Little Caesars Attracting a Crowd on Ennalls Avenue

Move over Peru. Italy just barged in, taking the form of a diminutive emperor slinging low-priced pizzas.

There’s a new Little Caesars in the Wheaton Triangle Park plaza that’s better known for its Peruvian chicken eateries. And what better day to check it out than March 15th? My only hope was that my experience on this date didn’t end as poorly as Julius Caesar’s.

It’s been a while since the simple, yet slightly pathological, “Pizza Pizza” slogan of Little Caesars ruled the collective consciousness. But it seems that our wee emperor was merely strategizing all this time. And now he’s returned to the area with a vengeance, aiming to pierce the stomachs of all his doubters by invading one mini-mall at a time.

The weapon of choice for Little Caesars’ comeback is the “Hot-N-Ready” pizza offer. This is a $5 large cheese or pepperoni pie that is already made and ready to go upon the customer’s arrival.

Little Caesars' corporate website lists Washington, D.C. as one of the Top 10 lucrative markets for prospective franchise owners. Baltimore, MD also has a seat at this table. Three new franchises have recently opened in the DC Metro area: Gaithersburg (Aug. 2010), Lanham (Jan. 2010), and now Wheaton (Feb. 2011). These locations, like many others, only offer take-out and do not have dining areas.

Given the absence of a dining area and the hyped Hot and Ready, it’s safe to say that Little Caesars has adopted a simple, yet vigorous “Push dough out, pull dough in” strategy as it reenters the local pizza market. Its emphasis on volume greatly differs from the Wheaton branch’s closest pizza rival, a on the next block over.

When it comes to Maryland pizza, the name Ledo is as much of a household term as the word “Terrapin.” The first Ledo opened in Adelphi, MD in 1955 and there are now over 60 in the state. The large dining room of the Wheaton Ledo allows customers to eat and stay a while. Unless you plan on hopping up on the counter at Little Caesars, you’d be hard pressed to find a seat.

The owner of the new Wheaton Little Caesars franchise spoke to The Washington Business Journal this past January. Irfaan Lalani, who also owns the Lanham location, said, “We definitely have an aggressive development plan for the area.”  This sentiment was echoed by an employee at Wheaton’s branch: the owner has the ambitious goal of opening thirty more.