Ann Arbor— Domino's Pizza Inc. will celebrateits 50th anniversary Thursday, starting a new half-century on a strong sales surge thanks to a gamble the company took on its core pizza recipe.
Last December, Domino's was at a crossroads. Flat same-store sales forced Domino's to close 108 U.S. stores in 2009, and the company battled a perception that its pizza tasted like cardboard.
The nation's second-largest pizza chain took a risk and changed its 49-year-old pizza recipe to feature a garlic-seasoned crust topped with a mix of mozzarella and provolone held together by a red pepper-infused sauce. It also ramped up its online marketing and aggressively rebranded itself by publicly admitting mistakes to show that its pizza quality was improving.
"In this economic environment, you're forced to examine what you're doing," Patrick Doyle, who became Domino's chief executive in March, told The Detroit News. "We'd be fine if we hadn't made the changes, but we certainly couldn't be expecting the kind of growth that we are."
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