Franchisee Stinginess Makes Promotion a Strikeout at Some Pizza Pizza Locations
Since 2006, Pizza Pizza has partnered with the Toronto Blue Jays to offer fans free pizza. As a sponsor, Pizza Pizza allows fans to redeem their ticket for a free slice of pizza on Mondays when Toronto Blue Jays pitchers combine for 7 strikeouts on either Friday or Sunday games. (The Toronto Raptors operate a similar promotion in which 100 points equals a free slice.)
But it seems that not all Pizza Pizza franchisees are on board with the promotion. In fact, some have been known to go to extreme lengths to avoid handing out those prized free slices.
Although I have had my own experiences with this promotion, I didn't realize that this was a widespread problem until recently. While browsing the consumer awareness website RedFlagDeals.com, I met Rene who had twice been mistreated by Pizza Pizza and was sharing his story so that others might avoid a similar fate.
Rene doesn't always go to the games, but when he does, he tends to get lucky. In 2008, he walked into a Pizza Pizza with two qualifying tickets to exchange for his dinner. There was a line in front of him, but he walked up to the display case tickets in hand anyways, to see if there was any cheese or pepperoni left (the promotion only allows for the redemption of cheese or pepperoni slices). Seeing that there were two pepperoni slices left, he returned to the back of the line, to wait his turn and chat with his wife.
When his turn came to order, before even being given a chance to speak he was told there were no slices left, only squares (which are about half the size of slices). Naturally, he assumed that the customers in front of him had ordered the slices and he hadn't noticed. But then as he was looking at the display case, he noticed that the two slices had been moved onto the Meat Lover's tray, where they fairly neatly blended into the rest of the pizza. When he asked for the two pepperoni slices, the attendant replied "One cheese, one pepperoni, square slices. OK?"
Rene repeated his request for 2 regular pepperoni slices to the anger of the attendant who put the two slices in the oven for 30 seconds, then threw them into a paper bag and slid them across the counter before moving on to the next customer. Needless to say, Rene was not impressed.
Later that summer, my girlfriend and I walked into the Pizza Pizza at Yonge and Elm with our tickets from a game the previous weekend. We handed two tickets to the cashier and asked for one pepperoni and one cheese slice, both of which they had plenty of. The cashier put the pepperoni in the oven and then said we would have to pay a $0.50 surcharge for the cheese slice.
Dazed and confused, we pointed to the sign above her saying that our ticket entitled us to a slice of cheese pizza for free. She said that they didn't have any "regular" cheese pizza, that they in fact don't make "regular" cheese pizza at this location, and that they only serve "4-cheese" pizza which costs more. So we were given the option to have another slice of pepperoni or pay a surcharge for the cheese pizza. At this point, we asked to speak to the Store Manager who wanted nothing to do with us and refused to give us his name upon request.
We read the Free Slices policy out loud to him and explained to him that our ticket entitled us to a slice of cheese pizza. There was no clause in the policy that only certain franchisees participate or that they are under no obligation to provide the specified selection of pizza. Based on the policy, the store had to provide a choice of pepperoni and cheese pizza to customers upon request.
The manager had no rebuttal to our claims, other than to tell us that he would not make a cheese pizza, even though we offered to wait 15-20 minutes while he made one. Eventually, after we essentially refused to leave the store or let them serve any other customers, the girl serving us capitulated and gave us the 4-cheese pizza for free, while the manager hid cowardly in the back of the store. All of this resistance seems disproportionate to the value of a couple of slices of pizza, doesn't it?
Flash forward to the 27th of September, the final home game of the 2009 Blue Jays season. The pitchers combined for seven strikeouts and Rene was once again in attendance. He decided it was time to try his luck again, this time at a different location. Upon arrival, they noticed that the store did not have any pepperoni or cheese pizza in the display case - highly unusual for a Pizza Pizza storefront.
He spoke directly to the manager who was manning the counter, and was told that it would be a minimum 20-minute wait for fresh slices. He was told he could get pizza quicker if he went to the next closest location, 5 or 7 minutes away, in a heavy rainstorm. Imagine the hospitality! Rene told the manager he was willing to wait and he took a seat not far from the counter. A few minutes later, another customer arrived with 4 tickets to exchange for free pizza. He was given the same message and told to go to another store. He too, opted to wait.
Several minutes later, another couple arrived with tickets and was also given the same message. Seeing that three others were waiting for pizza, they too decided to wait. After another 20 minutes of waiting, the manager went to the back of the store and brought out half a cheese pizza and half a pepperoni pizza. He put two pepperoni slices in the oven for Rene. Upon questioning as to why he was reheating supposedly freshly made pizza, the manager ignored Rene and proceeded to find out that the man with 4 tickets wanted 4 pepperoni slices, more than was left. The man was told it would be another 20 minute wait for pepperoni pizza.
It quickly became obvious to all those waiting that the manager in fact was not making fresh pizza, but was storing the pepperoni and cheese pizzas in the back of the store, hoping that in making them wait long enough, they would lose patience and leave. As the customers further pressed the issue, the manager slammed his hands down on the counter and said that he was running a business, and if they were unhappy with the wait, they should leave. All the customers left immediately, only Rene with pizza in hand.
Not all experiences are as bad as the ones described here. Though I no longer go to the Pizza Pizza at Yonge and Elm, the location just south of Bay and College has graciously given me free slices without complaint throughout the year. And I'm sure for every horror story, there are 100 customers who have been happily served their free slices. But those aren't the stories that we remember.
In a May 2009 Toronto Star article, Pizza Pizza marketing vice-president Pat Finelli called the promotion a "win-win situation". As this article can attest, I'm not sure some of the franchisees would agree. One has to wonder whether they're just stingy, or possibly getting a raw deal on the promotion. Regardless of the situation, some managers have clearly not realized that in business, you only get one first impression.
Guest contributor Mathieu Morin is an engineer by day, and a sports fanatic and photographer by night. You can see more of his work at his daily photoblog View Found.
First two photos by the author, third by AtillaSoylu on Flickr.
Comments (44)
I want to be like you when I grow up - having the guts to hold up the entire customer lineup ad refusing to leave until served the deserved pizza slice.
Me like when the fans chant 'Let's Go Raptors! We want pizza!' during the last 5 mins of the game....definitely 'Where Amazing Happens...'
Everyone knows that Pizza Pizza serves some of the filthiest gastro-sclerosis laced pizza pie in town. Why would you want to ingest this shit, even for free?
I can't believe an establishment as shitty as Pizza Pizza is still in business.
Their barely ever has any cheese or sauce on it, and additional toppings are just as hard to find. The only way to stomach their "pizza" is to go through a couple packs of dipping sauce. And the service is almost always shit. At the Runnymede/Bloor location the line was a bit long, and when I got to order I asked for a slice. He put it in the bag and threw it at me. I asked him to reheat it (he never put it in the oven and it was back around xmas time) and he gave me a look. Another time I went the guy working there started making very rude remarks about my girlfriend, and as I was leaving, he tried to tell the customer in line that they gave him a 5 and not a twenty dollar bill, when me and another person say a green bill being handed over.
Every other pizza franchise is far better than pizza pizza.
As others have already mentioned, the only possible way this lousy franchise is still in business is through advertising and sponsorship. There are so many better pizza alternatives out there (even among the take out options) there is no excuse for Torontonians (and Ontarians) to continue to prop up this cardboard empire even when the food is free.
But I'm glad to see they might be getting some bad publicity out of this--that's "win-win" to me.
Redeemed by ticket for a free cheese slice at the Queen and Bathurst location earlier this year with no problem
This seems to happen a lot in the States, I guess Pizza Pizza is the only one up here. I remember a big brouhaha a while back about a US chain (applebees?) offering a military discount and a bunch of franchises not participating and then there's the Quiznos and Arbys offers. I don't really understand, do the franchises not get compensated by head office for these promotions?
That's correct, the franchisees do not get compensated by the head office for the free pizza. So essentially the head office is writing a check with their mouth, and the franchisees get to pay for it.
Now in theory it's a marketing effort that drives traffic to all the locations, but.... you can see why individual franchisees, especially ones near the stadium, might get pissed off. The franchise in Moosejaw gets the advertising, but doesn't give out any free pizza. The franchise in downtown Toronto gets the advertising, and has to give out a full day's worth of free pizza, which probably blows three days' worth of profits.
Thanks "Answer", that's both aggravating and unsurprising. I imagine there's a lot of people only going in for the free slice and never with their hard-earned, so yeah, definitely makes sense that some of the TO franchisees are pissed. Flat-out hiding pizza out the back seems like a dodgy way to respond though.
i'm with you on that one...Dominos is by far the best take out/delivery for regular pizza in the area.
Pizzaiolo is the best by-the-slice option in the hood.
F Pizza Pizza...so what their number is easy to remember.
i prefer delicio over pizza pizza
i'm willing to wager that, like 'Answer' said, there's probably no financial support from the head office for this policy. as a result, if you're an owner, would you really be motivated to give away free stuff?
and after all, we are talking about FREE STUFF. this reminds me of axel rose trying to sue dr. pepper after chinese democracy. anyone buying a jays ticket expecting pizza has got their head in the wrong place anyway.
This city has low standards when it comes to food.
Pizza Pizza wouldn't survive one week in Montreal.
I've never attempted to redeam a free slice but the location at Church and Wellington always claims to not have chicken bites, onion rings, chicken wings and french fries. It becomes very obvious after a while that they just don't want to take the time to make them. They're also very rude as well as I find most locations are.
Queen and McCaul is BRUTAL with the free slices. I once had it out with the manager and actually called head office and handed him my cell phone after reaching them. He gave me my free slice.
I probably spent $300-$400 year with Pizza Pizza or more. They ripped me off on a home delivery while I had guests over, the manager I spoke to over the phone was a prick who dismissed me like a drunk, I sent a letter to management to complain and the response was half baked. That was 4 years ago, I've never eaten that crap since, still pissed about the treatment I got. Franchise owners are screwed by the head office every which way... this is a company with serious problems. I vote with my dollars.
The pizza pizza at davisville double charged me on my debit card for an entire pizza. When I went back after receiving my bank statement they accused me of false claims and it took me over an hour to get them to refund that stupid pizza.
never again!!!
i go to alot of jays games (say 10/ year).. and after the strikeout games, I go to pizza pizza to claim my free slices.
at least half of the time they tell me that they are out of pepperoni and make me wait.
its shitty pizza anyway.. only barley worth it if its free. i havent paid for a slice there in 5 years.
The author actually goes to over 35 Jays games a year. So it isn't about his head being in the wrong place, it's about sponsor holding up to their end of the bargain...it's about false advertising, which is completely illegal. I blame it on head office, they should have to reimburse the franchises for the free pizza, that is just bad business management.
You blame the head office? Obviously you do not work in business. How about the sales the locations get on days when they do not have to hand out free slices because everyone at the game heard Pizza Pizza a thousand times. Do they turn away that business? The net benefit of all that promotion probably makes them more money than they lose.
False advertising? At the one Jays game I attended this year, I distinctly remember hearing that the free pizza offer was at participating franchise locations only. Annoying, sure; confusing, maybe; but false?
I'm tempted to sympathize with franchisees when their chain screws them over this way, but then again, that comes with the territory.
pizza pizza is gross so why even bother going in there at all? the only reason that they have the ability to lay claim to the #1 Pizza in Ontario is because they have so many locations and sell the most pizza. spend $4 and get yourself a decent slice at pizzaiolo.
Pizza Pizza should consider themselves lucky with this "promotion". If the Jays actually had a good team and fans attended the games, then they'd be giving out infinitely more slices of pizza. If/when the jays ever get bigger crowds again we can rest assured this "promotion" will cease to exist.
Old Man Pizza is by the the best value! if you're looking for a quick cheap delicious slice. Taste-wise I've always been a fan of Pizza Nova with broccoli green peppers onions garlic on the crust... oooo lala. I'm getting hungry with all this pizza talk.. I used to go to the pizza pizza at oakwood/st.clair back when i lived up there; good service but it was the only pizza joint around the pizza was alright but like Shawn had said you go through a few packs of dipping sauce...
sounds like pizza pizza needs an internal operations auditor to handle quality controls of franchisees. If they implenment a promotion(whether they make the franchisee suck up the cost or not), they should follow through with some quality/service control review..
send out some secret shoppers who work for their head office, get into stores on a ground level to find out whats going on in their stores.. if a store isnt complying with head office policy, then fine them.. just like other companies do...
and if pizza pizza corporate doesnt care whats going on inside their stores franchise or corporate, then that ship will sink and they've no one to blame but themselves...
I suppose you could argue that you get what you paid for - ie. it's free, so what do you expect? - but yeah. Terrible place to get pizza.
I once had the fun experience of trying to order a Pizza Pizza sandwich in-store at Kingston Rd and Vic Park. I was rudely told "They don't make sandwiches"... like, for instance, the ones on their menu. (I think it had something to do with the fact that the place was frequented by a lot of high school kids and they preferred to sell them slices. Less work or more profit or something.)
Anyway. I left, phoned in an order for pickup, and returned 5 minutes later to collect my sandwich, which they dutifully made because they had to. Jerks.
That was my last Pizza Pizza visit. Now it's Pizzaiolo all the way.
I rather have frozen pizza than that junk
also, don't pay with debit cars, or credit for the matter, the yonge and elm location was a hotbed for debit card cloning
they busted the guilty guy supposedly, but it can happen again.
"I rather have frozen pizza than that junk"
The PC deep dish spinach pizza is actually better than most pizza places in TO.
Just saying.
I love stories like this - that is when the customer doesn't acquiesce to a sketchy pizza shop manager with a chip on his shoulder. Consumers have rights and shouldn't feel compelled to turn tail and run when some schmoe behind the counter gets surly.
As Mathieu touched upon, it's not known what real effect promotions like these have on the individual franchisees. Maybe it's draining the day's inventory for paying customers. Maybe it's throwing off the books for the day and leaving them closer to or in the red.
It could be those things, but more than likely it's the nuisance of having to hand out free food to groups of young happy people while the manager sits there in his bright orange apron wondering why he's at the McDonald's of pizzerias.
Corporations reimburse their individual store owners for money lost on 'free' promotions, so if these guys are angry about it they're probably just shitty at running a business. So screw 'em.
If a franchise isn't going to participate in the promotion, they should say so upfront when you approach them with the ticket. That's what happened to me at the Pizza Pizza at York University. By lying and saying they only have certain slices available or whatever, they want you to come in under the impression that the franchise is part of the promotion but spend your money on something else there. They want to have their cake and eat it too.
Someone should email this blog post url to PizzaPizza. Companies actually take this kind of thing very seriously and you might actually make a difference. Pointing out the PizzaPizza search ad from Google at the top of the page would just ad insult to injury too considering they pay for it to be associated with this content.
The Yonge/Eglinton location is brutal, they never have cheese or pepperoni slices the day after the Jays record seven strikeouts. It is always we are out of cheese/pepperoni slices, they will be ready in twenty minutes. So I waited twenty minutes and when I went up to get my slice the girl told me they do not have authorization to give out free slices, I even showed her the sign they had put up in their own store advertising the promotion. I told her I was not leaving the line until I got my slice and spoke with the manager after about five minutes of the line not moving and the coward manager hanging in the back she gave me my free slice. Everyone in the store went nuts as they were told they could not have a free slice, then she gave me one. My only suggestion is to be a bigger prick to them than they will be to you and you will soon get your free slice.
Hey..I emailed Pizza Pizza Corporate this morning and here is the response i just received....
"Thank you for your email Nick, we really appreciate you for bringing this matter to our attention. We at Pizza Pizza pride ourselves on quality products and services, and were very disappointed to learn of the concerns expressed.
We are very proud of our association with the Toronto Blue Jays, in what has been an overwhelmingly positive experience for our customers, based on feedback received. While the overwhelming numbers of customers redeeming their tickets for a free slice of pizza demonstrates that adherence is being met on a wide scale, we are very concerned that there seem to have been a handful of instances where we have let the public down. Our customers
mean a lot to us, and we intend to remedy any situation that does not meet with our corporate standards or support our core values. One upset customer is too many.
Our marketing department has been made aware of your concerns, and
working in tandem with our sales department, we are ensuring that all of our participating Restaurants, who are compensated $1.00 for each ticket redeemed, honor the promotion and provide proper service to the public going forward.
You are a valued customer as well and along with offering our thanks for having taken time out of your busy day to write us, we would be eager to learn if you yourself have had a similar negative experience to the ones you'd brought to our attention. If you had, please forward the Restaurant location, we'd be pleased to look into the specific issue once details are
forwarded.
Thank you so much, and we look forward to hearing from you Nick."
I go to lots of Jays games and redeem for lots of free pizza. I have had many poor experiences. Here they are by location:
- Church and Wellington: The worst. I saw a customer outside hand tickets for free slices to a homeless person. The Pizza Pizza attendant (I believe his name was Nabil from my recollection) refused the offer of free pizza to the homeless person while the attendant had just given the offer to others in line just moments before. Pure discrimination!
- Blue Jays Way and Front: I overheard instructions between staff there and they seem to make two sets of pepperoni and cheese slices on days where you can redeem for free slices. For those that they give away free, they put much less sauce and cheese; these are hard and not tasty.
- John and Queen: I go a lot and have had no problems generally, though I have been aware of some staff who think this is only applicable to Sunday (and not also Friday) game tickets. I have been upgraded to a better slice when pepperoni or cheese were sold out.
- Broadview and Queen: Not very tasty slices in general (I find locations prepare slices differently). But, I have been upgraded to a better slice when pepperoni or cheese were sold out.
I hope that people will boycott those locations with poor service and that Pizza Pizza head office reads this!
I'm pissed with Pizza Pizza. If you want to post a story about Pizza Pizza, I have a blog started about it. More posts needed.
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