New Take on a Classic Dish: Cheesy Chicken Cordon Bleu Wins Papas Specialty Pizza Challenge
Business Wire, August 31, 2010
Creator Barbara Hyman of Los Angeles Receives Slice of the Sales
and Free Papa Johns Pizza for Life
LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Papa Johns pizza fans can now say bonjour to the The Cheesy Chicken
Cordon Bleu the winning pizza in Papas Specialty Pizza Challenge.
Created by Barbara Hyman of Los Angeles, Calif., the rendition of the
classic dish struck a chord with Papa Johns customers, representing 45
percent of the more than 240,000 Specialty Pizza Challenge pizzas sold
in the month of August.
As the creator of the winning pizza, Hyman will receive a slice of the
sales (up to $10,000), free Papa Johns pizza for life, and the
opportunity to appear in a Papas In The House television commercial.
The Cheesy Chicken Cordon Bleu, which features Papa Johns original
crust, spinach Alfredo sauce, topped with grilled all white-chicken,
ham, fresh-sliced onions and extra mozzarella, Asiago, provolone and
Fontina cheeses, will now be on the Papa
Johns menu for one year.
Papas Specialty Pizza Challenge offered a unique opportunity for our
customers to have a hand in shaping our menu, said Andrew Varga, Papa
Johns Chief Marketing Officer. This innovative contest driven by
Facebook entries, the marketing ingenuity of the three finalists and
ultimately the number of pizza sales, demonstrates that people love our
pizza and will support it in a number of different ways.
Papa Johns received more than 12,000 entries via Facebook in the Papas
Specialty Pizza Challenge which were ultimately narrowed down to three
finalists in June by a panel of judges that included the Food Networks
Ted Allen and Rich Eisen of the NFL Network. On August 2, Papa Johns
put the three pizzas on its menu, and the three finalists traveled to
Papa Johns headquarters in Louisville to tour the facility and prepare
their pizzas for the companys corporate staff.
Each finalist was given a $1,000 marketing budget to promote their
pizza. Hyman spent her dough on local promotions and a Facebook page. In
addition, Hyman announced that if she won the contest, she would donate
a portion of her winnings to the National Wildlife Federation in hopes
of playing a part in the relief efforts for the gulf oil spill.
It is incredibly exciting to create a pizza that may be featured on
Papa Johns menu, Hyman said. The Cheesy Chicken Cordon Bleu pizza was
born on a grocery shopping trip with my daughter. I wanted to create a
spin on an old favorite recipe that my mother used to make. Were amazed
at how much Papa Johns pizza fans around the country loved the pizza,
too.
The other two finalists, Blair Dial of Springfield, Ill., who created
the The Big Bonanza and Kendra Chapman of Ball Ground, Ga., who
entered The Workin Fire, received free pizza for a year as
semi-finalists.
Headquartered in Louisville, Kentucky, Papa John’s International, Inc.
(NASDAQ: PZZA) is the world’s third largest pizza company. For nine of
the last 10 years, consumers have rated Papa John’s No
free chords