The International House of Pancakes (IHOP) is a United States-based restaurant chain that specializes in breakfast foods and is owned by DineEquity. While IHOP's focus is on breakfast foods such as pancakes, waffles, French toast, omelettes, and blintzes, it has evolved into also offering a menu of full course meals and a variety of desserts. As of December 31, 2008, the chain had 1396 restaurants in 49 states, Canada and Mexico. With the March 24, 2009 opening of a restaurant at the University Mall in South Burlington, Vermont, IHOP now has restaurants in all 50 states. Currently, there is an IHOP planned to be built in Puerto Rico. 11 are corporate-owned; 157 are operated under area licenses.

History

Jerry Lapin, Al Lapin and Albert Kallis founded The International House of Pancakes in 1958 with the help of Sherwood Rosenberg. The first restaurant opened on July 7, 1958, in Toluca Lake, Los Angeles, California.^[2] Since then, locations have been opened all over the United States, in the Canadian province of British Columbia and in the Mexican cities of Monterrey, Tampico and Mexico City. It also announced on October 23, 2006, that it is expanding into the province of Ontario as well. IHOP is headquartered in Glendale, California. The company uses "IHOP" as its primary name, though they still use "International House of Pancakes" as a secondary name.

Service, Style and Menu

Each table has its own sugar boat and four flavors of syrup dispensers: blueberry, boysenberry, butter pecan, and strawberry. Boysenberry is being phased out in many restaurants, replaced by plain, "old-fashioned" pancake syrup.Template:Fact There is also service of warm artificially maple-flavored corn syrup, brought out with every meal with pancakes/waffles. Recently, a major change was introduced in its core menu in an attempt to become more than just a breakfast restaurant. Recently, Country Griddle Cakes disappeared from the menu, replaced by "Corn Cake Pancakes". ]] The "international" appellation of the chain derives from its three core crepe-style pancakes: "German" (served with powdered sugar and lemon butter with lemon slices), "French" (served with orange marmalade), and "Swedish" (served with lingonberries and lingonberry butter). These fruit-topped crepes are offered with an egg-and-meat plate as the "International Passport Breakfast."^[3] Menu offerings such as French toast and Belgian waffles further reinforce the international theme.Template:Fact

Promotions

Recent advertisement campaigns have featured slogans such as "Just For the Fun of It", "Why not eat breakfast for dinner tonight?", and most recently "Come hungry. Leave happy." Other ad campaigns have revolved around menu items with Pancake Day. Since 2006, IHOP's National Pancake Day celebration has raised over $1.85 million. In 2008, over 1.5 million pancakes (12 miles high if they were stacked) were given to customers for donations.

Buyout of Applebee's

On July 16, 2007, IHOP Corp. stated its desire to acquire the bar-and-grill chain Applebee's International, Inc. in an all-cash transaction, valued at approximately US$2.1 billion. Under the deal, IHOP will pay $25.50 per share for Applebee's. IHOP stated it would franchise most of Applebee's 500 company-owned stores. Applebee's has 1,943 restaurants overall worldwide, including those operated by franchisees.^[4]

With a larger than 70% vote, the company approved the takeover which was due to close on November 29, 2007. The deal beat 26 other offers to purchase the economically slumping Applebee's. A number of executives from Applebee's voted against the offer, the chain's largest individual shareholder, Applebee's director Burton "Skip" Sack plans to take IHOP to court to demand a higher amount of money to be paid to him as the purchasing price that IHOP is giving is unfair to the shareholders of Applebee's. As part of the purchase, a brand re-marketing scheme and revitalization of the Applebee's image will be undertaken.^[5]

On November 29, 2007, the takeover successfully closed.^[6] The corporate entity IHOP changed its name to DineEquity on May 28, 2008.^[7]

References

External links

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• Official website