Food Outlet – Domino’s Pizza

There was a time when fast food used to sell by hawkers on the streets of city, outside historical monuments, zoo etc. Time changed and with the entry of McDonalds, Pizza Hut etc. The market of fast food chains started with a bang and people started enjoying the super quality burgers, fries, iced tea and other items. This move started a trend of Friday/Saturday evening dine-ins at these places with friends, family, dates and it soon become a habit for people living in urban areas. But then came the ‘Game Changer’ – Domino’s Pizza, The Pizza Delivery Experts.

Introduction

Domino’s Pizza chains started the business by delivering the pizza at your door step. No need to wait for Friday’s/Satyrday’s and go out to have delicious food or wait for the evenings. You just need to give a call to your nearest Domino’s Pizza delivery center and it will be delivered at your doorstep in just 30 miutes that too hot.

Observations @Domino’s Pizza (Adayar, Chennai)

The outlet is situated at a nice location in Adyar area of Chennai. It is located in a well established market place having various types of brands nearby. The outlet was titled in both Enlish and Tamil language to facilitate the local people who do not understand English. Nearly 18-20 bikes were standing outside for delivery purposes.

The Ambience

As soon as you enter the outlet a very nice smell of cheese and garlic comes which actually makes you drool and more hungry. However, the ambience is not so attractive or catchy. This is per their requirement although as they prefer and expect more orders to come by for delivery. However, Domino’s is changing their mindset and starting opening up new outlets with attractive ambience and couches to sit facility. The texture of the wall was matching with the color of their logo i.e. white and red. It was a fully air-conditioned outlet to provide a pleasant atmosphere to customers.

The seating capacity is 25-30 people at a time with separable tables. With soothing music playing in the background makes it better. Cleanliness in the house is good and no table was found to be unclean.

Operations

Domino’s Pizza outlet has three counters, all with tele-orders facility, one dedicated for dine-in customers and two especially for taking delivery orders. Nearly 75% of the orders are bound for delivery and rest comes from customers who wants to have the food inside the outlet. 

Menu, new arrivals and special items are on display at the counters. Kitchen and packaging operations are carried out at the back side of the counter. All the employees are well dressed with their trademark blue and black colored uniforms with red collar. Small banners were hanging all over the dining area to make customers aware about most preferred and other items. A water cooler is also put up in the area for customers to help themselves unlike pizza hut where waiter delivers the water, food and every other thing.

A proper distribution of staff is there with their roles and responsibilities clearly specified. Staff includes people for cooking, for cutting bases and rotating it, for delivery and for handling counters.

30-min Delivery else Free

Domino’s major marketing or USP is 30 min delivery else food will be free.

All the delivery staff is told from the day 1 to understand all the routes, shortest paths and alternate routes from the local area map. They follow the strict processes to complete the order. As per the process, order should come out of stove within 10 miins and should be delivered in 8-20 mins. They decide their service area on the basis where they can reach in 8 mins. If at the 1^st checkpoint they do not reach within 30 mins they give pizza for free. They do not cut any salary of their staff members for this. Moreover, they have taken measures to ensure their welfare and safety. In every bike they are using for delivery, they have mechanically fixed the speed at 40 Km/hr so that in case of urgency the delivery boy do not rush or speed up and take a risk.

This point is something which is very important which Domino’s do to their employees. The delivery boy carries chilli flakes and oreganos in case customer wants more of these. In case your area is outside the service area of Domino’s then the nearest outlet will still be ready to provide order if that place is reachable in 45 mins and the customer is informed, while taking the order, that your area is outside the service area so 30-min delivery will not be applicable.

Domino’s gets the raw material in every 4 days which they store at -4^o C. If any food item remain after 4 days then it is thrown out. The pizza boxes has expiry of 1 month. Domino’s follow First-In First-Out (FIFO) inventory system, whichever item comes first is used first.

Employees do have motivational sessions when they motivate each other. Also, they shout “Hip Hip Hurray” as part of their 1 minute activity to encourage others to deliver faster and better.

Customers who come and prefer dine-in are those who hanglout and come for shopping. Their experience for dine-in is neutral as first they get frustrated because Domino’s do not serve food one by one like Pizza Hut do (statres first and then the main course) but once the food is on their table they forget everything and enjoy the hot and delicious food.

Overall, the expereince of understanding the Domino’s through these observations was quite good and brought new dimensions to my thinking.

Lalit Agrawal

FT13434