On 8 May, the American pizza restaurant chain Pizza Hut announced its collaboration campaign ahead of Mother’s Day on 11 May. To the surprise of many, the partner of the Pizza Hut Mother’s Day campaign is Lao Gan Ma (老干妈), the popular chilli sauce brand from Guizhou of Southwest China. It’s worth noting that China celebrates Mother’s Day on the same day as the United States, on the second Sunday in May, instead of in March, like on this side of the pond.
The co-branded item is a pizza called “My Love for You is Hot” (辣么爱你, la me ai ni). It is a play on “那么爱你” (na me ai ni, lit. Love You So Much) as some dialects will pronounce the “na” at the beginning as “la”. The dish looks like a classic beef-topped Pizza Hut offering with the additional chilli sauce added on top, with all the dry chilli flakes from Lao Gan Ma. It will set you back 59 RMB apiece (8.15 USD). And of course, the choice of partner is also a play on the name, as Lao Gan Ma literally means Ol’ Godmother (gan ma does not have the religious undertone of a godmother but serves a similar role for a child).
Given Pizza Hut’s recent collab track record, it is perhaps not surprising that it has chosen a Chinese sauce maker to celebrate not just mothers, but godmothers as well. This past April Fool’s Day, the restaurant chain launched special “white snake” and “green snake” pizzas, serpentine-shaped, pure filled crusts, one cheese-flavoured and the other pistachio-flavoured. Unexpected Chinese fusion flavours such as the coriander pig’s ear pizza and coriander century egg pizza from 2023 and 2024, turns classic Chinese cold dishes into pizza toppings.
Pizza Hut has been embracing the “abstract” humour, or absurd and postmodern, post-ironic humour that is popular among Gen-Z consumers. But like most campaigns, despite the shock value, the recipe itself usually makes sense. Chilli sauce on pizza should not be a problem if fusing Chinese flavours into the pizzas anyway. The Italians, however, might not approve of this.
Need to boost your China strategy? Dao Pro delivers bespoke insights on marketing, innovation, and digital trends, direct from Chinese sources. Find out more from our Dao Strategy Team here.
