• by Teresa Buyikian , Yesterday

Spirit Airlines’ downfall didn’t just leave thousands of passengers stranded with no flights; it also left its regular customers with millions of unusable loyalty points. But now a pizza brand is reaching out to those members with a freebie as consolation.

Papa Johns’ “Skies to Pies,” promotion will take Spirit Airlines’ unusable loyalty program points and turn them into a large pizza. 

Now for a limited time, former consumers can send a DM @PapaJohns on Instagram with proof of their Spirit loyalty membership. They then must also DM @PapaJohns a screen shot of their Papa Rewards account, which, once verified, will earn the first 250 customers a code for a free large one-topping pizza.

“Loyalty points don’t mean much if you can’t use them,” said Shivram Vaideeswaran, senior vice president of brand marketing at Papa Johns, in a press release. “While we can’t fix cancelled flights or lost membership points, hopefully we can provide a smile and a pizza to those impacted.”

The “Skies to Pies” promotion follows Papa Johns’  Q1 2026 financials, which saw global systemwide restaurant sales at $1.20 billion, which is a 3% decrease compared to the prior year’s first quarter. In North America, comparable sales decreased 6.4% from 2025, with comparable sales from domestic company-owned restaurants down 5.2% and North America franchised restaurants down 6.7%.

Conversely, the brand’s international comparable sales increased 3.6% compared with the prior year first quarter, and it opened 28 new locations systemwide, including eight in North America. Overall the brand’s net income was $7 million, compared with $9 million in the prior year’s first quarter.