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Papa John's (PZZA) Declares Expansion Plans for Boston

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World’s third largest pizza delivery company, Papa John’s International, Inc. (PZZA - Free Report) is geared up to expand further in Boston, MA.

The company has inked a restaurant development agreement with 1630 Pizza Company LLC, which is owned and operated by two long-term franchisees. Per the agreement, 25 restaurants will be built in the course of the next five years.

As of Sep 25, the company operated 4,971 Papa John’s restaurants in 50 states of the United States as well as in 44 international countries and territories worldwide.

Meanwhile, we note that, large scale international expansion has been the backbone of Papa John’s operations recently. At present the company has more than 1500 international restaurants and is planning to expand in Brazil, Honduras, Uruguay and the Bahamas. Moreover, it has already inked restaurant development agreements in countries including Egypt, Mexico, Russia, Spain, and the Netherlands.

On the back of these ventures along with the company’s focus on menu innovation, international expansion and technological upgrades, Papa John’s currently holds a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

Moreover, shares of the company have widely outpaced the Zacks categorized Retail-Restaurants industry over the past one year. While the industry grew a little over 4%, Papa John’s recorded a massive gain of nearly 71% over the same time period.



However, the company’s considerable international presence makes it highly vulnerable to fluctuations in currency translations. Also, an increasing wage rate environment and a challenging industry backdrop, remain potent causes of concern for most restaurateurs like Restaurant Brands International, Inc. (QSR - Free Report) and Brinker International, Inc. (EAT - Free Report) .

Nevertheless, the demand for pizzas is hardly ever going to go down and pizza giants like Papa John’s and Domino’s Pizza, Inc. (DPZ - Free Report) ride on this certitude. Also, Papa John’s commitment to provide quality food to its customers seems to appeal to the health conscious customers. All these factors leave us hopeful about the stock’s prospects, despite certain headwinds.

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