Papa Johns promotes Anne Fischer to chief marketing and digital officer

Pizza chain Papa Johns International today promoted Anne Fischer to chief marketing and digital officer. Fischer, who had been serving as senior VP, customer experience at Papa Johns, will expand her responsibilities to include brand and advertising; media and field activation; and menu strategy and product innovation, in addition to continuing to oversee customer experience, the company stated. She reports to Max Wetzel, executive VP, chief commercial officer, and will join Papa Johns’ executive leadership team. Fischer fills a role held most recently by Wetzel, who was promoted to his current position in October. “Anne’s strategic thought leadership and creativity have been essential to the success of Papa Johns digital marketing success over the past three years, so we are especially thrilled with her promotion to CMDO,” Wetzel said in a statement. “Digital innovation continues to be an enormous long-term growth opportunity for our brand. Anne’s deep expertise in cutting-edge digital marketing, including leading our loyalty program, aggregator partnerships and our tech-enabled customer experience initiatives, brings a unique perspective and skill set to the CMDO role and will help Papa Johns continue to be a leader in our category.” Fischer's promotion comes as the chain is commencing a strategic plan to renovate its restaurants and adopt a more premium positioning in the quick-service pizza field. New branding, which includes a new logo that removes the apostrophe—a subtle reminder of its break with its controversial founder John Schattner—will begin rolling out this year. Fischer joined Papa Johns in 2015 as senior director, digital marketing, where her duties included growing the chain's Papa Rewards digital loyalty app which doubled in size under her watch. Fischer also helped drive growth of Papa Johns' aggregator partnerships. which refers to third-party partners involved with delivery. “Contributing to Papa Johns transformation and return to growth has been a highlight of my career,” Fischer said in a statement. “Papa Johns has long been a digital-first brand, leveraging technology to deliver our customers the highest quality, best value pizza and food wherever and however they want to order." Subscribe to Ad Age now for the latest industry news and analysis. Prior to Papa Johns, Fischer was the marketing director at SeaWorld Parks & Entertainment. She began her career at Walt Disney World. Papa Johns is the world’s third-largest pizza delivery company with more than 5,500 locations in 50 countries and territories. It is headquartered in Louisville, Kentucky.

Papa Johns promotes Anne Fischer to chief marketing and digital officer

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