Yup… It was only a matter of time before the Pizza multinationals got on the Menu Madness bandwagon, joining the Dog-and-Burger guys. First we saw a small Southwestern takeout chain launch Volcanic Mexican Pizza. Then, some BC entrepreneurs launched Marijuana-laced Pizza. Now, Boston Pizza and Domino’s are getting into the act…
The Domino’s Pizza ‘Specialty Chicken Pizza’ isn’t really a Pizza at all –
if you insist on a yeast-raised crust. It’s really a cluster of deep-fried
chicken balls welded together with pizza toppings.
Boston Pizza has, of late, been running what it calls the Pizza Game Changers Campaign – a promotion to spotlight some wild and crazy ideas they’ve come up with to invade other popular takeout food niches. Among the other things they’ve proposed: the Pizzaburger, the Taco Pizza and the Sriracha Chicken Pizza.
But these are like the auto makers’ concept cars – they’re fanciful projections of designs that were never meant to go into production, just indicate where the company is going, esthetically.
No so, perhaps, for something from Boston Pizza called the Pizza Cake, a multi-layered concoction consisting basically of stacked Pizzas, surrounded by a Pizza-crust collar.
Then, there’s Domino’s Specialty Chicken Pizzas (pictured above). They’re not really traditional Pizzas at all, but rafts of custered deep-fried Chicken Balls, glued together with Cheese and topped with Pizza Toppings. They come in four, count ’em four, zesty flavours. Specialy Chicken Pizzas are on the menu at Domino’s now, in the U.S. only, until further notice.
Stop the madness!
Why all this hokey-jokey menu madness?
As I’ve said before, in relation to the Burger-and-Dog niche of the Fast-Service restaurant sector, menu inspiration and innovation have reached – and surpassed – all logical, rational limits and a madness borne of desperation (to hold onto or expand market share) has set in, with purveyors both local and global.
It’s time to stop doing new, whacky things just because you can. Think before you bake! Calling it ‘innovation’ and ‘fun’ and whatever just masks the true nature of this crazy race to the edge of the marketing cliff.
I say, stop the menu madness! Instead, be the best at what you profess to do. I know that’s a lot harder than putting on a circus with your menu, and it means being compared directly to your competition. But it works. It always has. And we all benefit
Ten to one, the Burger and Dog and Pizza guys won’t go that route. After all, it’s the High Road.
~ Maggie J.