Hunt Brothers Pizza, the largest made-to-order pizza program in the U.S. convenience store channel with more than 11,000 locations, has launched a limited-time Hot Honey Ultimate Pepperoni Pizza developed in partnership with flavor brand Mike's Hot Honey. The product went on sale July 27 at participating locations across 16 states.
The Product
The pizza is built on Hunt Brothers' standard pepperoni base but carries 50% more pepperoni than the brand's regular offering, topped with 100% natural part-skim mozzarella and the company's proprietary Just Rite Spice blend. Mike's Hot Honey is applied as a post-bake drizzle — a technique common in fast-casual pizza that preserves the honey's heat and sweetness without caramelizing it into the crust. The collaboration marks one of the first co-branded LTOs Hunt Brothers has executed with a nationally recognized condiment brand.
Channel Strategy
For a c-store-native foodservice operator, limited-time offerings serve a dual commercial function: they give existing customers a reason to return more frequently and give store operators a promotional hook to merchandise at the point of sale. Robinson Hunt of Hunt Brothers Pizza said the Mike's Hot Honey partnership was chosen specifically because the flavor brand carries strong consumer recognition, giving store partners a ready-made traffic driver without requiring additional marketing investment on their end.
Hot honey has emerged as one of the more durable flavor trends in the foodservice segment over the past three years, migrating from independent pizzerias into national chains and now into the convenience tier. For Hunt Brothers — which does not charge franchise, royalty, or marketing fees to its store partners — attaching the LTO to an established third-party brand reduces the merchandising lift for individual c-store operators while extending the perceived premium of the product.
Availability and Footprint
The Hot Honey Ultimate Pepperoni Pizza is available while supplies last at Hunt Brothers locations in Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, New Mexico, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, and Texas. The 16-state rollout represents a substantial share of Hunt Brothers' footprint, though the company noted availability will vary by individual location.
For operators and foodservice buyers tracking convenience-channel pizza trends, the launch illustrates how c-store foodservice programs are competing for share by importing fast-casual flavor innovation at scale. Hunt Brothers' turn-key model — which supplies equipment, ingredients, and support to store partners without franchise fees — has historically allowed it to iterate on its menu faster than franchise-dependent competitors. Observers watching limited-time offer strategy in the pizza segment will note the structural advantage: a centrally managed LTO can be deployed across thousands of independently operated c-stores simultaneously, compressing the rollout timeline that would otherwise challenge a franchised system.
Written by Michael Politz, Author of Guide to Restaurant Success: The Proven Process for Starting Any Restaurant Business From Scratch to Success (ISBN: 978-1-119-66896-1), Founder of Food & Beverage Magazine, the leading online magazine and resource in the industry. Designer of the Bluetooth logo and recognized in Entrepreneur Magazine's "Top 40 Under 40" for founding American Wholesale Floral, Politz is also the Co-founder of the Proof Awards and the CPG Awards and a partner in numerous consumer brands across the food and beverage sector.
