The Bigfoot was a pizza that was sold from 1993 to the mid-1990s by Pizza Hut. It was a large-sized rectangular pizza, measuring 12 inches by 24 inches (or 2 square feet), and was cut into twenty-one square slices. This made it ideal for parties. The customer could choose up to three different toppings for their order of the Bigfoot. The pizza had a mascot in the form of a cartoonish depiction of the mythological creature, Bigfoot (also known as Sasquatch), wearing a green tank top and a pair of swim trunks.
At one point in 1993, Pizza Hut put in a free trial month of HBO with a purchase of the Bigfoot as a limited-time offer. A free video rental from Blockbuster Video was also offered with the Bigfoot for a limited time. There was also the "Bigfoot Big Six", which was a variation with six toppings and sold for the same price as the standard Bigfoot. Also advertised was the Meaty Madness, a variant of the Bigfoot with four different meat toppings, consisting of beef, pork, pepperoni, and ham.
In 1994, for a limited-time deal in the State of Oklahoma, Pizza Hut offered free admission for two to Remington Park with the Bigfoot, which is split down the middle in a way so that the customer can request up to three toppings for either side of the pizza.
The Bigfoot competed with the likes of Little Caesars' Big! Big! Cheese, which it was made as a response to[1], and later on, the Dominator from Domino's Pizza.
Pizza Hut was aggressive in advertising the Bigfoot, having spent millions of dollars in marketing it through billboards, TV, and newspaper ads, even leasing a $4,000,000 blimp with the Bigfoot logo on the side of it. On July 4th, 1993, an incident occurred where the blimp crashed onto the roof of an apartment building on the west side of Manhattan and two crew members were injured. Pizza Hut's VP at the time said that despite the unfortunate incident, it succeeded in heightening brand awareness. It was a successful product, having raked in $5.7 billion in sales for Pizza Hut across 9,800 locations in 1993.[2] [3]
Similar products sold by Pizza Hut in later years included the Panormous and the Big Italy.
Former Pizza Hut employees attested that the Bigfoot was a logistical nightmare, due to the specialized pans, boxes, and dough. The dough is said to be very fragile and tore easily, and employees had to be very careful in working the dough into the corners of the pan when preparing the Bigfoot. If the dough tears, it had to be disposed of, as it couldn't be worked back together, resulting in high waste and reduced profit.
Trivia[]
- Reggie Fils-Aimé, who is best known as his tenure as the President of Nintendo of America from 2006 to 2019, had previously served as a Senior Director of National Marketing at Pizza Hut, and was the one who pushed for the Bigfoot to be brought to market and also brought about its discontinuation. He was also responsible for the introduction of the Big New Yorker pizza.
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