A Domino’s PR Disaster in the Making?

UPDATE: Since I originally posted this, I’ve learned that Domino’s is taking steps to fire the two employees in the video.

AUDIO UPDATE: Neville Hobson posted this concise audio about the fiasco:

It was a relatively calm morning, both in my home and in the Twittersphere. And then I saw this message from Adam Cohen:

adamcohen

As a former Domino’s employee, a current Domino’s customer AND a professor of public relations, I felt compelled to see what Adam found. Here it is, all its “glory”:

 
 

At about 10:20 this morning, I went to Domino’s website. After a bit of poking around, I found their online contact form. This is what I sent to them:

I teach public relations at Georgia Southern University. Are you aware of this video titled “Disgusting Dominos People” on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZFxqC8hZ_xs ? Having worked at a Domino’s in Auburn (AL) in college, I was appalled at what is shown in the video. Is anything being done to address this? There’s a huge discussion going on about the topic on Twitter now, too: http://search.twitter.com/search?q=domino . If possible, I’d like to know what your company is doing to combat this, so I can share it with my PR students.

Thank you,

Barbara Nixon, Ph.D. (ABD) :: Georgia Southern University

I am curious to see what reaction Domino’s has to this video. This might be a good case study in crisis public relations.

UPDATE: April 14, 2009, 11:00 AM

Apparently another blogger has heard back from Tim McIntyre (in Corporate Communications at Domino’s).  See “Video: Let the Domino’s Appall” for his response, which says in part:

We just got off the phone with the franchise owner, who was absolutely dumbfounded by this. He has told us that he will be terminating their employment effective immediately.

Will I stop ordering from Domino’s? No, I won’t stop. I would like to know that these two people no longer work for the company. Domino’s is a company I trust. I just hope that they’re paying attention what people are saying about the company now.

Stay tuned.

barbara_is_listening

 

 

 

 

 

(PS: Thanks, Adam, for calling this to my attention. I’ve used part of original tweet as the title to this blog post.)


10 Replies to “A Domino’s PR Disaster in the Making?”

  1. Hey Barbara –
    I’ve been neglecting my own monitoring and came across your post, thanks very much for including my original tweet. That morning was very odd – to watch it unfold was surreal. When I first found that video it had less than 400 views. Within 24 hours it was over 600,000 – then pulled. Not to mention all of the turmoil that came in the following days. You were part of spreading the news that day and I appreciate your help. Thanks again for including me here.
    Best,
    Adam

  2. This video just made me cringe, that is so disgusting. Domino’s must be really embarrassed to have this video circulating on the internet, it will be interesting to see what kind of PR move they will make.

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