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I always reduced my marketing budget in January. It is a trick I learned at Domino’s a few decades ago. Your marketing ROI will be lower in Jan. I took my monthly marketing allotment and banked it for use in a busier month to maximize the ‘bang for the buck’. Do some major cleaning and cross...

I have posted a few of these, but Today’s post is also right on: Trading in your pain by Seth Godin The pain of a lousy boss, of careless mistakes, of insufficient credit. The pain of instability, of bullying, of inadequate tools. The pain of poor cash flow, corrossive feedback and work that...

This is something you are going to have to fine tune. Every market is different, in terms of what pulls better. In general (75% of the time), $ off coupons pulled better than add-ons. I did have one store that add-ons consistently pulled 2% better response rates though. The real trick is to be...

The only big change to your dough making process I would say is to add the oil last (after mixing for 2-3 minutes). As it is now, you are probably getting some encapsulation of the flour, eg when the flour becomes coated in oil. That stops gluten formation. If it was me, I would add the yeast...

Hmmm. 25 lbs of flour should get you about 40 lbs of dough not 50. If you post your recipe, I am sure a bit of tweaking will not change the flavor in any noticeable way. That said, you will only get so much mileage out of that. Changing the way you slap out pizzas will give you a much better...

Yep. You are starting to realize that you have a fairly small window to use your dough. Usually 18 to 72 hours. Either way, you want to leave your dough out for an hour before use to get it to room temp. You can start to accurately predict usage by taking an hourly average of 4 weeks (most...

Wow. 6 Minutes. There is a lot you can do in terms of operations to reduce that time. Buying a sheeter might not be your solution. You will get much more impact by changing the way you slap out dough. It takes me about 20 seconds, and some of the people I have worked with can blow that time...

Can you be more specific about your goals? Do you need to focus on marketing, menu, or operations? Do you have a budget?

If you have pizza guys who don’t understand whats going on with your web site, it might be time for a revision.

I was just wondering what percent of the pizzas sold in the US were round. My initial guess was most, but schools serve a ton of square pizza, and some chains are also making pizzas that aren’t round. Anyone have data? A good guesstimate?

Wizard of ads is a good book: The next question is all too predictable: “Well, then, what would be the highest and best use of the money?” And again, my answer never changes, but it’s not because I’m trying to dodge the question or want to play silly games. The only honest way to answer this...

I thought I had seen everything. Guess not: Boy disciplined after waving gun-shaped pizza slice

I see this all the time when I am on the road. I also tend to roll my eyes a bit at the technicality, but the average customer is usually none the wiser.

The response on newspaper ads is pretty low, and makes the ROI negative. They are hard to do right and hard to track. If you want to set up a newspaper ad marketing plan, it takes work to prepare and a long term horizon. Taking up the same spot on the same page again and again, as repetition is...

Re: Square Slices vs Triangle Slices I always did thin crust in squares. Hand tossed might be more of a challenge, because people aren’t used to it.

See? You are way too nice to your staff. How many days do you plan on closing? In your place, I would start hiring a month before the take over. Doing the interviews at a Starbucks or other convenient location. Start training a week before in a rented class room. We have rented rooms at a...

About a decade ago, the company I was working for took over 5 under-performing shops. The biggest mistake we made was not firing the entire staff and starting out fresh. It is really difficult to get them out of the “We have always done it this way” mentality. Marketing is pretty easy to ramp...

@Bubba - I rack would probably be counter productive. Getting the pizzas up off the baking surface would probably cause them to take a lot longer to cook. The oven is just too small. I had a tough time adding wood as it is. @AFS - That oven is outside, and has some cracks around a few of the...

Whew. I started baking at 10:45 and the oven was a nice 575 degrees. 20 Pizzas in, it was down to 450, and 10 more pizzas it was down to 350. There was a line for 3 straight hours, and I ended up making 60 pizzas. I probably could have won an award for public speaking for keeping the people...

NicksPizza: Nah. You are preaching to the choir here. I have made quite a few pizzas in that thing, and it just isn’t that fun. I wish I had been around when they made it. I would take a 300 pie hour and a few PS360s any day.