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Who doesn’t love pizza? Apparently, nobody — well, that’s if the sheer number of pizza chains in the United States is anything to go by. Pizza feels like one of the safest bets you can make for a food business, and this has led to an endless string of pizza chains jostling for supremacy in what sometimes feels like an oversaturated market. Plus, for every titan like Domino’s, Pizza Hut, and one pizza chain that we bet you didn’t know is the biggest in the country, there are multiple restaurants that are struggling to keep the lights on. Running a pizza chain isn’t as easy as it looks, and in 2025 there are tons of them that may soon go out of business.
While some struggling pizza chains are regional, others are a little bigger than you might think. Former big stars of the pizza scene like MOD Pizza and Pie Five have been clinging on by their fingertips in the last few years, due to rocky economic circumstances and fierce competition. Elsewhere, beloved long-time chains like Mary’s Pizza Shack seem unable to keep up with a modern pace and seem an inch away from closing for good. You’d better hope that your favorite pizza joint isn’t on this list, folks — otherwise, you may well be disappointed quite soon.
1. Pie Five
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Pie Five’s rise was pretty meteoric, and its fall has come about just as quickly. The pizza concept first opened its doors in June 2011, and for around five and a half years it grew at an exponential rate. Its promise of a super-speedy pizza in just five minutes chimed with customers, and thanks to a franchising operation it reached 100 locations by February 2017. It seemed like the sky was the limit for Pie Five, but things started to take a turn for the worse. Its stores started to shut as quickly as they opened, and by the end of fiscal 2018, it had 73 units. Just three years later, it had 33.
Cut to 2025, and Pie Five is operating just 19 restaurants – and things don’t look like they’re picking up any time soon. In May 2025, RAVE Restaurant Group (the owner of Pie Five and Pizza Inn) announced that the brand had seen a 5.6% decrease in same-store sales since the previous year. RAVE has tried to keep its Pie Five locations feeling busy and brisk by operating Pizza Inn ghost kitchens in its restaurants, but that doesn’t seem to have made it any more appealing to customers. To us, Pie Five’s downfall looks like a lesson in trying to expand too quickly. Don’t run before you can walk, folks.
2. Pieology
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There was a time when Pieology looked as though it was going to take over. Back in 2015 it was the fastest-growing chain in America, with 60 units across 11 states and dozens more restaurants in the works. Pieology built its name on its food’s highly customizable nature, as well as having one of the best chain garlic breads out there, and championed gluten-free crusts and dairy-free cheese at a time when these ingredients were relatively niche. The future looked nothing but bright for this concept.
Cut to the present day, however, and Pieology is in serious trouble. In the years following the rocky market created by the COVID-19 pandemic, the chain began losing stores at a rapid pace, with 8.4% of its units closing in 2023. In 2024 its sales were astonishingly bad, falling by over 10%, and it was forced to shut even more locations. This bad luck continued in 2025, and the year has seen a string of closures for Pieology, with restaurants in California shutting up shop for good. It’s unclear whether the concept is going to be able to bring itself back from the brink, particularly in such a competitive market.
3. MOD Pizza
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MOD Pizza has had a tough couple of years, folks. This brand was once seen as the future of pizza: Starting its life in 2008, it built its name on offering highly modifiable (hence the name) pizzas made with fresh, wholesome ingredients, and served in an atmosphere that felt welcoming and convivial. For a while, MOD Pizza did exceptionally well, and it even managed to defy wider industry trends during the COVID-19 pandemic. In fiscal 2020 it opened 22 net stores, finishing the year with almost 500 units, and saw its digital revenue increase by almost 300% as the world pivoted to online ordering.
With all that good fortune, it’s pretty wild that MOD Pizza is now in as much trouble as it is. Despite keeping busy serving food to its customers and testing out new menu items, in July 2024 MOD announced that it was exploring ways to avoid bankruptcy and brought in a new owner in an attempt to keep itself afloat. Industry commentators noted that the business had attempted to expand way too aggressively, and while things looked good on paper, behind the scenes it was unable to sustain momentum. As of 2025 its luck hasn’t improved much, and the concept is still announcing closures of its stores.
4. Old Chicago Pizza and Taproom
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Old Chicago Pizza and Taproom has had almost a half-century to build its brand in the pizza space. The chain (which, contrary to what its name suggests, was started in Boulder, Colorado) specializes in serving a combo of good pizza and even better beer, with a massive selection of the latter for all those brew aficionados out there. While you’d think this was a winning formula, it doesn’t seem to be paying dividends more recently. In 2024 Old Chicago Pizza and Taproom saw its sales drop by a dramatic 16.4% since the previous year, and it also closed almost 20% of all of its restaurants, leaving just 59 of them in operation.
SPB Hospitality, the company that owned Old Chicago Pizza and Taproom, seemed to scramble into action, selling off various other concepts so that it could focus on turning around its pizza chain. However, just months later, it announced that it was giving up the ghost entirely. July 2025 saw the sale of Old Chicago Pizza and Taproom by SPB Hospitality to an unknown buyer. This move was preceded by even more Old Chicago restaurants closing across the country. This feels like it could be the last gasp of a dying brand.
5. Fired Pie
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Fired Pie’s rise and fall has been pretty rapid. The concept was founded in 2013 by former employees of California Pizza Kitchen, and within six months it had opened four restaurants. These units were followed by more, then more, as the chain built its name. However, behind the scenes there were a host of personnel changes, with two of the owners eventually leaving and the final remaining party, Doug Doyle, left with a hefty debt to settle. This was coupled with a decline in footfall to Fired Pie stores and destructive inflation, pushing prices and lending ever higher.
As a result, in November 2024, Fired Pie announced that it was filing for bankruptcy. With 13 units remaining, the bankruptcy claim was pursued so that the company could rebalance the books, with Doyle also stating that some of its stores would have to close. 2025 has seen this prediction take place, with the Fired Pie in Gilbert, Arizona shutting its doors for good. It’s unclear how much longer this chain can weather the storm.
6. Cici’s
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On paper, Cici’s (formerly known as Cici’s Pizza) might not seem like it’s struggling that much at all. The Texas-based company has hundreds of restaurants around the country, and they seem like they do a pretty roaring trade. However, all is not as it appears. In the last few years, Cici’s has seen a significant reversal in its fortunes, with its unit numbers halving in just over a decade. These troubles culminated in a bankruptcy claim in 2021, with Cici’s noting that the pandemic put a huge dent in its ability to continue operating as it normally would.
This announcement was followed by a restructuring effort, which allowed the company to re-emerge from its bankruptcy and look forward to better times. While there has been talk of it making a comeback, though, it seems as though it’s still struggling. Throughout 2025, Cici’s stores have been closing in states like Tennessee, Alabama, and Florida. Customers have also reported that the general quality of Cici’s has gone downhill, with hygiene standards slipping in its stores. It doesn’t yet look as though it’s out of the woods, and we wouldn’t be surprised if Cici’s has some trouble ahead.
7. &pizza
It’s not uncommon for restaurant concepts to rise up and fall pretty quickly, and &pizza is demonstrating that in real time. The pizza chain began life in 2012, and it soon skyrocketed to success, opening dozens of locations as people fell in love with its oval-shaped pies. Just over a decade later, though, it was shedding units in a bid to stay alive. 2024 saw &pizza lose 22% of its units, while its sales plummeted by a massive 15%.
&pizza’s struggles largely stem from its price: In an ultra-competitive market, its pies stood out for just being too pricey compared to other brands. In May 2025, the restaurant announced that it was slashing its prices across the board, in an attempt to boost customer numbers and bring people back through its doors. Although this may be effective, it’s also an incredibly risky, last-ditch attempt to keep business going, and may result in it compromising quality or simply being unable to keep afloat. It’s unclear yet whether this move will work, and we wouldn’t be surprised if it’s just not enough to revive the flailing brand.
8. Mary’s Pizza Shack
It’s always sad when a much-loved restaurant with decades of history looks as though it’s seriously struggling. That’s why our heart goes out to Mary’s Pizza Shack, the family-run pizza chain that’s been serving pies since 1959. Started by Mary Fazio, the restaurant has been doing a brisk business for years, but in 2024 it looked as though the jig might be up. Following a restructuring in 2022, it announced that it was filing for bankruptcy.
This may not have come as much of a surprise to people who had been observing the restaurant for a while, as there had been a clear downward trajectory for 10 years or so. It reached its peak in 2014 with 20 locations, but this number had halved by 2024 as the business gradually contracted due to rising food and employee costs. The restaurant stressed that its bankruptcy didn’t mean that its existing restaurants were closing, but it’s unclear how it’s going to get itself out of the pickle it now finds itself in. It could be the end of the line for this family-run stalwart of California.
9. Oath Pizza
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Oath Pizza may have once had a bright future, but in the last few years that’s been completely overtaken by the chain’s dramatic troubles. Oath Pizza started life in 2015 in Nantucket, and quickly spread to well over a dozen cities across the country. As time went on, it attracted investors who plunged generous amounts of money into the chain, but the pandemic put a massive dent in its finances. In 2022, CEO Andrew Kellogg told the chain’s investors that the restaurant was insolvent.
Following this, however, investors claimed that Kellogg tried to sell the company under his own steam, by handing the company to himself under a new business name at a nominal price and giving himself an inflated salary. These investors then filed a lawsuit against Kellogg, accusing him of fraud. Following the lawsuit, multiple Oath Pizza locations were closed, and just a year later, the company declared Chapter 7 bankruptcy. At the time of the bankruptcy claim, Oath Pizza had up to $50 million in unpaid debt. We think it’s pretty unlikely that it’ll make a comeback.
10. Bertucci’s
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To be honest, we’re amazed that Bertucci’s has been able to hang on for as long as it has. The popular Italian restaurant chain started life back in 1981, and for 30 years it was doing pretty well, with a peak of over 100 restaurants in the late ’90s. However, since 2011, its sales have been declining, and in 2018 it seemed as though Bertucci’s was past the point of no return. The company filed for bankruptcy in the face of massive unpaid debt and poor performance.
2019 saw a brief bump in sales, but then the COVID-19 pandemic caused Bertucci’s to spiral once more into crisis, with sales continuing to fall in subsequent years. As a result, it had to file for bankruptcy again in 2022, and then once more in 2025. Three times in seven years has to be a record, right? This third bankruptcy was followed by multiple store closures. Bertucci’s has more recently been focusing on the expansion of its fast-casual concept, Bertucci’s Pronto, and while this could perform well in subsequent years, it’s not the best jump-off point for it to start from. The classic Bertucci’s brand, however, looks as though it’s in its final days.
Dining and Cooking