2. Domino’s Pizza Crisis 2009
• On Sunday the 12th of April
2009, two Domino’s employees
from a branch in North Carolina
upload a film on YouTube
• The footage is filmed while they
are at work, showing disturbing
images of themselves violating
health codes with unsanitary
actions, whilst preparing food
Above: An image of the footage that was available
e.g. putting cheese up his nose
from YouTube before the video was removed before putting it into sandwich
etc.
3. Domino’s online crisis
• The video becomes a viral
sensation with more than a million
hits on YouTube 3 days after it was
uploaded (source NYTIMES.COM)
• Hoax has ripple effect in social
media bleeding into conversations
in twitter, other social media
forums and mainstream media
• 65% of respondents who had
visited Dominos Pizza say they
would not visit Dominos Pizza after
seeing video
(source Wall Street Journal, HCD research, 2009)
4. Timeline of Dominos response
Date Event
April 12, 2009 • Video posted to YouTube.
• Video reaches 29,000 views within hours of posting.
April 13, 2009 • Domino’s is alerted to video by the Consumerist.com (Monday morning)
• Domino’s identifies location of store where the video was filmed. (Monday Evening)
April 14, 2009 • Hammonds and Setzer (employees) fired by Domino’s
• Health department and local police contacted by Domino’s
• Twitter traffic becomes noticeable
• Between Tuesday and Wednesday, the video jumps from 29,000 views to 700,000
April 15, 2009 • Video surpasses 1 million views.
• Video is removed from YouTube by Hammonds.
• Hammonds and Setzer face felony charges for distributing prohibited foods and report to
Conover Police.
• The hoax is found in 5 of the top 12 search results presented by Google to users.
• Twitter account is created by Domino’s
• Domino’s CEO (Patrick Doyle) responds in a YouTube video.
• Domino’s video response has 330,000 views when first press conference is held.
April 17, 2009 • Wikipedia entry for Domino’s was found to contain information about the hoax posted by
an unofficial individual.
April 20, 2009 • A copy of the original video posted by Hammonds has 345,000 views.
April 20, 2009 • The video remains accessible on the Internet in its entirety.
Source: management communication quarterly (SAGE) – 4th December 2011
5. Why didn’t Domino’s respond faster?
”Two things we didn’t anticipate. The first thing we didn’t anticipate was the
pass-along value, or the pass-along nature of this particular video, because
there was a lot of “Man, you ought to see this going on.” And the sheer
explosion of interest from the traditional media.”
Tim McIntyre, Vice President, Communications, Dominos Pizza
6. A hoax is a threat
• A false claim can become a real threat
– Even though the company knew the claim was
false, the public perceived it as being real
• The video was plausible
• Imagine your nightmare scenarios
– Avoid a meteor crisis
7. Do Domino’s deliver during crisis?
What Dominos Pizza did wrong
Delayed reaction – alert was heard late
- Silent when answers were needed
• Reacted after they were contacted by consumer affairs blog site
Lack of strategy for digital crisis management
• Fault or lack of online surveillance
• Lack of social media presence
• Lack of employee policy on social media use and communication
• Lack of overview on main online influencers
What Dominos Pizza did right
Response through traditional media and social media
- CEO video response on YouTube targeted core audience
• Changed discourse to ’how companies should deal with hoax crisis’ in
mainstream media
Created a twitter account
• to engage in dialogue with consumers and respond to negative comments
8. PRventive
• Act fast
• Not enough to proactively use internet as a
communication platform
• Need to use your eyes and ears and listen to
all the conversations – not only the ones
which you are engaged in
