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Leaders in Customer Loyalty: Brand Stories | California Cool, Loyalty-Driven: Inside CPK’s Brand Rejuvenation

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California Pizza Kitchen (CPK) has been delighting diners for four decades, but as the brand celebrates its 40th anniversary, Chief Marketing Officer Dawn Keller, is focused not on nostalgia but on reinvention. At the helm of marketing, culinary, digital, and menu innovation, Keller is bringing a deeply personal connection to the brand—and a bold, modern vision for its future. 

Speaker 1:

Turning 40 isn't just a milestone. It's a moment of truth. In today's hyper-competitive landscape, brands hitting the 40-year mark either evolve or risk fading into irrelevance. It's no longer just about nostalgia it's about reinvention. Smart brands use this moment to reintroduce themselves to the market, sharpening their positioning, doubling down on customer experience and launching bold marketing campaigns that re-engage customers and reignite loyalty. One brand doing exactly that California Pizza Kitchen. As CPK celebrates its 40th anniversary, it's not slowing down. It's turning up the heat With a fresh brand voice, fearless marketing and an unwavering focus on customer loyalty. The brand is rewriting what a legacy brand can't be. And at the center of it all is Don Keller, their dynamic new CMO. Who's leading the charge, don, we're excited to speak with you today. Thank you very much for taking the time to join us on the Leaders in Customer Loyalty series. How are you?

Speaker 2:

I'm great, Mark. How are you?

Speaker 1:

I'm doing well. Thank you very much for taking the time to speak with us today. First off, we'd like to start these with a little background and, for those who may not know, can you give us a short introduction to California Pizza Kitchen. What's the backstory of the company? Why was it started? We'd love to know that.

Speaker 2:

Oh sure, I'd be happy to. So California Pizza Kitchen, more affectionately known as CPK, as we're going to talk about later, we're celebrating our 40th anniversary. So the brand and the restaurant was founded in 1985 in Beverly Hills, california, somewhat famously, by two former lawyers who had a passion for food and had taken a look at the landscape, decided they wanted to do something more interesting and saw some of the emerging, I think, california cuisine trends that were happening in LA at the time in some fine dining spaces and decided that they wanted to take a huge leap of faith and bring high quality ingredients and creativity from a culinary perspective inspired by global trends and fine dining to the masses, essentially through a casual dining experience. So California pizza kitchen was born in Beverly Hills. That first restaurant still exists today.

Speaker 2:

I was just there not recently, you know, not that long ago and our kind of you know twist on global flavors with the California spin and freshness and creativity really resonated. We really hit the map with the barbecue chicken pizza, which really built the brand and is still the number one selling pizza at CPK today, even though it's been copied the world around and the rest is sort of history. We've been in the restaurant business for 40 years with a global footprint, and for about 25 of those years we've also been a national brand at your favorite grocery store in the frozen food aisle with high quality frozen pizzas and additional product categories that have come later. So people know CPK, sometimes for both and sometimes just one or the other, depending on where you've lived.

Speaker 1:

Okay, excellent when you look at your role chief marketing officer fairly new within the organization. We'd love to know a little bit more about your role, what you're in charge with at California Pizza Kitchen and maybe what led you to the role you have now. How did you get into marketing? How did you get into customer experience? It'd be great to know that.

Speaker 2:

Sure, okay, so I joined CPK just over a year ago as a CMO and I oversee sort of all facets of marketing, as you would expect, and digital, and also culinary right or R&D and menu development. So it's a broad, robust but exciting role that allows me to have a lot of impact and help drive the company forward. So you know, in terms of how I got here, there's sort of the professional track and then there's a little bit of the personal story too and they sort of dovetail of the personal story too and they, they, they sort of dovetail. You know, professionally I don't. I always say I don't have the most traditional CMO career path, but lots of people say that, right, because CMOs are a diverse bunch now, because of the demands of the of the role, as you know. So I, prior to coming to CPK, I was the chief marketing officer at Lou Malnati's Pizzeria in Chicago. So I mean, it's one of those legendary brands, if you know. You know, famous for deep dish, been in business for over 50 years, both their restaurant business and their direct to consumer e-commerce business, which they've had forever too. So, and prior to that, I led global digital and e commerce and parts of US marketing for Krispy Kreme donuts for several years. So I've been in the food business for a while, but previous to that, for many years, you know, I've been in and out of the restaurant industry. So spent many years in big box retail in companies such as Best Buy, staples and CVS Health, doing a variety of functional leadership roles across strategy, customer service, customer experience, marketing, digital, omni-channel strategy I don't know, you name it. And my first foray into food and the restaurant space where I really kind of got the bug right and realized what a fantastic industry it is, was at Caribou Coffee out of the Twin Cities and I led the strategy and P&L for the food category and then later took over innovation, all innovation across their retail business. So you know, and my first career was in the television industry. So I've kind of been here, here and there and everywhere. But you know, I like to think that that diverse path, both in terms of industry and functional roles, has all kind of helped me be kind of the well-rounded CMO that I hope to be today and I know that might be something we just talk about later right, which is how we see this role kind of evolving. Right For the modern marketer, the personal, oh, go ahead, and then I'll just tell you one quick.

Speaker 2:

This is very interesting, the personal sort of hook that got me to CPK, which I always love to talk about, and I've been so fortunate to work at really iconic and great brands. Like there's no brand on my CV that like I look at today and go why wouldn't you want to work at that brand? In my mind I'm biased, but CPK was extra special because I've been a customer of CPK for decades for decades so like literally since I don't know, the mid 90s or perhaps even earlier than that. And as I've moved around the country, which I've done a lot of, I've always had sort of my CPK right as one of my go-to restaurants. So it was just so awesome when I got the call and had the opportunity to come, come here right and say now I can take sort of this personal you know passion that I have for the brand and apply it to helping usher in the next wave of growth.

Speaker 1:

And you mentioned, you have a very diverse background, which is great. I think you bring a kind of a very unique perspective. But you know, from CVS to Best Buy and some of the others you know, when you look at the role, how do you see the role changing and are you bringing kind of a unique perspective to CPK that may not have existed before?

Speaker 2:

You know, I think lots of people are talking about and have written about the ever evolving CMO role, right, I think it is one of those roles that has evolved significantly over the past several years.

Speaker 2:

As you know, the consumer has evolved and as the business landscape is evolving and as technology becomes and data right becomes more a central focus for ways to drive the business, and I love that, I love the fact that you um to me, to be a modern CMO, you've got to be, um, all the marketing things, um, and you've got to be data-driven, you've got to think like a CFO, you've got to be a general and have a general manager mindset, um, and all those things are very appealing to me.

Speaker 2:

Um, and I think you know, like many other CMOs, you know a diverse background similar to what I have, but there are plenty of other paths helps set one up to face the challenges right in this role today, especially in an industry in the restaurant industry, right which is very dynamic and is constantly faced with challenges. You know ones that we love to work on, but challenges nonetheless. So, you know, I appreciate the fact that I didn't have, maybe, a linear path getting here, and I remember years ago, earlier in my career, maybe mid stage, somebody asking me do you want to be a CMO? And at that time I said no. I said no because at the time I saw it in a more narrow context and I didn't think that I fit the bill just given my skill, set and interests. But fast forward right. Several years later now it's a fantastic role and a fantastic platform, you know when put at the right brand, inside the right organization to drive growth.

Speaker 1:

Excellent and we'll talk a little bit about some of the things you have in the works and you've rolled out recently. But you know you talked about some of the changes that you're seeing in the industry. It's a big topic within our community. We've had some CMOs on the show recently in S4P's, marketing from Cracker Barrel and Papa John's and others about just how the industry is changing right Fast casual, QSR, the more fine dining restaurants. There's a little bit of disruption going on within the restaurant industry. How do you see the fast casual industry changing and how, maybe, are your customers changing and how are you even adapting to that?

Speaker 2:

There's so many changes, how could we possibly count them all right? As a disruptor between you know what we do in full service and what the traditional QSRs do right In limited service. And you know fast casual, of course, created an opportunity for consumers that ended up taking from both segments, right Above and below, and so that's been a major factor that has driven, you know, brands like us in the full service category to really think about how we modernize and streamline the experience that we deliver to make sure that we can also, you know, adapt to consumers' expectations, given that they now have all of these fast casual experiences and brands right to meet their needs. Then, of course, I mean you've got you know the impact of COVID, you know, which is hard to believe, was five years ago but still is with us today right in terms of those lasting impacts Not only on the consumer and their expectation, but also on, you know, how consumers like to order and consume, right, the sort of acceleration of digital and then also on the labor force, which impacts us quite a bit as a restaurant, you know. Then then, of course, you've got the consumer themselves, who have gone through major transformations, both with the technology and power that they have in their hands and you know, their navigation of the macroeconomic environment, right, and all of its ups and downs.

Speaker 2:

I mean, I could go on and on, and none of these things are new, right, that's what we all talk about all the time, but it does, you know, keep an industry like ours on our toes. Because, right, this sort of confluence of factors that all of which are fluid at any given time, and so I think you know it requires a certain level of leadership now in, and decision making in, the industry, which is, we have to move and adapt at such a higher, right, speed than ever before, and that requires change in leadership and culture, right, um, within organizations, we have to be more data driven, and that requires new capabilities right inside organizations. I could go on and on, but all of that equals amazing opportunity and it's a fantastic time.

Speaker 1:

It definitely is for sure. Well, I know your company's getting old, right 40-year anniversary. I know you have a new promotional campaign, rebranding very exciting things that you're going through. I think I saw a tagline you're 40 or we're 40 and we're fine with it. You're looking at streetwear, fashion and culture to stay connected with today's consumers. How did that promotion come about? What does it mean to the brand and how big of an undertaking was that?

Speaker 2:

Okay, well, first of all, I'm going to, you know, politely contest that we're old, but I'll use that as a way to talk about what we did in our 40th anniversary campaign. So, if you'll oblige me for a minute, I'm going to rewind. I'm going to rewind and set the stage for the context, because that will help explain why we did what we did here recently, you know. So, when I came into the brand a year ago or so and was taking stock of everything, you know, one of the things I learned right away is that the CPK brand is actually very strong still from an awareness and, more importantly, equity standpoint just a ton of positive sentiment around the brand, you know, which isn't always the case for a brand that has been around for 40 years. Right, people know CPK and they love CPK. It's really sort of rooted in these, in nostalgia and these fond memories that many people have growing up with the brand. Okay, great, what's the problem then? The problem was we're not top of mind, and that's not that surprising when you consider, you know, we've been around for 40 years. There's a lot of newer restaurants that have come around since then and, frankly, we in recent years had not been investing in, you know, brand marketing, as you would call it. We just haven't for all sorts of reasons. So, you know, we had a little bit of a deficit there, but I knew that the brand didn't need to be relaunched. The brand needed to be rejuvenated, okay, so that was sort of the order of business. Then we looked ahead and we said, well, great, you know, we've got. First of all, we and there was some press about this several months ago we overhauled our agency roster and we hired, for the first time ever, a true sort of integrated creative agency. That's also, you know, working with us on social strategy and brand strategy. Okay, and we had never had a partner of that scope and of that caliber before. So that was a big deal to help us start to rejuvenate the brand through these means.

Speaker 2:

Okay, so then we look ahead to the 40th anniversary and we said, wow, what an amazing milestone that's coming up in March of 2025. What are we going to do? And though, internally we knew it was a huge milestone and something to be so proud of, right, 40 years doing what we do is amazing. But we also had the humility to understand that, like, the general consumer shouldn't and doesn't care when brands have birthdays and brands like to celebrate their birthdays all the time, right, but who cares? I mean, you know I'm being a little bit dramatic, but so we said, okay, we are not going to approach this in that traditional navel gazing way. We have to flip this on its head. We can use the milestone right as a way to usher in this sort of era of brand rejuvenation and modernity, but, but we're not going to do it in a traditional way. Okay, so fast forward.

Speaker 2:

And the concept that we ended up moving forward with which we basically just did in the last few weeks, is we said what is the most human way that we can turn 40? Maybe even the most California way, because, of course, we are a brand rooted in California. Well, when people turn 40, what happens? They kind of want to deny it, right, Because no one really loves turning 40 and some people even may have a bit of a midlife crisis. So that's what we did. We said we want to be relatable, right, we want to humanize the brand. We want to do something and say something that has personality. We want to get people talking about cpk. Get people talking about CPK. So the idea was we're going to feign a midlife crisis and the midlife crisis would eventually be resolved to reveal our true brand campaign.

Speaker 2:

But the midlife crisis, we did for three days and we literally designed, created and launched, with all seriousness, a fake rebrand. And the fake rebrand was um. What a lot of people, a lot of people, saw um starting on march 21st and a lot of people reacted to and it was streetwear culture inspired and it was. You know, it was harsh and it was young and it was a little off kilter and it was preposterous and it was definitely not CPK and it created the buzz and, honestly, confusion that we intended and we saw that play out in social and in media, et cetera, etc.

Speaker 2:

Well, three days later, we, you know, revealed that it was a ruse and we came out with our true sort of first brand campaign of this 40th anniversary year, which had the tagline that you said, mark, we're 40 and fine with it. And the way that we got there was through a partnership with I know we'll talk about, you know, actor and CPA superfan, busy Phillips. You know, actor and CPK super fan, busy Phillips, who was the hero of the campaign to essentially usher us in to our 40th anniversary in a place of peace, and not just peace but positivity about right, reminding us and everybody why CPK was great in the first place. And it was a way for us to say that's what we do. What we do is unique and relevant still and we're going to keep doing it. But now you sort of see us with this new personality that engages people, particularly younger demos, in a different way and that will persist going forward.

Speaker 1:

Okay, so you teased it a little bit. The partnership with Busy Phillips looks like she has a history with the brand, which is also something great to have from an authenticity perspective. How did the partnership with Busy Phillips come about and what did that mean to you? And kind of the bigger picture of the rebrand the not the rebrand, just the buzz that you were driving so significantly for the brand.

Speaker 2:

Busy Phillips. I mean, I really don't think you could come up with a better partner, a better celebrity partner for a brand, and brands use celebrities all the time, right, it's like they've done it for decades in advertising. Cpk has not really done it, but you couldn't find something better because her connectivity to the brand and, as you said, mark, her authenticity is sort of through the through the through the roof, and that's really what is needed today with modern consumers, right, who just aren't interested in slick advertising campaigns that talk to you even if they have celebrities in front of them. They're right, they want authenticity and relatability. So Busy Phillips was a CPK employee before. She was a famous actor and she was a CPK employee twice, not once, but twice in high school in Arizona and then later in college in LA, and she worked at the brand Okay. And then, secondly, since then, she has continued as a super fan of the brand, which is crazy. We didn't even realize just how much of a fan she was until we really got in into this arrangement with her. But she loves CPK, she still goes to CPK, she knows who the founders are, she knows the things on the menu today and yesterday she's got a lot to say Okay.

Speaker 2:

Third, we looked at her as somebody who, as a woman in their forties which she is, but thriving, right and sort of being in that stage of life with zest and, you know, achievements and positivity, she was like a great Sherpa, if you will, right For a brand moving into its forties. And then, lastly, her sense of humor and sarcasm played very well into basically the campaign, which was a mockumentary style, and so we couldn't have cast anyone better than her. So you know, the fit was fantastic. She's been a fantastic partner who's gone above and beyond to promote the partnership. We still have more elements of it coming to market in the coming weeks. We haven't even released everything. It's been great, I think, for the brand and just a really fantastic fit.

Speaker 1:

That's awesome. So when you look at the partnership, customer loyalty, authenticity, customer experience are very important to you. You know how does customer loyalty and customer experience what does it mean to you first, and how does it fit in with everything that you're doing at CBK?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, oh gosh, okay, Well, it's such a robust and rich topic. Of course, as you know, this is your area of expertise. You know, I think customer loyalty is so much I mean I'm preaching to the choir now, mark, I know but it's so much more than loyalty programs. People always want to talk about loyalty programs, and we definitely do and we can talk about that, but it's so much more than that. Right, that's a thing that we offer, but loyalty is really what lives inside the customer's hearts and minds. Right, with respect to a brand that drives behaviors that maybe are, you know, over and above their behaviors with other brands and perhaps even go into stages of irrational right decision making. Right, because there's emotional connection.

Speaker 2:

So when we think about you know, all the ways to garner or cultivate customer loyalty. It's multifaceted and we have to be working on those and measuring those all the time. You know it starts in the restaurant, with the experience that we deliver. Right, and how we treat our guests and how we treat them like they're the most important guest. Right, whether they're a loyalty member or not, whether it was their first visit or their 25th visit, and that is something we have to do every day as a building block to earning loyalty, right, and service and hospitality, but also, you know, the food itself, right, because at the end of the day, that's the core of the experience.

Speaker 2:

You know, we certainly think about how we make the experience of CPK to our guests more relevant and more personalized. Again, every brand is talking about this and pursuing it in different ways, but we know it is so critical towards again building those loyal emotions and loyal behaviors. So you know, there's all sorts of things that we are working on to drive relevancy so that when we're showing up and talking to consumers or talking to our guests or even delivering the experience, whether digital or in real life, you know that it's their experience Right, it's not a one size, one size fits all and they can really feel like this is a brand for me that knows me and gets me, you know. And then the rewards program itself, you know, is a mechanism, right, a mechanism on top of all of those things or, in some cases, a way to help deliver on those things.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely. And customer loyalty is not just the program, as you mentioned right. It's kind of a more holistic approach to the customer, customer centricity. And we see that there's bifurcation between brands who truly focus on the customer, who truly listen to and understand, tailor offerings to them, and those who don't. And there also is kind of a bifurcation right now when they look at customer loyalty and customer experience as is it a cost. Is it investment and is it priorit cost? Is it investment and is it prioritized organization? Yeah, you look at this. How is customer loyalty prioritized within your organization?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, you know, before I answer that, I just wanted to make one other comment, which is, you know, I think one of the things that gives me so much positivity about CPK and that would feel very fortunate is that we are a brand that has sort of such embedded loyalty already. Remember, at the beginning I was talking about the emotional connection people have with the brand, the fact that it's rooted in nostalgia, the fact that a lot of people grew up with it and have been coming to CPK over the various cycles of their life, because that's just the way that the brand has played out. We already kind of have the foundational loyalty as a brand, you know, and one that is not as transactional, so it's a great foundation to build upon. Okay, so you were asking about how it's prioritized. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I mean right now. It's actually, I would say, both at the broad level that we talked about a minute ago and in the specific context of loyalty program or loyalty marketing.

Speaker 2:

We're putting a very significant priority on the space right now and on the first hand, when we think about and talk about all of those different methods by which we garner consumer loyalty and guest loyalty. You know, all of those areas. We have specific KPIs and measures right that we focus on constantly, all the way from our corporate office down to every general manager. So we're monitoring right and measuring all sorts of things around guest sentiment and loyalty and behavior and so on and so forth. And then in the specific context of, you know, loyalty programming, this is a huge effort and focus area for us right now and is something we're working on behind the scenes and you know we can talk about that more at a future date, of course.

Speaker 2:

But we're taking a fresh look and you know I can certainly talk about our current rewards program today. We're taking a fresh look at it. It's been around for, I mean, more than 11 years, okay, and has been a good program for CPK, but, in all candor, it's a legacy program and it's a very traditional program and it's a one size fits all program and those things are not the way of the future and do not align with our go forward strategy. So we're doing a lot of great work now strategy and design work to reimagine what that can look like to be a win-win for our guests and for the business and growth and profitability, and I'm really excited about some of the things we're working on in that space.

Speaker 1:

High level. I know we've touched on a number of different things today. High level how are you looking at reimagining the Customer Experience, Customer Loyalty Program? How has the program actually evolved today and how do you see it going forward?

Speaker 2:

You know. I mean, I don't purport to have the full history from the 13 years or whatever that it's been around, but it hasn't evolved that much, to be honest. The program's gone through a couple of tweaks over the years, but it's essentially sort of the same kind of program we've had for a while and again, it's not that there's anything wrong with it. It actually, you know, sort of operates like a lot of restaurant loyalty programs. It's point-based right. You earn a dollar, you earn a point for every dollar you spend and every time you hit a certain threshold in our case it's 75 points you get a $5 kickback right To use on an upcoming visit. We have tiers. You know you can, by your points achievement, you can unlock different tiers of membership which come with additional benefits. We've got an app right that helps you with your experience, but you don't have to be an app user and it's the same for every guest. So, fundamentally right, as we've been thinking about what a loyalty program that is fit for purpose in today's day and age, both for the business and the guests, looks like, a lot of those things will look different at cpk in the future. Most notably, you know, one size fits all um, we want to simplify for the guest.

Speaker 2:

Simplify for guests. I don't want them to have to go through all sorts of mental gymnastics to figure out what they have to do or what they're going to get at a restaurant that they may only come to. Right, but a handful of times a year, right, if that? So simplify. We want it to feel like every guest has a chance at getting value back, not just those who come 16 times a year, and we want a program that is not feeling transactional. We want it to feel like it's truly us appreciating our guests and giving them something of value right when they come in, and giving them something of value right when they come in and as a mechanism for us to treat them as individuals, with personalization and relevant experiences. So all of that and more is being baked into what we're designing, and I'm excited for it.

Speaker 2:

I just I see a lot of cookie cutter. I'd love to talk to you about this, because you see more than I do. I see a lot of cookie cutter. I'd love to talk to you about this, because you see more than I do. I see a lot of me, too, and a lot of cookie cutter in the marketplace in terms of loyalty programs and yet a lot of hype about them, and I think we want to kind of cut through the hype and make sure that we're really doing something that is unique and meaningful and it's going to drive the business.

Speaker 1:

Well, this has been a fabulous interview, dawn. It's great to get to know you, great to get to know a little bit about the program, some of the 40th anniversary pieces that you've rolled out and are rolling out, but, most importantly, kind of the reimagining of the program. Your passion, your vision you have for the offering is great to hear. That doesn always exist, but, uh and but I think brands, as you mentioned earlier, yeah, that have a focus on customer centricity, have a true focus and understanding the customer or at least an interest in having that understanding and keeping up with the customer.

Speaker 1:

you know they set the pace, they set the bar within this, uh, this industry and you bet you guys are doing some great things and looking forward to learning more uh in in the coming year. For sure that would be great. All All right, great Well. Thank you everyone also for joining us today. On the Leaders in Customer Loyalty series. Make sure you join us every Thursday for a new episode and until then, we look forward to having you back. Thank you, Thanks.