Toppers Pizza has never been shy about making one of its ambitions known to the rest of the world: stealing the spotlight from some of the key players in the industry. Thanks to steadfast growth plans, enhanced technology, and a drive to never settle, the innovative pizza chain has been suiting itself up to compete head-to-head with the largest pizza chains in the U.S. This tenacity is paying off in a big way—in 2015, 73 percent of all stores boasted record sales, boosting overall system-wide sales up 22.5 percent from 2014. Now, as Toppers closes out its record-breaking year and sets its sights on 2016, the brand’s goal is to gain an even bigger piece of the pie.

Toppers fanatics love the brand’s fresh, handmade, and customizable pizza baked in about 360 seconds and delivered extremely fast, with more than a million combinations of fresh, high quality toppings, and the brand’s signature line of flavored Topperstix and baked Buffalo wings. After growing from 46 restaurants to 73 in the past two years, the brand has yet to see a ceiling in any of their markets.

Toppers Pizza has formulated the perfect recipe to appeal to both pizza enthusiasts and savvy investors. Headquartered in Wisconsin, Toppers is one of the fastest growing better-pizza chains in the United States. The brand has doubled in size over the last three years and completely sold out three states based on growth spurred by both existing franchisees and established multi-unit operators. Now with restaurants in 12 states and with territories immediately available across the country, Toppers plans to reach 700 stores in the U.S. within 10 years. Toppers is committed to quality and consistency throughout the system, and plans to maintain 25 percent of locations corporately owned while the brand expands to continuously improve on best practices and product development.

Much of Toppers’ success is credited to the brand’s focus on recruiting franchisees with demonstrated multi-unit restaurant backgrounds to open a minimum of three to five stores in a reasonable time frame. Since that plan was enacted in 2015, three strong new franchisee groups representing 14 restaurants came on board. That’s why this year’s growth tactic continues to rely heavily on that proven strategy, and Toppers will continue expanding with existing franchisees and by recruiting only the most experienced restaurant operators.

Requirements for potential franchisees include liquidity of $350.000–$500,000 with net worth of $750,000–$1,000,000. Franchise fees start at $30,000 for the first store, then decline by additional units opened. The average square footage is 1,300–1,700. Average unit gross sales are $914,000.

“Everyone that works for Toppers Pizza, whether it’s a delivery driver, store manager, or corporate employee shares the same drive to ‘Never Settle,’ and we aren’t messing around when we say that,” says Topper’s founder and president Scott. Gittrich. “The growth we have seen, the changes we have made to the way we recruit franchisees, and the improvements we’ve imparted in our operations are all strategic moves to stay ten steps ahead of the game. We’re not afraid to shake things up, and we’re playing to win.”

For more information about franchising opportunities with Toppers Pizza, visit www.ToppersPizza.com