Here’s why Bellefonte’s Pizza Hut relocated and how it plans to meet new dining trends
Pizza Hut has relocated its restaurant in Bellefonte to modernize and focus on keeping up with dining trends, according to its franchise owner, including carry-out and delivery.
The previous location at 1074 E Bishop St. was built in 1978 and had been operated by ARC Restaurants since 2003. Franchise owner Roger Gates said they had the opportunity to purchase the property, but decided to find a new location instead.
“We decided to go to a smaller location (and) modernize,” Gates said. “It’s a very old place where we were at, we wanted a new facility, new equipment and we wanted to focus on our carryout business and our delivery business.”
The new location — 372 Phoenix Avenue — will not have an indoor dining area. Rather, it will be solely carryout or delivery. This decision, area manager Dean Risser said, will allow Pizza Hut to serve more people beyond just the general Bellefonte area, including parts of Milesburg and Pleasant Gap. Deliveries can be made within an eight-minute radius from the store, he said.
Customers can come inside to pick up their order, or they can go to the new pickup window.
“Right by the pickup window, we’ll have a couple marked spaces for pickup, the customer can get out of their car, walk up the window, pick up their pizza and get back in their car,” Gates said. “And that saves them from leaving the visibility of their car and children. The old store obviously didn’t offer that opportunity and we wanted a pickup window to make it convenient.”
The majority of Pizza Hut’s business has always been carryout or delivery, Gates said, but he said he’ll miss having the salad bar and buffet.
“But the trend has changed — what people want and when they want it — and our business is to deliver food hot, fresh and fast to people or for them to come and pick it up,” Gates said. “And that’s what the trend has been. It’s been that way since, I’d say, 2019.”
The pandemic strengthened that part of the business, too.
Risser and Gates are looking forward to serving the community from a new location. Gates and another manager, Jared King, are both graduates from Bellefonte Area School District and have a local connection with customers.
The new location is planned to be open by Thursday. The phone number will stay the same, 814-355-5160.
