His simple yet unforgettable two-word marketing tag line

Turned this couple’s restaurant into a $4.2 billion cash machine

Baseball … that was his favorite sport.

He played it all through high school. And he was good at it too.

So good that after graduating from Cooley High School, which sits at the intersection of Hubbell Avenue and Chalfonte Street on the northwest side of Detroit, Mike Ilitch was given the chance to sign with the Detroit Tigers.

The Tigers offered Mike a $5,000 bonus if he signed on with them right away.

Yet for Mike that just wasn’t enough money. So he made a counteroffer: Pay $10,000 and he’d be more than happy to sign on the dotted line.

Not impressed with his negotiating skills, the Tigers turned him down. And that was the end of what could have been the start of Mike’s professional sports career.

Mike then decided to join the military. So in 1948, he enlisted into the United States Marine Corps. That turned out to be a good decision because he got a chance to play baseball on base.

In fact for the next four years, when he wasn’t on duty, he was out on the field playing baseball.

Maybe it was a matter of luck or just good timing, because when Mike’s military service ended in 1952, the Tigers approached him again.

But it was the same deal as the last time … $5,000 to join the team. Not wanting to lose the opportunity a second time, Mike agreed to join the team. He spent the next three years playing in the Tiger’s farm system as a short-stop for the Tampa Smokers.

Break A Leg

While Mike was more than content playing baseball, his father didn’t like it one bit. He believed that baseball was a “bum sport.”

That’s mostly because Sotir Ilitch was a more traditional kind of guy. He immigrated to the U.S. from Macedonia and believed there was nothing wrong with putting in a good days’ worth of hard work to support your family.

And worked hard he did. Sotir was employed in the automobile industry  as a tool-and-die maker for the Chrysler Corporation. He thought Mike should follow suit, especially as Mike was starting a family of his own.

In fact in 1956 Mike met his future wife Marian on a blind date … oddly enough, one arranged by his father. Seems Sotir’s match-making instincts were smack on because Mike and Marian hit it off right away.

To Sotir’s delight, the very next year the couple got married. But Sotir still insisted that his son get a real job.

Yet Mike wasn’t about to give up the sport he loved playing … not unless he was forced to do so, or the Tigers no longer wanted him.

Maybe it was matter of bad luck or just bad timing, but shortly after the two were married Mike broke his leg, which caused damage to his knee. That injury ended his baseball career.

Once healed and needing a job, Mike found work at a cement company. It wasn’t an ideal job, so eventually he quit and became a door-to-door salesman for a dinnerware company.

That didn’t pay as well, so Mike’s next job was selling aluminum awnings.

He was doing well at this job. Mike had managed to work his way up to being a partner in the company.

Maybe it was a matter of fate or wishful thinking, but the partnership didn’t last long. In fact the two other owners no longer wanted Mike as a partner. So they insisted on buying him out, to which Mike agreed. Why work where you aren’t’ wanted?

And so in 1959 Mike was jobless but he had an idea … one that would allow him to do the other thing he loved … making pizzas.

The Italian Food Connection

If there’s one food Americans love, it’s pizza.

In fact approximately 3 BILLION pizzas are sold in the U.S. each year. We eat approximately 100 acres of pizza EACH DAY, or about 350 slices per second.

Although pizza has been around for centuries … over 323 to be exact, it was brought to America by Italian immigrants in the late 19^th century. 

The first pizzeria in the U.S. was Lombardi’s, which opened in New York City's  Little Italy district in 1905. Lombardi’s specialized in making Neapolitan-style pizza.

The first pizzeria in the U.S.

Neapolitan pizza was created in Naples Italy, which many Italians will tell you is the spiritual homeland of pizza. In this southern Italian city of 963,000 people, there are roughly  8,200 pizzerias.

And it’s said that fathers want their sons to be one of two things: soccer players for SSC Napoli or pizza chefs, otherwise known as a pizzaioli (or in the local dialect, pizzaiuoli.)

There are 15,000 pizzaioli in Naples, and these pizza making virtuosos are seen more like pop stars. Some even reach the status of being treated more like maestros.

And if you wondering what makes a true Naples Neapolitan pizza different than other kinds, there’s two ingredients that give it a distinct taste: (1) The tomatoes used are either San Marzano tomatoes or Pomodori Pelati tomatoes and (2) The dough.

In fact pizzaiolis allow their dough to ferment anywhere from 12 hours to several days before it’s used in the pizza making process.

For the Love of Dough

For Mike Ilitch making home-made pizza was all about the dough you used.

In an interview in New York Times Magazine, he said, “I was fascinated by water and flour. You knead it into dough, put it in the oven, and it comes out baked. Wow!"

Mike started making pizza when he was on the minor league baseball team for the Detroit Tigers. It was a cheap way to feed himself and his teammates.

And of course, when he and Marian had children (they had seven kids together), it was also an affordable way to feed the family.

When Mike lost his partnership with the aluminum siding company, he decided he would open a restaurant and serve typical dishes such as fried fish, hot dogs, chicken, and shrimp.

And of course, his homemade pizza would be the featured item on the menu.

Mike and Marian went all in on the restaurant. In fact they used their entire $10,000 in savings to open it, which was located in a strip mall in Garden City, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit.

Mike handled the food production, the menu, and the marketing while Marian concentrated on the business side of things, such as taking care of the books. Marian was so meticulous; she carefully recorded their sales in a spiral notebook.

Of what to name their restaurant, Mike was in favor of something simple such as Pizza Treat. But Marian thought it needed a snappier name. And she convinced Mike to use the nickname she had for him … Little Caesar.

So he changed the name to Little Caesar's Pizza Treat. The first day they were open, Mike and Marian sold 49 pizzas. By the end of that week, they had made and sold over 296 pizzas.

The original Little Caesar’s Pizza Treat

The reason those pizzas were selling so well is because they were offering customers a deliciously good tasting pizza at a low price. And they decided this would be their guiding business principle for as long as their little restaurant remained open.

Well their business proved profitable. They managed to open a second restaurant in just two years. By 1962, they had their first franchise.

And by the end of the 1960s, they had franchised over 50 restaurants including one in Canada. They also changed the name to Little Caesars Pizza.

Make It Once, Say It Twice

Now Mike and Marian weren’t the only people in the “pizza making business.” They had competition from other companies such as Pizza Hut, Dominos, and Papa John’s.

But what separated their franchise from the top of the competition was their decision to NOT offer home delivery. See by not delivering pizzas, this meant they didn’t have to hire extra people as drivers. And if they didn’t have to hire drivers, it kept their overhead low.

With lower overhead, they were able to make more money and remain competitive.

And competitive they were. Mike was always coming up with ways to keep Little Caesars Pizza top of mind with their customer base.

Sometimes his advertising campaigns focused on the quality ingredients used in making their pizzas. For instance,  they use high-gluten flour pizza dough, grade A cheese,  and specially grown California tomatoes.

In fact all of their pizzas are made with all-natural spices compared to the synthetic flavorings which are used all over the pizza industry.

But it wasn’t until 1971 that Mike Ilitch came up with a brilliant idea that greatly increased his and Marian’s fortune. He decided to sell two pizzas for one low price.

And to advertise this new “two-for-one deal” to the public, he came up with the catchy marketing tagline of "Pizza! Pizza!"

Can you say success Dear Reader because that’s exactly what happened. His ingenious idea changed the industry. Everyone now wanted a Little Caesars Pizza. And if you didn’t eat one of their pizzas, anytime you heard those two words, Little Caesars came to mind.

Little Caesar's rapid growth continued on throughout the 1980’s. By then, Mike and Marian had 226 units with sales of $63.6 million. By mid-decade annual sales had grown more than fivefold to $340 million. And sales have continued to spike.

Little Caesars Pizza founders, Mike & Marian

Today, Little Caesars has stores in all 50 states and 18 international markets. It’s the third largest pizza chain in the country. And sales recently climbed to over $4 billion.

Coming Full Circle

You could say Mike’s love for baseball never ended. In 1992 he bought the Detroit Tigers for $85 million.

He also bought the Detroit Red Wings for $8 million, which at the time was a struggling NHL team. But the couple were convinced they could turn things around. And they most certainly did.

By 1997, the Red Wings had won their first Stanley Cup in 42 years. They went on to win three more. Today, the team ranks number 7 in the world hockey league.

Mike also started Little Caesars Amateur Hockey League, which has grown into one of the country’s largest and most respected youth hockey programs.

However Mike doesn’t just buy sports teams. He’s known for his generosity too.

Since 1982, Mike, along with his wife Marian have invested over $200 million in revitalizing downtown Detroit. He bought and renovated the Fox Theater, a 1920s movie palace in 1987. He turned the Fox Theater into one of the most profitable venues of that size.

When asked about revitalizing the area, he told a reporter, "I was born in Detroit and raised here. I came from zero. This community helped make me. It's nice to give something back."

Perhaps his most generous act, one few people know about, is that he paid Rosa Parks' rent for eleven years.

In 1994, Rosa was assaulted, beaten, and robbed while she was in her Detroit home. She was 81 years old at the time. Mike promised to pay her rent until the day she died, which he did until her death in 2005.

Sadly, Mike died in February 2017 at the age of 88. Marian still remains an active member of the business, which she runs with the help of her children.

---

Awesome Quotes by Awesome People

“When you’re in a position to have gotten so much, the gift at this point is giving back.”—Paul Stanley

---