Chapter Fourteen - The American Dream in a Cardboard Box

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

The American Dream in a Cardboard Box

I ALMOST SKIPPED Little Caesars, man. We gotta talk about Little Caesars.

Where do I even start with the Caesars?

Let’s just begin here: Hot-N-Ready. That’s a memory, right there. My grandpa used to pick it up for us when I lived with him and my grandma. It got repetitive sometimes, but I liked it. And the older I got, the more I learned to appreciate just how hot and how ready it really was.

As a kid, you don’t think about the business model. You’re not paying for it. You’re not picking it up. You’re not waiting on it. But when you grow up and it’s you going out, whether it’s picking up food for the family or you're broke and with a buddy and you’ve only got six or seven bucks, you walk into Little Caesars and they say, “We got a pepperoni pizza right here with your name on it.”

What else can you ask for in life?

Name one other pizza place you can walk into and say, “Do you have a pizza ready right now?”
Who’s telling you yes, other than Little Caesars?

Where are you going?

Oh, and don’t even get me started on the Kmart Little Caesars. Oh my God. When Kmart used to have that Little Caesars inside? That was it. Walking in with my dad and my sister, grabbing some Italian cheese bread and dipping sauce, taking a break from shopping, maybe putting something on layaway for Christmas.

And then boom. Cheese bread, warmth, and holiday lights in the background. That’s life. That’s the moment.

What more could a human ask for?

That right there? That’s the American dream.

Little Caesars. Hot. Ready. Exactly what your soul didn’t know it needed. They never needed anything more than that pepperoni pizza. They could’ve thrown out the rest of the menu and the business model still would’ve worked.

That’s all you ever needed, guys.