Looking to franchise serving up custom-made wood-fire pizza pies? Check out Blaze Pizza. This chain elevates the food scene a unique pizza ordering experience with a wood-fire concept. Blaze Pizza has garnered a lot of attention growing to more than 340 units at present. The pizza concept isn’t showing any signs of slowing down either.
How much does it cost to open Blaze Pizza? Blaze Pizza is open for franchising! To apply as a franchise operator, you’ll need a minimum liquid capital of $300,000 and a minimum net worth of $500,000. The initial investment for Blaze Pizza is estimated to be $605,400 – $1,086,500 with a franchise fee of $30,000.
Interested in becoming part of the Blaze Pizza family? This guide outlines what to expect when you franchise Blaze Pizza, revenue expectation, and the pros / cons of this business. Take this 7-minute quiz to find out if it’s the right pizza franchise for you.
Financial Requirements and Fees
These are the fees to expect when you want to franchise Blaze Pizza:
| Fees / Expenses | Financial Amount |
| Liquid Capital | $300,000 |
| Net Worth | $500,000 |
| Total Investment | $605,400 – $1,086,500 |
| Franchise Fee | $30,000 |
Other ongoing fees you need to be aware of are Blaze Pizza’s royalty fees that are 5% of gross sales and an ad royalty fee of 2% of gross sales. The term of agreement to run Blaze Pizza is 10 years. These royalty fees are slightly lower than many other pizza franchises, meaning you get to keep a larger slice of the revenue.
Average Sales / Revenue per Year
Restaurant Business Online reported systemwide Blaze Pizza sales in 2022 were $373 million. The sales for the pizza chain increased from $347 million in 2021.
Blaze Pizza Franchise Facts
| Total Units | 340 |
| Incorporated Name | Blaze Pizza LLC |
| Franchising Since | 2012 |
| Industry | Fast Casual Restaurant |
| Subsector | Pizza; Food and Beverage |
Blaze Pizza was founded by Elise and Rick Wetzel in 2011. The two were not beginners to running a food business especially since they were also co-founders of Wetzel’s Pretzels. The concept and idea of running Blaze Pizza came to them while they were having a meeting at Chipotle and saw how a made-to-order and customizable menu could also work for pizza.
They opened two Blaze Pizza branches simultaneously in 2012. One location was in Pasadena and the other was in Irvine. They were able to ride on the fast-casual market by making authentic pizzas in 2 to 3 minutes using a pizza press rather than hand-tossed dough and then a wood-fired oven tweaked to using gas. This is where the name came to be: Blaze Pizza would be known as a made-to-order pizza with any toppings of your choice in just one price and fast fire cooked in just 3 minutes.
Pepperoni pizza.
Despite the quick service, Blaze Pizza uses fresh dough and unprocessed ingredients. The dough is never frozen. It’s fermented for 24 hours and developed by Zagat-rated Chef Bradford Kent, who is Blaze Pizza’s head chef. The fermentation process along with their fire-deck is responsible for making the crust light and crisp. They also use natural ingredients without preservatives, artificial colors, and artificial flavors.
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Blaze Pizza serve beverages that aren’t just your usual sodas too. Their drinks consist of refillable freshly brewed tea, blood orange lemonade, agua fresca, and pure cane sugar sodas. Wine and beer are also available at Blaze Pizza. My personal favorite is the creative lemonade flavors available at my local store.
Pizzas and upscale beverages aren’t the only things you can find at Blaze Pizza. They have salads which you can also build on your own. They also have desserts such as S’more Pie (also reccomended) and cookies.
Aside from the food, beverage, and service, Blaze Pizza is known for stylish store designs. Their restaurant designs are made by Ana Henton, who owns an architectural firm in Los Angelos, which adds a certain kind of modern feel, look, and flair to the pizza chain.
The investors of Blaze Pizza are all high-profile. They have Boston Red Sox co-owner Tom Werner, movie producer John Davis, Maria Shriver, and basketball star LeBron James who also became a celebrity endorser.
Blaze Pizza has over 340 locations in 38 states and 6 countries which some of these are in Canada and the Middle East. One of their popular locations is at Disney Springs which can serve up to 3,000 pizzas a day and is the busiest Blaze Pizza store.
To apply as a Blaze Pizza franchise operator, complete this form that includes personal information and the area you are interested in developing. You will also be asked about liquid assets and the number of locations you’d want to develop.
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Once you meet their criteria of becoming a franchise operator, a formal franchise application and a signed confidentiality form will be required. After Blaze Pizza has receives and reviews these forms, a conference call is scheduled. Blaze Pizza Franchise Disclosure Document will only be released to you once you meet all their requirements. A face-to-face meeting will also be scheduled after.
Blaze Pizza is currently looking for multi-unit operators to join their family. They have 45 mid-sized areas planned for franchise development.
Breadsticks and dip at Blaze Pizza.
Blaze Pizza is right up there other fast-casual restaurants alongside Shake Shack, Chipotle, and Tender Greens. They have a strong technology and marketing support which you can benefit from should you franchise with them.
Mandy Shaw is the current Chief Executive Officer at Blaze Pizza and their headquarters is located in Pasadena, California.
How Much Does Blaze Pizza Make in Profit?
An unofficial estimate states that a Blaze Pizza franchise makes $197,000 in profits annually. The profit margin is at 16%. It’s not uncommon for pizza joints to net 7% – 10% after all expenses like rent, taxes, labor, and food cost.
According to Blaze Pizza, their average unit volume (AUV) is at $1.1 million.
Advantages of a Blaze Pizza Franchise
What’s all the hype around Blaze Pizza? Here we have a few advantages you can expect when you sign up as a Blaze Pizza’s franchise owner.
Helping Franchisees
When the pandemic hit, Blaze Pizza was quick to help their franchisees to ensure they weren’t crippled financially. The company quickly offered full abatement for five weeks of royalty fees. This was followed up by a 50% abatement for four more weeks. Franchisees also received financial coaching wherein some received forgivable loans through the help of the Paycheck Protection Program to keep their businesses alive during the early days of the health crisis.
With the flexible financial measures put in place by corporate, franchisees interested in signing up with Blaze Pizza can feel confident the company is going to have their back in the event of an unforeseen crisis or black swan style event.
Healthy Options
Blaze Pizza has healthy options for customers with dietary restrictions. For instance, if you are living a vegan lifestyle, Blaze Pizza has vegan cheese on the menu. If you’re into low-carb, they have keto crusts. They also have options like gluten-free dough and plant-based spicy chorizo.
All other toppings are healthy as well since Blaze Pizza does not use ingredients that have artificial flavors. If you franchise with them, not only are you advocating for healthy eating, but you’ll also win the hearts of those looking for a place to dine that can cater to their special diet. Customers have an incredible number of options.
Eco-packaging
Blaze Pizza advocates keeping earth a better place to live by using packaging materials for their pizza that are compostable, recyclable, and made from post-consumer reclaimed materials. Now that’s something to be proud of if you were to franchise Blaze Pizza.
If you’ve ever dined at a Blaze Pizza before, you know the waste created is minimal. You’re served pizzas on a metal pizza plan (that is not thrown away) covered by a square of parchment paper that’s tossed. They also offer plastic cups and straws that are thrown away. The napkins are made from recycled paper. There are also trash and recycling disposals inside the restaurant. It’s clear this company has been extremely thoughtful about handling waste.
Don’t miss the specials at Blaze Pizza.
Custom Made Pizzas
Blaze Pizza offers a fun build-your-own pizza experience where customers can choose the toppings to put on their pizza for just one price. The experience of having to choose which ingredients go in your food is quite interesting and gives one a lot of freedom and creativity. If you bring Blaze Pizza into your community, consumers will take note because this is a totally different experience than they are accustomed.
Future Expansions
As we come out of the health crisis, Blaze Pizza has ambitious goals of expansion. The company wants to reach 800 Blaze Pizza stores by 2025. In addition, multi unit deals are already set for Bahrain. Meanwhile, Blaze Pizza also opened their first store in Alaska.
With this ambitious expansion goal Blaze Pizza will need determined franchisees like yourself to manage and grow the brand.
Challenges of a Blaze Pizza Franchise
Every business comes with a laundry list of challenges. Here are a few you can expect with Blaze Pizza.
A Change in Pizza Experience
About 80% of Blaze Pizza’s sales in 2019 came from customers dining inside their store. With indoor dining being closed for much of the past 24 months, it really hurt franchisees. The company has had to pivot into putting more of a focus on delivery, pickup, and takeout.
The bummer is customers don’t get to enjoy the full Blaze Pizza experience of watching the team assemble a pizza right in front of them when they opt for pick up or drive-thru. If you operate in an area with more government restrictions this concept could be a challenge to operate.
Global Expansion
Blaze Pizza is popular across the United States and it has locations in Canada and the Middle East. It would be even better if Blaze Pizza had locations across the globe to further spread their name and their concept.
Some Closures
Despite being a big brand in the fast-casual scene, Blaze Pizza also suffers from closures. For instance, a location in Berkley was confirmed closed for good last September. Another one closed down in the Theatre District of Boston. No other reason was given but one can assume that it was probably underperforming.
Is the Blaze Pizza Franchise Right For You?
If franchising a pizza business that offers a unique customer experience is appealing to you, then Blaze Pizza could be a fantastic fit. The pizza chain also seems determine to grow and expand the brand nationally. A growing franchise is the type of business with plenty of runway left is the type of opportunity you want to get involved in.
What is an alternative Blaze Pizza franchise?
One pizza place you can franchise with a build-your-own pizza experience is MOD Pizza. Since 2008, MOD Pizza has been serving delicious pizza and providing a fun make-your-own pizza experience for customers.
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MOD Pizza is privately owned and they only allow their store to be franchised at locations where there isn’t a MOD Pizza available yet. So if you would like to bring a new pizza experience to your area, check out MOD Pizza. Not much is known about their financial fees and requirements but the unofficial franchise fee is $10,000 to $30,000 while the investment is said to be around $588,000 to $955,000. With this guide, I hope you were able to learn a lot about Blaze Pizza and determine if this is a restaurant worth evaluating further.
