The pizza that defied the Covid-19 pandemic: How Domino's managed to stay afloat in the US

Last year, Domino’s Pizza in the US began testing a new way to deliver pizza which was aimed to serve customers pressed for time. This new contactless manner to pick up pizza without entering the store lets customers check in via their app or text message when at the store, and an employee will deliver the pizza in the trunk of a customer's car and hence the customer never makes contact. The company termed this service "Carside".

Customers stopped going to restaurants or couldn't go to restaurants due to lockdown restrictions in various US states. Domino’s quickly rolled out “Carside” pickup at their restaurants which is a major reason why the pizza giant continues to thrive during the Covid-19 pandemic. Its sales and stock price surged while other restaurants struggled, reports Wall Street Journal.

Another low-tech but efffective tool that the company used to deliver pizzas was the "pizza pedestal". The pedestal is a small cardboard foldout structure on which pizzas are placed to avoid contact with customers or potentially infected surfaces.

GPS order tracking which was introduced in late 2019 was also rapidly expanded during the pandemic to enable customers not to interact with delivery drivers if they didn't want to by notifying the customers when the delivery person was at their door and left afterwards.

Over 15,000 restaurants have failed during the coronavirus pandemic, according to statistics maintained by Yelp. Popular pizza chain California Pizza Kitchen has filed for bankruptcy protection, says the report.

Sales at stores that were open plummeted 37% from the second quarter of 2019. Domino’s Pizza, however, didn’t face any issues as the company's US sales in the same period surged by 16%.

The companies best positioned for the Covid-19 era were innovating and used technology which enabled quick adaption in these testing times. Some of these technologies include touchless transactions, online commerce, robotics or the facilities required to support a decentralized workforce. These companies are emerging as winners in an economy where customers and workers need too avoid contact.