May

Domino’s Pizza Process Kicks Ass

I just ordered a Domino’s Pizza online. I’m not feeling well today and I’m hibernating. At the end of ordering online, I was given an amazing meter, the “Pizza Tracker”, which told me at what stage in the process my pizza was currently, when each started, and who was doing it. It updated this all in real time!

It makes sense that Domino’s Pizza, a very successful company, would instrument and measure every step of their process. Now, they’ve smartly exposed some of that to the customer to inform them of progress; its fun and entertaining.

I got my pizza within 30 minutes and since I was working on some other computer things, I could see the progress. Its mesmerizing. When I noticed each stage complete, I got more excited. And when I saw it was in the car being delivered to me. Wooooo!

The delivery guy was great. He called a few minutes before he got to my place saving us both time. I walked down to meet him and he zoomed up to my door and jumped out. He greeted me and I signed the receipt. The whole thing took less than a minute. My ordering and delivery experience was excellent.

After now eating a few pieces of the pizza, the pizza itself could improve. There was too little italian sausage when compared to the amount of tomatoes and mushrooms also on it. Also, the distribution of toppings could be more consistent. Yes, I know that humans make this pizza (humans…right?) so distribution and amounts could vary. So what can I do about it? That same nifty Pizza Tracker lets me rate my experience in four areas (ordering, delivery, taste, and will I recommend) and allows me to give written feedback. I provided all.

Clearly, Domino’s is striving for a consistent, high-quality, and predictable product. There is always room to improve. However, its not always cost-effective. Domino’s is gathering the metrics (I wonder if this is a Six Sigma project) and with them, they can make smart decisions. For example, if this pizza prep person gets statistically significant lower taste ratings, they could re-train or discipline them. These metrics could be used to compare stores to each other. Or perhaps, determine if the order or delivery step significantly influences if someone recommends Domino’s. Can you tell I have 13 years of high-end project management experience?

This has been a fascinating peer into some of the inner workings of Domino’s Pizza. But I’m done; with both my pizza and this post.

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