The pizza dining sector has been in a downsizing mode in 2026 with several chains closing numerous locations for a variety of reasons.
Some of the biggest and most popular chains, such as Pizza Hut and Papa John’s, plan to close 100s for restaurants in 2006 to rid themselves of properties that have become a financial burden.
Boston-based pizza dining chain Bertucci’s, which has filed for bankruptcy three times in the last eight years, has also closed dozens of locations.
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Bertucci’s closes another location
Bertucci’s most recently shuttered its last Washington, D.C.-area location with the closing of its Springfield, Va., restaurant at the end of September, according to the Washington Business Journal.
The 45-year-old pizza chain, which at one time had over 100 locations, has 11 remaining restaurants in Massachusetts, Delaware, and Pennsylvania.
Bertucci’s, which was established in 1981, grew slowly as it opened its second and third locations in Massachusetts in 1985, and accelerated to 14 locations by 1989. The company would eventually open over 100 locations, from New Hampshire to Florida and as far west as Illinois.
Closed over 40 locations
The company’s growth reversed course, and it closed over 40 locations by the time it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in April 2018, with 59 locations remaining open, Nation’s Restaurant News reported at the time.
Bertucci’s Brick Oven Pizza & Pasta had downsized to 31 locations when it filed for bankruptcy a second time in December 2022 and closed 15 more units before filing its most recent petition on April 24, 2025.
The pizza chain blamed a trend of consumer demand shifting away from legacy casual-dining restaurants for its third Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing.
Bertucci’s attempted a new concept that it called Pronto at its downtown Boston location at 22 Tremont Street on April 23, 2025, the day before filing its last petition.
The Pronto Tremont fast-casual location, the first of its kind in the chain, was “designed for busy city life, built around speed, and fired in our signature brick oven,” the restaurant’s website revealed when it was launched. The new restaurant was designed as a take-out location, where guests place an order at the counter or online and take their food to go.
Bertucci’s features a large variety of pizzas, Tuscan chicken wings, soups, and fresh-baked focaccia sandwiches. The restaurant discontinued a morning menu from 7 a.m. to 11 a.m., which featured such items as the croast, a toasted croissant with smashed avocado and fried egg, or a bacon, egg, and cheese pizza.
Other chains closing locations include Pizza Hut, whose parent Yum Brands said it would shutter 250 underperforming restaurants as part of its Hut Forward plan in the first half of 2026. Papa John’s announced in its fourth-quarter earnings call that it will close 200 locations by the end of 2026.
Chuck E. Cheese closed locations
The owner of Chuck E. Cheese, CEC Entertainment Concepts LP, has closed six restaurant locations so far in 2026, after not renewing certain leases of the locations.
CEC Entertainment, however, did not give a specific reason for closing the restaurants, but indicated that the closures are a common practice of footprint management.
Adjusting real estate strategy
“As leases expire, markets evolve, and consumer preferences shift, we adjust our real estate strategy accordingly,” CEC Entertainment spokesperson Allison Chouinard told The Star.
“This is how we manage a national footprint across 45 states and should not be interpreted as an indication of financial or operational distress,” CEC Senior Director Alejandra Brady told WBOC.
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