A little-known southern pizza chain is edging in on big name brands to take a big slice of the market . Hunt Brothers Pizza provides gas stations and convenience stores with ingredients and start up equipment but does n't charge franchise fees . As a result it now boasts more U.S. sites than either Domino 's or Pizza Hut , with 7,300 locations in 28 states . As well as the convenience factor , customers apparently love the taste . Scroll down for video . Loyal fan : Roy Bruce , owner of the Rightway Foodmart poses for a photo in front of a Hunt Brothers Pizza display in Andersonville , Tennessee . 'It beats Pizza Hut and Domino 's , ' said 23-year-old Brittany Bunch , who buys Hunt Brothers about once a week during breaks from her job at a water damage company . 'It 's just got more flavor . It seems like , with the others , you 're getting cardboard . ' While Hunt Brothers may be unknown in many households , it runs television ads during NASCAR races and cable outdoors shows . For several years , it has sponsored Kevin Harvick , who won the 2014 NASCAR Sprint Cup . On a recent morning at 10:40am , Roy Bruce , who owns Rightway Foodmart in Andersonville , Tennessee , started sliding Hunt Brothers pizzas for the lunch rush into a conveyor-belt oven . Easy-to-make : Each pie starts out frozen , a crust with sauce and a layer of cheese . Build your own : Employees can add fresh pepperoni , extra cheese and other toppings . Tasty treat : The result after about five minutes in the 525-degree oven is a bubbling-hot pizza with browned toppings that tastes comparable to the big delivery chains ' pizzas . Each pie starts out frozen , a crust with sauce and a layer of cheese . Employees can add fresh pepperoni , extra cheese and other toppings . The result after about five minutes in the 525-degree oven is a bubbling-hot pizza with browned toppings that tastes comparable to the big delivery chains ' pizzas . In about an hour , Bruce sold that first pizza and another one in two-slice $ 2.99 'hunks ' from a countertop warming display near his cash register . Pizza customers included a UPS delivery driver , a woman on her way to lunch with her daughter and a guy in camouflage who confessed he was just coming from the liquor store . In a typical Hunt Brothers arrangement , Bruce said he paid about $ 10,000 for his oven , freezer , display case and other equipment and now just pays the Nashville , Tennessee-based company for the pizza ingredients . Hunt Brothers , which is privately owned , fine-tuned this approach starting in the early 1990s when four brothers who 'd worked separately in the restaurant industry joined forces to sell pizzas to convenience stores . Hunt Brothers had 750 locations by 1994 , said Keith Solsvig , its vice president for marketing . 'Convenience stores in rural areas were the hub , ' Solsvig said in a phone interview . ' A lot of people coming and going . And a lot of these smaller towns , they did n't really have a lot of other restaurants or other places to eat . ' Alabama , Georgia , Tennessee and Texas each have more than 700 locations , Solsvig said . Not all locations are isolated , with Hunt Brothers also found at busy highway interchanges . And it 's moved into some urban areas , such as Memphis . The convenience store model is different from a free-standing restaurant , and a Hunt Brothers outlet is likely to bring in far less than the more than $ 700,000 an average Domino 's makes a year , said Darren Tristano , a restaurant industry analyst with Technomic . Speedy delivery : Maria Witkowski hands a Hunt Brothers Pizza from the drive-thru window to a customer at the Rightway Foodmart in Andersonville . Pit stop : In a typical Hunt Brothers arrangement , outlets pay about $ 10,000 for an oven , freezer , display case and other equipment - they then just pay the Nashville , Tennessee-based company for the pizza ingredients . Tristano noted that 7-Eleven offers pizza in some of its 7,800 U.S. locations and that Little Caesars has also had success in rural areas . While Hunt Brothers declined to discuss company finances , Bruce says he sells about 500 pizzas a month , much of it by the hunk . Combined with drinks and other convenience items , he estimates pizza customers spend more than $ 10,000 each month in his store . Tristano says the simplicity of the setup has helped the company grow . Bruce agreed . 'In a convenience store , you 're doing the register , you 're doing gas . You 're doing so many different things , ' Bruce said . 'It 's hard to be able to do pizza from the ground up , making the dough and the whole thing . ' Fred England , a food vendor at a furniture factory about 30 miles east of Andersonville , added a Hunt Brothers to his lunch counter about a year ago to keep his customers from looking elsewhere for their pizza fix . 'The problem I had was all these other places were delivering pizza , so I had to come up with something , ' he said while stopping at Rightway to chat with Bruce . Angela Moles came in to get three hunks of pepperoni pizza and drinks to take to lunch with her daughter . The 35-year-old Andersonville resident said she buys Hunt Brothers about twice a week . ' I love it , ' she said . ' I usually do n't get other pizza . '
Hunt Brothers Pizza provides gas stations and convenience stores with ingredients and start up equipment but does n't charge franchise fees . It currently has 7,300 locations in 28 states . As well as the convenience factor , customers apparently love the taste .