Skip navigation
Pizza Patrón deal with radio’s Piolín aims for stronger ties to Hispanics

Pizza Patrón deal with radio’s Piolín aims for stronger ties to Hispanics

DALLAS —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

The chain has signed a deal with Piolín to endorse Pizza Patrón on his “Piolín por la Mañana” radio show, the No. 1 nationally syndicated show in the United States. As part of the deal, Pizza Patrón licensed his image and logo for ads and in-store material. —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

The deal is the first national marketing campaign for the 68-unit chain, which came under fire from right-wing critics last year who claimed its acceptance of pesos promoted illegal immigration. —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

Although other marketers may not feel comfortable using Piolín as a spokesperson because of his involvement in Hispanic causes, chain officials said they considered him a good match for Pizza Patrón. —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

“Piolín seemed to be a natural fit to take us to the next level in letting people know who we are and what we’re all about,” said Andrew Gamm, the chain’s director of brand development. “For us, our position as a Latino pizza brand comes first and foremost, and finding ways to reinforce that is something we work very hard at all the time.” —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

That position has paid off in strong sales. The partnership with Piolín comes on the heels of six consecutive quarters of double-digit same-store sales increases for the chain, officials said. —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

Pizza Patrón, founded in 1986, bases its restaurants in Spanish-speaking or predominantly Hispanic neighborhoods in Texas, California, Arizona, Colorado and Nevada. Although it has used radio, print and TV to exclusively target Hispanics, Pizza Patrón has a strong history of bonding with customers through community involvement. —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

The “Pizza por Pesos” promotion, launched last year, grew out of that involvement, as did the marketing partnership with Piolín. —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

Chain founder Antonio Swad called him the “living embodiment of what Pizza Patrón is all about.” —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

Chains have often used athletes, rock stars and other celebrities in ad campaigns, but largely as a famous face pasted onto their brands with no real connection to what the brands stand for. What sets Piolín—or “Tweety Bird” in English—apart from them is his involvement in Hispanic causes, particularly immigration reform. —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

“His community involvement is something that really made the connection that we felt was important to us,” Gamm said. “There’s a number of celebrity spokesmen that are available, that we could have chosen, but his unique mix of being as popular as he is throughout the country and his involvement in the community made him stand out.” —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

Last spring Piolín launched a letter writing campaign called “Por la Reforma Migratoria con Piolín,” that generated more than 1 million letters urging Congress to pass an immigration-reform bill. —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

He regularly discusses politics and immigration on his radio show, but a March 2005 story in LA Weekly pointed out that he also helps callers who need medical, legal or financial help. —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

“Piolín has something no rock star seems to have, and that is he’s a guy who tapped into the soul of the immigrant,” said Tom Landis, a Pizza Patrón franchisee who owns four stores in Dallas. —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

Landis has firsthand knowledge of how popular Piolín is with Hispanics. When a customer wearing a Piolín hat walked into one of his stores, Landis offered him two free pizzas in exchange for the hat. —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

“He looked at me as if I just asked him to sell his soul for 5 cents,” Landis said, adding that the customer would not even sell the hat for $20. —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

A number of times, when one of Landis’ managers was driving a delivery vehicle with Piolín’s image on it, cars driven by women pulled up next to him “and they just went crazy because they thought [the manager] was Piolín,” Landis said. —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

Although Piolín is popular with Hispanics, other marketers are afraid to sign him as a marketing partner because of his involvement in Hispanic causes, Landis said. “It never ceases to shock and dismay me and depress me that so many in the wider community just can’t see any good in what the Hispanic community is doing,” he said. —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

Pizza Patrón believes it is doing something good with the “Pizza por Pesos” program, which accounts for 5 percent of sales, but when the program was launched in January 2007 some critics accused the chain of fostering illegal immigration. —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

Landis said he expects some of the same backlash because of the Piolín partnership. —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

So far, however, no one has criticized the partnership, Gamm said, and he doesn’t expect non-Hispanics to complain about it. —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

“If you don’t know who [Piolín] is, I don’t think you pay much attention,” he said. “I don’t think this is a detriment in any way to the non-Hispanic who comes into the store.” —Pizza Patrón, whose controversial “Pizza por Pesos” promotion is a hit with the chain’s Hispanic customers, has ramped up marketing efforts to strengthen its ties to the Latino community by signing popular radio personality and activist Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo as the voice and face of the brand.

Hide comments

Comments

  • Allowed HTML tags: <em> <strong> <blockquote> <br> <p>

Plain text

  • No HTML tags allowed.
  • Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
Publish