Cheesier pizza simply tastes better than less cheesy pizza. Who knew, right? Well it turns out that Domino’s Pizza didn’t know about it. Their sales had been nose diving last year and their pizza had been voted the worst tasting pizza in the entire country. Yikes!
However, that’s not what this story is about. Instead, we’re more interested in how Domino’s managed to turn things around. It seems they got a government bailout, just like the banks and the car companies last year.
Government Agency to the Rescue
An organization called Dairy Management stepped in to help out the ailing pizza chain and get them back on their feet financially. The organization worked with Domino’s to come up with a new recipe for their pizzas which has forty percent more cheese on it than the old ones did.
They also helped them plan a $12 million marketing bonanza to advertise their new pies and to get people back in the door. Sales jumped and everything seemed to going their way. However, there’s one interesting wrinkle. Dairy Management is a government agency, not a private firm.
A Creation of the USDA
The United States Department of Agriculture funded and indeed created Dairy Management in order to help their core constituency to be more competitive in the world of dairy products. The organization exists solely to promote dairy products and cheese in this country. The fact that a government agency is stepping in to help however has some people up in arms.
No Less than the First Lady Herself
What makes this whole incident so amusing is that the first lady herself, Michelle Obama, has been pleading with restaurants to try to make their menus healthier while Dairy Management has been spending some $140 million to promote eating more cheese. While cheese may be tasty, it is not always the healthiest thing to eat in large quantities.
Bottom Line
The bottom line of course for us as restaurateurs is to try to balance the demands. Ultimately, we need to provide what our customers want to eat and not what the government says we should be serving. Luckily for Domino’s, the government and the market both agree on more cheese!
Jim Balis' Blog 