Big Mistake.

We like pizza. We order it often. Our company of choice is Papa Johns. There was a time when we switched it up between Papa Johns and Pizza Hut. That is until Pizza Hut started taking its good ole’ sweet time and we couldn’t get a pizza in less than an hour and 45 minutes. That’s ridiculous! So lately we’ve been sticking with the papa. After all, he does have better ingredients and better pizza – or so he says.

That is until a few weeks ago when the papa made a big mistake. We placed an order for one of our favorites – large thin crust with pepperoni and sausage. It was shaping up to be a good evening. The pizza arrived and looked oh so yummy. But then, we tried it. Um what happened to our favorite pizza? The typical warm, cheesy goodness was replaced by… well… yuck. Sean thought it tasted metallic or possibly even soapy. I thought… well I’d just as soon not think about it. We haven’t ordered one since.

But tonight I wanted pizza. So, we did something we haven’t done in years. We called Domino’s. Hey, it was great in college, wasn’t it? Yeah, but that was college. Back then anything was good that didn’t come from the cafeteria. But you know how it is – when you want pizza, you want pizza. And, we’ve seen their new advertising campaign. You’ve seen it too – the one where they admit their pizza sucked. Hey, any company that’s willing to admit that publicly is worth a look in my book. I mean according to their ads, they’ve got new cheese, new sauce and new toppings. What did we have to lose?

I created an account on the website and ordered our pizza – a large hand-tossed with extra-large pepperoni (I thought that might be fun), sliced Italian sausage (a new twist on those boring crumbles), and beef (the old stand-by). The confirmation email I received said our order would be to our door in 30-40 minutes, which seemed reasonable. However, not 15 minutes later we heard a knock at the door. Sean and I looked at each other in wonderment. I said, “That can’t be the pizza, it wouldn’t even be cooked.” But darn it if it wasn’t our pizza. And, it was piping hot I might add. I mean did that guy have an oven in his car?

The real test was still to come – the taste test. Pulling a piece out of the box, I noticed the seasoned crust, large meaty toppings, and sauce, which I have often found lacking with others. It looked good. And on the first bite, we both agreed, it tasted good. We had found a new pizza.

The moral of the story is this: In today’s world, your customer service and your product must both be top-notch. You can’t relax for even a minute or you risk having a competitor swoop in and take what was previously yours. There are too many other options out there… other companies that are diligently working to improve these things and succeeding on a daily basis. And while price is a very important factor in our present economy, it’s not always the most important. We just paid a couple bucks more for Domino’s. And you know what? We’ll do it again because it’s worth it.

I know this story sounds like a huge endorsement for Domino’s. It’s not. The fact that we liked their new pizza is really just a sidebar. The point is more a reminder for businesses. A reminder that if you make a big mistake in today’s world – you lose.