US Pizza Latest Brand To Change the Meaning of Their Name To Avoid Boycotts
Recently, we reported about ZUS Coffee rewriting its origin story linking it to the Greek god after customers threatened to boycott it.
Now, US Pizza may change its name to ‘KITA Pizza, jumping on the bandwagon of multiple brands attempting to disassociate themselves from countries that support Israel in its ongoing war with Palestine to avoid being boycotted by Malaysians.
‘US Pizza’ doesn’t Apparently Refer to the United States
A notice by Wealth Link Freedom Sdn Bhd, the company operating the US Pizza outlet in Taman Prima Saujana, Kajang, Selangor went viral lately. The brand emphasised that it is a “Muslim business entity” and its CEO Mohd Sobree Ali said, “This company belongs to my family and myself.”
Bizarrely, the notice read, "Kindly be informed that US Pizza refers to the word 'us' ('kita' in Malay). It is totally a local incorporated company.” We think the obvious visual of the star in the logo, the use or red, white, and blue, and usage of typical Americana symbols must have confused all of us. It's obviously 'kita' and not United States based on its design.
US Pizza, founded by American pizza maker Donald Duncan in the 1990s, established its first Malaysian outlet in 1997.
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Notice Retracted
Malaysiakini later reported that the company had retracted the notice after it went viral because their explanation had yet to be discussed with the franchise's headquarters. Mohd Sobree told the portal that he indeed does interpret the 'US' in the brand name as the pronoun 'us' to welcome all people to his restaurant although the issue hasn’t been cleared with the head office.
Another one (brand name) bites the crust
On 18 November, the official Facebook page for US Pizza Malaysia has uploaded a post asking its followers if they wanted them to change names. The post featured Malaysian, Palestine, and US flags and declared that if the post received 10,000 likes and comments, they would change their name to ‘Kita Pizza’. In addition, they would carry the tagline “pizza professional” in Malay instead of the former tagline “the pizza professionals”.
As of the time of writing, the post has received 2.7k likes and over 600 comments. Many users suggested that they change their name to ‘MY Pizza’ instead and seemed to be in support of the name change. However, there was a smattering of users who seemed opposed to the move, saying, “Preparing to ban this pizza permanently if really change name walaupun sangat sedap dan (even though it’s very delicious and) yummy,”
Donating to Palestine
In a separate Facebook post, US Pizza ran a campaign whereby customers who showed the post to their cashier at the outlets would be entitled to a ‘Buy 1 Free 1’ promotion. “Someone said US = Untuk Semua! We heard you gais!!!”, the caption read.
“US Pizza will also be donating RM 1 from every receipt to a renowned Palestinian humanitarian aid organisation. Don’t worry! US Pizza does not pay royalties to the U.S.”, it added.
What do you think: US Pizza, Kita Pizza, or My Pizza?
Image credit: facebook.com/USPizzaMalaysia, reddit: u/Hyshegu