Domino's Pizza Media Crisis Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Domino's Pizza Media Crisis - Research Paper Example The women holding the camera spoke the following vulgar words while filming the video: â€Å"We all have our secret ingredient....and in about five minutes they will be sent out on delivery where somebody will be eating these. Yes, eating em. And little did they know that cheese was in his nose and that there was some lethal gas that ended up on their salami. Now, that’s how we roll at Domino’s.† (Actual words of Kristie Hammonds). (Jacques 2009). What made matters worse was that both employees, the female holding the camera and the man performing various disgusting acts of contamination with the food, were in Domino’s uniform. The video was shot during working hours and the female employee repeatedly claimed that the contaminated food would soon reach innocent, unsuspecting customers. There were a total of five videos uploaded on YouTube by Kristie Hammond and they went viral within the span of a few minutes. One of the video was of 2.26 minutes duration and was named Domino’s Pizzas Special Ingredients, and showed Michael Setzer passing gas on salami and sticking pieces of cheese up his nose before inserting them into a sandwich. Meanwhile, Kristie joked consistently and claimed that food contamination occurs daily at Domino’s. The other videos were titled Sneeze Sticks, Poopie Dishes and Domino’s Pizza Burger. One of the videos also showed the name of the customer to which Kristie narrates, that the contaminated food would be delivered to. Later, the employees stated that the videos were a prank and none of the food they delivered was actually tempered with. However, the damage was done and the video was much talked about and many online conversations on Facebook and Twitter made it the foci of their attention and this was the primary reason why the issue became a social media crisis. By April 15, the first page offered on Google search for ‘Dominos’ contained at least five out of twelve reference s of the food tampering video on YouTube. (Jacques 2009). Objectives: For the first 24 hours, Domino’s executives did nothing in the hope that the issue would resolve by itself. However, when this did not happen, the executives were forced into action. The first objective in reversing the damage done to their Company was the identification and the subsequent dismissing of the two employees, Kristie Hammonds and Michael Setzer. The second objective was to contact the local authorities and issue a warrant for their arrest. The third objective was the removal of the food tampering video from YouTube and to contact the consumerist and goodasyou.org, two popular blog sites. The fourth objective was to call the local health department for the inspection of N.C. Domino’s store, where the video was filmed. The fifth objective was the issuance of a formal press release and the creation of an account on Twitter to issue responses to online conversations and to dedicate time in r eassuring customers about the fact that this was an isolated incidence and strict safety and cleanliness measures were followed at all Domino’s stores. The sixth objective was to launch an apology video on YouTube featuring the President of Domino’s. (Jaffe 2010). Programming: On 13 April, Domino’s headquarters was alerted for the first time about the disturbing videos posted on YouTube. The first person at Domino’s to learn about the videos on was the company’