2023 with an anemic 1% sales growth, compared to Taco Bell’s 6% same-store sales growth in the U.S. and KFC’s 2% same-store sales growth. The pizza brand’s sales growth trailed Domino’s U.S. same-store sales growth for 2023, which was about 1.6%. Pizza Hut did, however, see stronger sales growth in 2023 than Papa John’s, whose North American units achieved 0.8% comparable sales growth.