Starting today, eager customers of the US pizza restaurant chain Papa Johns living in one corner of southern North Carolina will have the opportunity to receive their food from the sky, thanks to a new collaboration with Alphabet’s drone company, Wing. But Papa Johns’ signature pizzas won’t be on offer. Instead, drone-loving North Carolinians will have to choose between three kinds of sandwiches, a newer product for the fast-food chain: Philly cheesesteak, chicken bacon ranch, or steak and mushroom varieties.

Drone deliveries are popping up in more communities across the US and the world. Questions about the long-term economics and regulatory picture around unmanned aerial vehicles persist, but Wing boasts partnerships with Walmart, Panera, and DoorDash and is delivering through the sky to customers in four metro areas: Atlanta, Charlotte, Dallas-Fort Worth, and Houston. (In 2019, Wing received the US Federal Aviation Administration’s first certificate allowing a drone delivery company to operate in the country.) Competing drone companies, including Zipline, Amazon Prime Air, and Flytrex, fly packages, medical supplies, and Chipotle burritos in select communities across countries like Ghana, Japan, and the US.

But until very recently, drone operators have struggled to fly full-size pizzas. For companies hoping to break into the food delivery space, this is unfortunate: 11 percent of the US population eats a slice on any given day, according to the US Department of Agriculture. In a fast-diversifying restaurant industry, getting them to customers is still big business. But the realities of physics, engineering, and the restaurant business conspire to make pizzas a challenge for drones.

Flying Pizzas

Traditionally, pizza is the experimental tech delivery of choice. The familiar and cheap cheese-sauce-bread combo has been loaded onto self-driving cars and autonomous sidewalk delivery vehicles and has been assembled by robots. It’s a fast and satisfying option, especially for busy families tight on time. And theoretically, a great fit for automated drones, among one of the faster delivery options—people love fresh, piping-hot pizza.

But transporting one by drone requires some extra work, says Wing CEO Adam Woodworth. “Pizza comes in a very different box, with a big, flat surface area,” he says. They’re not naturally aerodynamic. Also, “you don't want a pizza tilted.”

Wing’s relatively lightweight drones are engineered to carry three specific package sizes; right now, pizza boxes aren’t one of them. Woodworth says a new design is on the horizon. “I want to see pizzas coming at me from the sky,” he says.

Flytrex, an Israel-based drone delivery company, announced late last month that it had finally solved the problem. In collaboration with rival pizza chain Little Caesars, the company began delivering via drone up to two large pizzas (16 inches each), plus sodas and bread, in Wylie, Texas, a suburb of Dallas. The leap comes courtesy of a much bigger new drone, capable of carrying up to 8.8 pounds for four miles.

Unlike Wing’s more conventional flying machine, which resembles a traditional airplane studded with extra propellers, Flytrex’s Sky2 looks more like a flying spider. When pizza is its passenger, a square delivery bag dangles from an attached hook. It took Flytrex two years to execute what cofounder Amit Regev calls the “slightly unique design.” A flat, winglike net attached to the drone helps keep the pizza level as it flies through the air.

The drone has been successfully delivering pizzas in Texas for about five months, the company reports, with hot packages arriving at their delivery spots an average of 4.5 minutes after takeoff. “It’s not the sexiest drone, but it gets it done,” Regev says.

Droning by the Numbers

The bigger challenge of flying pizzas, or any other low-cost food delivery option, isn’t the physics, but the economics. Drone companies need to figure out how to keep down per-delivery costs even as they’re limited by payload constraints (the drones can’t carry too much), their vehicles’ range, weather challenges, and various regulatory hoops. Restaurants need to figure out how to create flying-friendly packaging, train their workers to deal with drone deliveries, and think through the physical space needed to get the machines in and out.

Regev says the decade-old company found through years of trial and error that it needs to depend on retail workers, not its own specially trained drone delivery operators, to make the whole thing work financially. The process needs to be “simple, simple,” he says, including as much automation as possible. “We spend a lot of time on Excel sheets,” he says.

Papa Johns’ partnership with Wing will start at a single franchise in Indian Trail, North Carolina, outside of Charlotte, though the chain intends to expand the delivery option, according to chief digital and technology officer Kevin Vasconi. Part of that expansion will be training workers on the adjusted “workflows” needed to get drone deliveries out the door. “We have an internal business case that pencils out,” Vasconi says. Drones might be especially helpful at food rush hours, he says, when workers and delivery drivers are pushing hard to get everything out the door.

Vasconi also thinks drones are just fun. “It’s a surprise-and-delight kind of feature,” he says. (Customers will be able to opt out of drone delivery if they choose.) “Ideally, we’ll get to being able to offer the full menu.”