Tuesday, October 7th 2008

If it aint broke, don't fix it? A rebrand too far...?

Keep your eyes peeled during the ad breaks on television tonight, you might just catch a glimpse of a big company rebrand that will either be a spectacular success, or a ‘why did we do that?’ moment in history.

Pizza Hut, who are 50 years old this year, have decided to spend £100million on renaming themselves as Pasta Hut. Apparently in the UK we now eat more pasta dishes than pizzas.

Do not despair, all your favorite pizzas will remain on the menu, with the addition of seven new pasta dishes. Strangely for a massive change like this, only nine of their 700-restaurant network will change their signage immediately.

So have they done the right thing? I’m not sure.

Going out for pizza, especially as a child, was always one of those ‘Saturday night, mum doesn’t want to cook, lets have something a bit different’ events. Come on kids, lets all go out for… er… pasta! doesn’t quite have the same excitement.

At first I thought this was a badly timed April Fool, until I saw pastahut.co.uk

So, what do you think? A thin and crispy clever move, or a deep-pan disaster?

Posted by Richard on Tuesday 7th of October 2008 at 1:03pm

Comments

Could it be a health issue? Pasta is healthier than pizza and so maybe they're struggling against the Jamie Oliver generation of food enthusiasts?

Posted by Tasha on Tuesday 7th of October 2008 at 1:21pm

Could this be nothing more than a brand awareness stunt? Something to remind the general public that they are there and they do indeed serve pasta as well as pizza, but with no intension of making the change.

Posted by Melissa on Wednesday 8th of October 2008 at 12:03pm

I've just had my say on the pastahut website - 89% of visitors have voted no to the name change. Then you get to enter a competition and give them all of your personal details to find out the result of the name change competition. Wow. Think you are spot on Melissa.

Posted by Louise on Wednesday 8th of October 2008 at 12:16pm

Why didn’t they just go the whole hog and rename it pasta hat (pass the hat said in an italian accent - geddit?)
Ok I’ll get my coat...

Posted by Maria on Wednesday 8th of October 2008 at 2:08pm

It is just all 'pasta' joke now.. get it - 'past a' joke hehehe!

Posted by Marian on Thursday 9th of October 2008 at 11:27am

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