Domino's Thinks You're Stupid

Domino's Pizza's latest commercial shows us just how stupid advertising grunts think we all are.

Puffery, the spokesactorpizzaman says, is exaggeration of opinion, not fact. Papa John's claim of pizza flavor superiority, he says, is just puffery. Domino's pizza flavor superiority, on the other hand, he says, is based on FACT.

His data for this FACT? A graph showing the results of a taste test showing that people prefer Domino's Pizza, overwhelmingly, he says, over Papa John's and Pizza Hut's!

What is the best cheese? Cheddar? Provolone? A nice ripe Brie? You say Cheddar is the best cheese? Okay, what data did you use to determine that? What? It's your OPINION? What? Your sister thinks Brie is best? Your dad likes a stinky Camembert? So, then, what's the best cheese? Come on! Come on! Just the facts, ma'am!

No puffery over at Domino's, though! Really? Since when is taste-testing anything other than recording the OPINIONS of various individuals in a group of individuals who tried the product?

In regard to the test: Restaurant News reports that an independent company tested Domino's new recipe pizza with 1800 people in 8 nationwide markets. The numbers do show that at least 58% and as much as 67.5% of people asked said that they preferred Domino's pizza over Papa John's or Pizza Hut's in each case.* Pretty good, but hardly overwhelming. Variation among restaurants could raise those numbers through the roof or drop them to zero from one day to the next. Nonetheless, all of these pretty numbers are still based on OPINION, not fact. A bit of puffery on Domino's part, perhaps?

A very unscientific taste test reports that the overall opinion (and it's still just an opinion, people, not a FACT) of tasters was, "Meh, cheap pizza is cheap pizza."

Domino's thinks you're too stupid to see through their puffery.



*58% of those asked said they preferred Domino's sausage pizza over Pizza Hut's. Domino's pepperoni took the highest prize, with 67.5% of tasters preferring it to Pizza Hut's. For other numbers, see the article.