Incredible story behind how popular chain pioneered online food orders

Modern tech has given us some conveniences that have become hard to imagine living without.

If you’re in a new city and you’re reliant on Google Maps, what would you do if the tech suddenly vanished? If you’re stood waiting for a friend for 10 minutes and mobile phones have ceased to exist, for how long do you wait before deciding to go and do something else?

If you’re absolutely starving on a Tuesday night and you can’t bring yourself to cook something or drag yourself to the shop for something microwaveable, what would you do if you couldn’t order a pizza with a few taps on your phone?

It’s not just thanks to the smartphone that you (probably) won’t have to face these ordeals – one particularly adventurous pizza chain played its part in shaping the mod cons of online orders, and they kicked off a trend that’s evolved into near-banal commonplaceness.

That brand was none other than Pizza Hut.

Pizza Hut pioneered much of the modern pizza world (jetcityimage/Getty Images)

The first pizza ever to be sold online was a Pizza Hut pie featuring pepperoni, mushrooms and extra cheese, and it was all made possible by PizzaNet.

By signing in to pizzahut.com in 1994, customers in California could access the cutting-edge PizzaNet where orders could be placed and deliveries could be rendered.

The rest is history.

While PizzaNet was the dial-up era monstrosity you would expect, its influence will echo in eternity. It first launched in Santa Cruz in 1994 and, while it likely took longer to load the website up and input the order than it would over the phone - honestly, if you never experienced dial-up internet connections then you don’t understand the meaning of ‘slow’ - customers were nevertheless excited to give the new tech a try.

And naturally, the service came on leaps and bounds in the following years.

15 years after PizzaNet graced CRT monitors and tower PCs featuring a whopping 5KB of RAM, Pizza Hut launched its mobile app.

This 2009 launch came two years after Pizza Hut had introduced a tracking feature to its online orders system to give customers an accurate gauge of when their pizza would arrive. If that sounds familiar, it’s because any app that involves waiting for an order is likely to feature it.

We've come a long way (Pizza Hut)

With the app rolled out, Pizza Hut said its mobile sales jumped by 4,000% in its first three years.

“Pizza Hut has a long history of digital innovation - from launching PizzaNet in 1994 to becoming one of the first in the industry to offer mobile ordering,” said Pizza Hut global chief digital and technology officer Jim Dausch in a conversation with Food & Wine.

“Today, that legacy continues with the recent launch of Pizza Hut’s all-new Book It! mobile app to inspire the next generation of readers and brand fans.”