Episode 37 - Domino’s Partnership Growing School Pizza Sales

Domino’s leaders, Jim Zimmer and Kris Holley, along with DMI’s Rebecca MacKay Allen, speak with DMI’s Scott Wallin about the success of the Domino’s Smart Slice program with schools.

They highlight the 16-year partnership, which has grown from 300 to 21,000 schools, serves over 59 million slices of pizza, and sells an additional 3 million pounds of cheese. 

They also discuss future goals, including international expansion and improving pizza crust to enhance cheese sales. The long-time partnership's success is attributed to shared values and community focus between dairy farmers and Domino's franchisees.  

Tune in to find out!

Host & Guest:

• Host: Scott Wallin, Vice President of Farmer Communications & Media Relations, Dairy Management Inc.
• Guest: Jim Zimmer, Marketing Manager for Domino’s Strategic Sales.
• Guest: Kris Holley, Director for Domino’s Strategic Sales.
• Guest: Rebecca MacKay Allen, Senior Vice President, Growth Platforms and Partnerships for Dairy Management Inc.

Transcript (AI-Generated, please ignore typos)

Your Dairy Checkoff Podcast   0:00  

Scott, welcome to your dairy check off podcast from dairy Management, Inc, where dairy check off leaders and farmers share real stories, strategies and insights that grow sales and build trust for us dairy let's get started.

Scott Wallin   0:18  

And I'm Scott Wallen with dairy management incorporated I'm so happy to serve as the host of today's your dairy check off podcast. And today we've got a great topic for you, pizza, and specifically Domino's Pizza. You know, the checkoff has worked with Domino's for many years. We've helped them innovate and move a lot of pizza, not just around the United States, but across the world. And today I've got two leaders from the Domino's team, Chris Holly and Jim Zimmer, who are going to help with the discussion. Welcome to both

Jim Zimmer  0:46  

of you. I'm Jim Zimmer, and I've been with Domino's for about 20 years in marketing, and specifically for the last six years, I manage the Domino's smart slice pizza program. I'm the brand manager on that for Domino's marketing, and I've been doing that for about eight years. Thank

Scott Wallin   1:06  

you so much. How about you, Chris?

Kris Holley  1:07  

I am Chris Holley. I have been with Domino's for 26 years, and I am the director of strategic sales, and one of my sales division is the smart slice team, or the school lunch sales team,

Scott Wallin   1:21  

and then Rebecca Mackay is with us as well. My colleague at DMI, she is the lead of the Domino's partnership. Good morning, Rebecca, how are you?

Rebecca MacKay Allen   1:29  

Good morning? Great. I'm so happy to be here. I love talking about this partnership and the great work we've done over the years.

Scott Wallin   1:35  

You know, we have this long standing partnership with Domino's. Can you kind of walk us through how things got started with them. We started

Rebecca MacKay Allen   1:41  

partnering with Domino's in 2009 so 2025, marks our 16th anniversary. I've had the privilege of working on this partnership for the last several years, and working with Jim and Chris and the rest of the extended team is, you know, it's so easy to come to work in the morning because they're so great. Some of the things that we started this partnership doing was promoting extra cheese on pizzas. We leaned into promoting carry out together as that was becoming an increasing part of the business, introduced a line of cheese focused specialty pizzas. We've developed pizzas specifically for schools lunch school lunches, which we'll talk more about here on this podcast, we've done some really game changing online value promotions, and the list is long of the delicious new cheesy products that we have worked on over the years. Our partnership has has evolved over time, as Domino's business has evolved as the consumer has evolved, but the three pillars have really kind of remained consistent, driving a catalytic, catalytic effect. So our dairy farmers want us to grow the pizza category. While it's great that Domino's it's continued to succeed and become the number one player in QSR pizza. It's important that the behavior of eating pizza, the behavior of ordering out pizza, has grown as well. So that's important to this this partnership model to drive that catalytic effect with with other folks in the category, driving cheese through sales growth. Domino's has consistently, year over year, grown that needle for us from both a sales standpoint and a cheese volume standpoint, and then promoting and instilling trust in dairy through the quality products that Domino's delivers, and through some promotional efforts that we've done over the years. You know,

Scott Wallin   3:28  

one of the great things about a partner like Domino's is dairy farmers and others across the industry could walk into a Domino's store and they can see tangible proofs, tangible tangible successes. Can you just talk about some things, some of those highlights that have occurred over the years. Yes,

Rebecca MacKay Allen   3:43  

absolutely. There's way too many to list here, but I will hit on some, some recent ones that that folks should have been able to either enjoy in their homes or see on the news. Most recently, just in the last month, Domino's launched their first ever Parmesan stuffed Stuffed Crust Pizza. Off to a great start. We've ordered it many, many times in the Makai household. Last year, there were also some successful introductions with a New York style pizza, the five cheese mac and cheese, also a fan favorite of the Mackay family. We partnered on a game changing emergency pizza value promotion, which was introduced in 23 and then ran again in 24 because it was just such a great promotion. We continue to do boost weeks driving, kind of those, those big wins on a in a short window. And then, you know, the one of the busy, biggest success stories is Domino, smart slice pizza, developed for school lunch, delivering dairy in schools across the US growing steadily each year, and really was kind of the first big news coming out of this partnership all those years ago. Jim,

Scott Wallin   4:48  

what does a company like dairy management incorporate bring to the table for Domino's, as far as resources? And can you talk also about some of the synergies that you see between us?

Jim Zimmer  4:58  

Yes, for sure, I. Mean, obviously, a great, important part of every pizza is cheese. Domino's is very focused on cheese, and so, you know, our partnership with the Checkoff Program really provides great insight and awareness into the business of dairy for Domino's. You know, what's going on in the dairy business, and it's just very important that we have an understanding of that, because we always say around here, you know, without dairy farmers, there's no cheese. Without cheese, there's no Domino's Pizza. So the relationship, through with DMI and the Checkoff Program, we learn so much about dairy and dairy farming, very helpful in our business. They also, as Rebecca said, the checkoff program really helps us with innovation. Domino's is very focused on innovation, and you know, with their help, we've developed, as Rebecca mentioned, that domino smart slice pizza, a hugely successful product developed specifically for the school lunch category, that DMI was a huge partner in helping us develop, and continues to help us grow that business and evolve that business. Also, of course, products, pepperoni stuff, cheesy bread, parmesan stuff, crust loaded tots, many cheesy products that Rebecca didn't mention, but over the years of our you know, the 16 years of our relationship. There's been many successful product launches, all specifically helping us grow cheese more ways to provide cheese to our consumers and to you know, provide cheese sales for dairy farmers. Importantly, behind the scenes, the Dairy Checkoff Program also provides a lot of support towards research that Domino's does that allows us to do this innovation. So check off partners with us, even at that level, not only in the launching and the promoting, but also in the research and development, which is a huge help for us. And then, importantly, at the end of the day, they help us drive awareness of these products. They help us develop them, research them, but that ultimately help us tell consumers about them, which drives cheese, incremental cheese, and that's a very important part of the partnership as well. Chris

Scott Wallin   7:38  

Jim mentioned our dairy farmers, and I think one of the things that we've seen over the years that there's so many commonalities between dairy farming and dominoes. Can you speak to that a little bit? Just

Kris Holley  7:49  

like dairy farmers are local business owners, they, you know, they live in their community. We have 725 local business owners. They're called Domino's franchisees, you know. And they are, you know, the synergy is that their communities are important to them, that they sometimes live in the neighborhoods that they serve, which is important to them. They're all entrepreneurs, right? 95% of our franchisees started as drivers in our store. So they were drivers. They became managers, then they hoped and someday owned a store, right? Just like I'm assuming, most farmers worked in the local farm or on their family farm, wanting one day to come back and own that farm. So very entrepreneurial, very, you know, young, family oriented, look at the business, and then I would say the other thing is, you know, from a different perspective, is that both farmers and franchisees have had to lean into technology differently, right? Like the world is changing. And how do we lean into technology differently? And also, how do we look at labor force and things that are coming at us and really adjust to make sure that we're not only serving our community but growing our business for the long term?

Scott Wallin   8:57  

Yes, certainly there's so many things in common, as you pointed out, and I know our dairy farmers certainly appreciate that, and they relate to the franchisees, which I think just makes the partnership that much more special. Jim, we've touched on some of the highlights, and I really want to get into the conversation on smart slice, which is nationwide. It's so exciting to see this delicious pizza hitting cafeterias across the country every day, and my gosh, I'd go back to school just for smart slice if I could. But can you talk about the history of smart slice and why it was so important to Domino's to get this launched in schools? Smart

Jim Zimmer  9:30  

slice really began back in 2009 2010 right when we were starting our relationship with DMI. So it was perfect timing. But as Domino's, as a company, had always been selling pizza to schools. As Chris mentioned, our franchisees are members of their communities, and they want to have a presence. Not only that, are they employing members of the community, but they also, you know, we're selling pizza to schools who were serving it for. School lunch. But when we saw this healthy, Hunger Free Kids Act, which you may have heard of, but it was a it was a game changer in terms of setting nutritional requirements for food that could be a part of this school lunch program. There are going to be regulations set by the USDA that for schools to serve products to children, they had to meet certain nutritional guidelines, and that was really what made us develop smart slice pizza. We needed a whole grain product. We needed a product that was going to be lower in fat and lower in sodium to be able to sell that long term to schools for their school lunch program. So we partnered with DMI and got into their test kitchens and worked on the cheese, specifically the most important part of our pizza, and they really helped us determine a proper melt, a fantastic cheese that we work with to this day. So it all started back in 2010 so that we could continue to provide pizza to schools. So that's really how it all started, and it's been a huge success. School nutrition

Kris Holley   11:15  

directors, they're one. Their goal is to feed kids right, to get kids into the cafeteria. And I love when they say this to us. They say, you know, when pizza is on the menu, kids eat more pizza, or they eat more lunch. When Domino's Pizza is on the menu, kids even eat more lunch. So it's really important not only to have a product that supports kids eating more because that supports the kids, but it also supports the budgets in schools, which helps, you know, school cafeterias continue to grow and serve our student communities. And Jim,

Scott Wallin   11:45  

I know you've got some impressive figures of where we're at today with the reach of smart slides. Can you share those figures and also maybe talk a little bit about future plans for growth, 16

Jim Zimmer  11:54  

years of steady growth, year over year, this product has just taken off throughout the country. Currently, we're in about 21,000 schools, and that represents about 1600 school districts across the US, really, in every state. We like to say, like we estimate, like, last year, we served 59 million slices of domino smart slice pizza across the USA, driving kids into the cafeteria, which makes cafeteria our customers happy at the school level, and franchisees providing those pizzas to the schools, which makes them Extremely happy as well, in terms of where we want to take this business, I mean, there's still so much opportunity for growth. I mean, I say 21,000 schools, but as you may know, there are many more schools out there that we still have opportunity to grow into. Our average store has about 16 schools in their delivery area. So lots of opportunities still for franchisees to work with schools and grow this business. Yeah,

Kris Holley   13:08  

and we're super dedicated to it. So even just last year, after 16 years, we went back and we took a look at the product, and we said, you know, do students like this product? You know, what's what's different about it? Where can we improve? And we came out with some key differentiators that we were, like, we're looking at dough. Possibly could it be crispy, or could it be softer in the middle? So really, after 16 years of tremendous growth, you know, we're still saying, hey, we want to have the best school lunch product, the best school lunch pizza in schools. And we continue to grow our business because of that thinking,

Scott Wallin   13:40  

you know, Rebecca, smart slice is one of those parts of the partnership that, obviously, you know, we embraced it and we wanted to support. Can you talk a little bit about what the checkoff did to support Domino's with smart slice

Rebecca MacKay Allen   13:51  

really is an example of what makes these partnerships so great when, you know, a fantastic company like Domino's leans into the resources that the dairy check off has, and in this case, it was all the way from, you know, R and D through promotion, through launch and continued support. When it was initially developed, we leaned into our research centers and our R and D capabilities to help Domino's create that delicious, 100% real, light mozzarella cheese that is on those delicious, smart slice pizzas, and it's a real differentiator, and again, a resource that check off can uniquely bring to the table. We've also provided research or consultation, I guess is the right word, over the years through NDC and all of our nutrition experts on that team just helping Domino's tell the story of the total nutritional package that a slice of smart slice pizza provides. We also provide marketing and advertising support over the years. You know, helping attend and sample this product. It really speaks for itself once you've had a chance to try it. And so it sells itself. Yes, and really just doing that kind of with local and state and national conferences, helping, helping get the word out that way. You know, one

Scott Wallin   15:07  

of the great things about smart slice is that it engages our entire Federation. This isn't just a DMI effort. You know, we work with all the state and regional teams to make it happen. Can you speak to how critical our state and regional checkoff teams are to smart slice

Rebecca MacKay Allen   15:20  

Yes, and Chris alluded to this before. You know, the local business, the local franchisees, and obviously our strong federation with local resources, through our state and regional organizations, we're really kind of always looking for ways to engage at the local level, level, whether that's product sampling at Dairy events or conferences, which which Domino's is always so great about partnering with us on or educational opportunities for smart slice, for the constituents and the stakeholders who would be purchasing smart slice, allowing, you know, some engagement at the local level with those audiences, because we know our state and regional organizations have relationships with those school nutrition professionals, and we've also definitely leaned into our states and regions when it comes to promoting new new products. Domino's is a master at marketing, master at producing delicious, you know, not just pizza, but menu items that contain cheese, and we've found opportunities over the years to lean into some of our state and regional teams to help amplify that. That's really another, you know, kind of power of the partnership is really just allowing us to co invest in that amplification of the message so that we're growing, you know, orders, order size, frequency, customer base, all of those good things.

Scott Wallin   16:37  

Kudos to all of you for making this thing work so well. It's awesome to see the reach of it and know that kids each day have a chance to enjoy a nice slice of Domino's Pizza. You know, before we wrap up the podcast, I want to go to each one of you to see if you have any final thoughts to share. Chris, let's start with you.

Kris Holley   16:53  

So when we look at this partnership and growth, obviously, we continually want to grow in schools in the US and, you know, selling more pizzas to US consumers, but one of the things that we put on our objectives this year was really to think about international expansion. And how do we support DMI in their efforts to get more US cheese internationally? So that's a goal of both Geminis and with Rebecca. You know, we hope to, we hope to make that happen this year, the international

Scott Wallin   17:19  

reach is just amazing. When you sit back and look and see just Domino's is all over the globe right now. So we're excited by that as well. Jim, how about some thoughts from you?

Jim Zimmer  17:27  

I just wanted to touch again on the growth opportunities in the US. You know, as Chris was explaining, we're innovating on our crust right now, which, at the end of the day, would just help us move more cheese in schools, because if the pizza crust is a little bit more improved, more kids will eat it, and that's the vehicle for delivering that wonderful, 100% real light mozzarella cheese. So that will help grow our business, along with get us into more schools who maybe, you know, we can tell a story of this new and improved crust, and that's going to open more doors for us as well. So that growth is what we're really focused on. My team is really focused on for this year. And side note, we're also looking now more into the US territories and the non contiguous us, trying to see if we can expand into Hawaii, Puerto Rico, which those customers want smart slice. So we're trying to work through the logistics of you know that that from a supply chain perspective, but that's another area of growth that we're looking into this year. So

Scott Wallin   18:33  

exciting to see that you guys have those goals of keep on going get more pizza out there across the world. So thank you for all you do there. Rebecca, how about some final thoughts from you could hardly top

Rebecca MacKay Allen   18:42  

either of those, but I do just want to put kind of a fine point on how strong and and important this partnership has been over the years. And one of the reasons is because Domino's continues to evolve its business to meet the ever changing needs of those, those crazy consumers out there and and we've been able to make sure you know that, that we're using us cheese to grow, that to grow their business, help amplify their growth and their their growth priorities. And I would say, you know, the the road is, the future is bright. There's, there's so many more things we can work on together, because it really just is such a strong partnership. And I did, I meant to mention this at the beginning, but I want to explain that I explain that I am not away at summer camp, though it may look that way, I am, in fact, in a bunk bed, but I'm at a conference, and wanted to, wanted to make sure to make time for this podcast, so I felt the need to explain my whereabouts.

Scott Wallin   19:35  

You want to bunk beds at home? Rebecca, I

Unknown Speaker   19:39  

do not, and after this experience, we're not getting them.

Scott Wallin   19:44  

Yeah, I know you're super busy this week, so I do appreciate you making time and and Jim and Chris. Thank you both so much for your time as well. This is certainly a conversation that is so important to the the people who fund the dairy check off our farmers and our and our importers and. I really, really am excited to bring them all these great insights. Thank you. Thank you our pleasure.

Jim Zimmer  20:05  

We love talking about the Checkoff Program and our partnership and pizza.

Kris Holley   20:10  

I love talking about pizza always. Yeah,

Scott Wallin   20:13  

I love talking about pizza. And I'm ready to go eat some pizza right now.

Rebecca MacKay Allen   20:17  

And I do, I personally want to thank Jim and Chris for taking the time to do this. I again, I love allowing you the opportunity to speak to our dairy farmer audience, because you guys just you epitomize our partnership every day. So thank you for this.

Your Dairy Checkoff Podcast   20:36  

Thanks for listening to your dairy check off podcast. Want to hear more about how your checkoff is making every drop count. Head over to Dairy checkoff.com or follow us wherever you get your podcast. See you next time you.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai