How to reinvent franchising with tech and transparency

In 2019, Dodo Pizza launched 141 new pizzerias and closed 5, capping off the year with 576 units in 13 countries. Outlets outside of Russia generated 11.4% of total revenue, up from 9.5% a year before. Our annual system sales exceeded 20.2 billion rubles—around $314m. In US dollars, that’s a 46% year-over-year growth in sales. Building at such a pace, Dodo remains one of the fastest-growing QSR brands in the world.

Our expertise isn't just in pizza. We know how to create retail concepts, merge IT and operational business, build a franchising system, and team with strong entrepreneurs.So we are going to start launching new retail concepts based on the Dodo franchising platform that includes the Dodo IS digital platform, our supply network, quality control, training, communications, funding for franchisee growth, and many other things. We’re talking about coffee shops, sushi bars, bakeries, and even bed-and-breakfasts or dry cleaners. We will be changing people's lives for the better by creating everyday goods and services...

The dark kitchen is a very popular idea nowadays—it’s getting a lot of investment hype. Dark kitchens are restaurants without a dining area, they do delivery only. Their rent is low, their kitchens combine several concepts at once, and their storage areas and courier service are shared between them. All this should result in cost savings and increased efficiency.

This year, I visited CloudKitchens in Los Angeles, one of Uber founder Travis Kalanick’s new ventures. In a low-rent neighborhood near the downtown business district, several concepts are gathered under one roof—pizza, Tex-Mex,...

This week, a historical moment happened for our company. We launched our mobile app in Kazakhstan. However, that’s not the big news. The big news is, we’ve created the first multinational app in global pizza industry history. It works like Uber. Arriving to a new country, you don’t install a local Uber app. You use one app everywhere. But usually, it’s not the same with pizza apps—you have to download a local one every time you’re in a new country. Our app will work in every country where Dodo Pizza is located, you just have to choose the country in the app menu. So far, there are only two countries there, Russia and Kazakhstan, but we’ll add Romania, Belarus, Lithuania, Estonia, Slovenia, the UK, USA, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and of course, China, soon.

We’ve closed two of our pizzerias. In business, sometimes it’s important to cut your losses, draw necessary conclusions, and move on. So we’ve closed our small “Dodo Pizza and Coffee” pizzeria in Syktyvkar.

The idea was beautiful, but ultimately, this experiment hadn’t become profitable. Nonetheless, we should thank it for the accumulated experience. Technologies and design created for this project are the central elements of our format. We’ve created new interior design for this pizzeria, as well as our “pizza slices” product that is timer prepared and priced flexibly (it sells at a discount after 45 minutes; after 60, it is written off).

Also, Mikhail Kropanev, our partner in China, has closed our first Hangzhou pizzeria. It was located at a distance from the main thoroughfares. Unlike our pizzeria in Yantai and despite all our efforts, the Hangzhou pizzeria at that location and in that format couldn’t become profitable. Mikhail doesn’t plan to leave the business altogether and intends to open a new pizzeria.

We’re working on our first corporate pizzeria in Hangzhou. This will be a pizzeria in a completely new format, and a brave attempt to break into the Chinese market. What’s that all about? Check out our earlier posts.