Domino\u2019s Pizza\u00a0is finally releasing its own version of stuffed crust on Monday, aiming to win over the customers who are willing to spend more on the pricey pizza customization.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Thirty years ago,\u00a0Yum Brands\u2019\u00a0Pizza Hut debuted the cheesy stuffed crust, marketing the launch with a television\u00a0commercial starring Donald Trump. As years passed, rivals\u00a0Papa John\u2019s\u00a0and Little Caesars eventually followed with their own takes. Trump went from hawking pizza to sitting in the Oval Office.<\/p>\n
Generations of consumers have grown up with stuffed crust, including the increasingly important Gen Z diners, who are entering the workforce and buying their own pizzas now. The addition is critical for Domino\u2019s, the top U.S. pizza chain, to compete with rivals Pizza Hut and Papa John\u2019s, which have ceded market share to Domino\u2019s in recent quarters but still steal the pizza chain\u2019s customers.<\/p>\n
\u201cNearly 13 million Domino\u2019s customers each year are buying stuffed crust from our competitors, and these are our customers who have to leave our brand because we\u2019re the only national pizza brand that doesn\u2019t offer it,\u201d Domino\u2019s Chief Marketing Officer Kate Trumbull told CNBC.<\/p>\n
Domino\u2019s has taken so long to release stuffed crust that a survey of its customers found that 73% already believed that the chain offered it on the menu, according to Trumbull.<\/p>\n
That all changes on Monday, when Domino\u2019s launches its Parmesan Stuffed Crust. The menu item is included in the pizza chain\u2019s $9.99 carryout deal.<\/p>\n
When Pizza Hut originally launched stuffed crust, Domino\u2019s viewed the menu item as gimmicky, according to Trumbull. Plus, the company heard that stuffed crust caused bottlenecks and slowed down service, leading to unhappy customers and workers.<\/p>\n
But Domino\u2019s perspective changed after more national competitors followed Pizza Hut\u2019s lead. The chain committed to launching its own version in 2022, when its\u00a0sales were faltering\u00a0in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic pizza boom.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt has been one of the longest development efforts in the company\u2019s history,\u201d Trumbull said.<\/p>\n
The process began with extensive market research. Findings included that stuffed crust customers tend to buy pizza more frequently and often spend more per transaction.<\/p>\n
Eight potential iterations followed before Domino\u2019s landed on the right recipe for its Parmesan Stuffed Crust, made with mozzarella and topped with garlic seasoning and a sprinkle of Parmesan cheese.<\/p>\n
At the same time, Domino\u2019s was improving its restaurants\u2019 overall operations, retraining its employees across the system on making its crust and rolling out a custom dough spinner to restaurants. If the pizza chain hadn\u2019t made its kitchens more efficient, it wouldn\u2019t have been able to launch stuffed crust, according to Trumbull.<\/p>\n
Ahead of the launch of Parmesan Stuffed Crust, the pizza chain spent 12 weeks training franchisees and 7,000 stores on how to make it properly.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re not going to leave anything to chance after taking three years,\u201d Trumbull said.<\/p>\n\n
Domino\u2019s Pizza\u00a0is finally releasing its own version of stuffed crust on Monday, aiming to win over the customers who are willing to spend more on the pricey pizza customization.\u00a0 Thirty years ago,\u00a0Yum Brands\u2019\u00a0Pizza Hut debuted the cheesy stuffed crust, marketing the launch with a television\u00a0commercial starring Donald Trump. As years passed, rivals\u00a0Papa John\u2019s\u00a0and Little Caesars <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":37260,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-37259","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37259","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37259"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37259\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37260"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37259"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quickassetsmarket.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}