ROYAL OAK, Mich. (WXYZ) — A fresh slice of pizza is hard to beat, but local places like Tania's in Royal Oak say orders aren't popping off like they used to, and there may be a few reasons as to why.
Watch Carli's report in the video player below
Whether it's by the slice or the whole pie, Tania's Pizza in Royal Oak, which opened in 1987, has been serving it up fresh for nearly four decades.
Current owner Amos Sheena took over the family business in 2011, and while a lot has changed over the years, he said one thing stands out recently: customers are ordering smaller pizzas with fewer toppings.
“I do believe people are buying smaller increments, like the small pizzas that we sell are greater than the last three years, medium pizzas are greater than the last three years," Sheena said.
Benito's owner, Jamie Muter, is just down the road from Tania's. He said he's seeing the same thing.
“Some people, they’ll call up and they’ll be like, 'how much is a large pepperoni pizza?' and then I’ll tell them the price and they’ll go 'oh, then I’ll just have a medium pepperoni pizza,'” Muter said.
According to Slice, an online ordering platform for Pizzerias, the average cost of a large cheese pizza is now about $17, and large chains are seeing the biggest drop in sales.
Sheena said that third-party delivery apps like DoorDash and Uber Eats may also be part of the shift.
“There’s apps that give you access to hundreds of local restaurants," Sheena said. "We’ve delivered pizza to Lake Orion because of these apps. So, just like there’s a good thing, there’s a bad thing to them as well.”
Consumer Mason Ballard said that for him, he's just trying to eat healthier.
“It really used to be big when I was a kid, when my mother and my father, that is when I came home from school, we would order pizza, but I got older, so now it’s kind of just like what I want to eat so there’s really not too much pizza going on for me," Ballard said.
Whatever the reason for the slowdown, both owners told me they're not cutting corners where it matters most: the community.
“We pride ourselves on supporting the community, whether it’s baseball teams for the last 35 years or soccer teams or the high school needing a donation for hockey helmets," Sheena said.
“The band boosters, the high school PTA, the middle school, that’s where my advertising dollars are going, by me being able to give it back, and it has proven to be very popular and successful," Muter said.
