Phone is still the best way to order pizza • Hacker News Board

Re: Phone is still the best way to order pizza

#111

Post by pizzasnob » Sun, Jan 30, 2022, 1:03 AM UTC

Scoundreller wrote: post #89

pizzasnob wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You mean the "Chicago and the sprawl around it all the way up to Maine along the great lakes" right? https://i.imgur.com/GOvnHcv.png Sorry coasties, Chicago's the new pizza capital

Good choice of username for a new account. It's yours for life now!

Thanks I couldn't stand to read yet another pizza misinformation

Re: Phone is still the best way to order pizza

#112

Post by hnal943 » Sun, Jan 30, 2022, 1:03 AM UTC

kzrdude wrote: post #105

tamaharbor wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Back in the day in NYC, I always ordered simply a ‘large pizza’. Cheese only and thin crust were assumed.

This is wild, I didn't know such default pizzas existed (my context: scandinavia)

I'm USA and had no idea adults ate cheese pizza.

Re: Phone is still the best way to order pizza

#113

Post by scaredginger » Sun, Jan 30, 2022, 1:04 AM UTC

Definitely feels like standardisation could be a solution to the author's woes. Given food ordering places can have templates that fit most restaurants' menus, we ought to be able to define open standards for these and then anybody could make a client to interface with a restaurant's system. Payment is probably the only part that couldn't be made standard, but you generally don't pay over the phone anyway

Re: Phone is still the best way to order pizza

#114

Post by jdavis703 » Sun, Jan 30, 2022, 1:06 AM UTC

And how does he pay for the pizza? Cash? Check (do they even take checks these days?)

Seriously, I can open the Toast (they started off making POS software) for my go-to pizza place. I can look to see if their special of the day looks worth ordering. If not, I go to my default.

Then comes the fun part: payment. They have Apple Pay enabled, so I let them save my Apple Pay token. So even if Toast gets compromised, they won’t have my card number. And I definitely have to worry about some underpaid cashier taking the card number I read off over the phone.

Re: Phone is still the best way to order pizza

#115

Post by mulmen » Sun, Jan 30, 2022, 1:07 AM UTC

MattGaiser wrote: post #86

mulmen wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hah, this is really interesting! This is the one case where an "engagement" metric actually makes sense. Is your storefront inviting enough that a customer would place an order in person just to hang out for a few minutes? And does that drive sales (beer?). Incredible.

I have never seen a restaurant try to sell you a drink while awaiting your pickup order, but it seems like quite a clever idea.

I was at a brewery/restaurant recently. They have a small beer garden attached to the waiting area. You put your name on the list for a table and can grab a beer while you wait. It took about 20 minutes to be seated but walking to our table we noticed there was no shortage of available seating. We also noticed that the beer garden prices carried something like a 40% premium.

Re: Phone is still the best way to order pizza

#116

Post by _RPL5_ » Sun, Jan 30, 2022, 1:09 AM UTC

But over the phone you have to talk to a person. When I use an app, it's not because I want to save time. It's because I want to avoid having to talk to people.

English is a second language for me, maybe that's why, but even in my native language I dread making a call to a live person. I have to hype myself up for a few minutes, before I pick up the phone.

Re: Phone is still the best way to order pizza

#117

Post by gruez » Sun, Jan 30, 2022, 1:10 AM UTC

paco3346 wrote: post #60

post_break wrote: post #9

I'm sorry but I don't agree. Dominos pizza has coupons, deals, etc. Trying to get those deals over the phone is a chore. Ordering specific toppings can be a chore since it's a relay back and forth vs a button. Multiple pizzas with multiple toppings? The delay just compounds. If you live alone and order one pizza or one style of specific themed pizzas then sure, it might be faster, if that's the metric of "best" but i…

I agree with the author and you. I think Dominos is the exception though. Pizza places aren't nearly as painful as other places that have javascript bloated, every single interaction has a spinner, there's too much whitespace ordering apps. Looking at you Applebee's.

>Pizza places aren't nearly as painful as other places that have javascript bloated, every single interaction has a spinner, there's too much whitespace ordering apps.

Maybe I just have more patience than the average person, but I haven't seen a site with enough bloated javascript/spinners/whitespace that would cause me to reach for alternatives (phone or otherwise).

Re: Phone is still the best way to order pizza

#118

Post by AdamH12113 » Sun, Jan 30, 2022, 1:11 AM UTC

rafaele wrote: post #69

post_break wrote: post #9

I'm sorry but I don't agree. Dominos pizza has coupons, deals, etc. Trying to get those deals over the phone is a chore. Ordering specific toppings can be a chore since it's a relay back and forth vs a button. Multiple pizzas with multiple toppings? The delay just compounds. If you live alone and order one pizza or one style of specific themed pizzas then sure, it might be faster, if that's the metric of "best" but i…

Who is in the pizza "Big Three" anyway? Domino's, Pizza Hut, Little Caesars?

Today I learned that Little Caesar's is a bigger pizza chain than Papa John's[1]. As of 2018, the top five are:

1. Domino's, with 14,856 "units" and $12.2 billion in gross sales.

2. Pizza Hut, with 16,784 units and $12.0 billion in gross sales.

3. Little Caesar's, with 5,500 units and $4.0 billion.

4. Papa John's, with 5,199 units and $3.7 billion.

5. California Pizza Kitchen, with 267 units and $840 million.

Everything after Papa John's is a long tail. Strangely, revenue in the long tail is not obviously proportional to the number of units. So instead of a top three, there's really a top two, a next two, and everyone else.

[1] https://pizzatoday.com/pizzeria-rankings/2018-top-100-pizza-...

Re: Phone is still the best way to order pizza

#119

Post by technothrasher » Sun, Jan 30, 2022, 1:12 AM UTC

ecshafer wrote: post #25

post_break wrote: post #9

I'm sorry but I don't agree. Dominos pizza has coupons, deals, etc. Trying to get those deals over the phone is a chore. Ordering specific toppings can be a chore since it's a relay back and forth vs a button. Multiple pizzas with multiple toppings? The delay just compounds. If you live alone and order one pizza or one style of specific themed pizzas then sure, it might be faster, if that's the metric of "best" but i…

But then you would have to eat... Dominos. I get that its not the same everywhere, but in the pizza belt, I couldn't imagine going there. Luckily my local place has a good website though.

When I used to live in Rochester, NY I ate Dominos because it was the best pizza in town. Rochester is a pizza wasteland. Or at least it was when I lived there.

Re: Phone is still the best way to order pizza

#120

Post by drdec » Sun, Jan 30, 2022, 1:13 AM UTC

toomuchtodo wrote: post #38

post_break wrote: post #9

I'm sorry but I don't agree. Dominos pizza has coupons, deals, etc. Trying to get those deals over the phone is a chore. Ordering specific toppings can be a chore since it's a relay back and forth vs a button. Multiple pizzas with multiple toppings? The delay just compounds. If you live alone and order one pizza or one style of specific themed pizzas then sure, it might be faster, if that's the metric of "best" but i…

Dominos has been abusing push notifications on iOS recently. They have two push notification settings, one for order events (being made, in the oven, ready for pickup), one for marketing. Even with marketing off, they've been sending marketing notifications. Dislike.

For an app like Domino's or MacDonald's or the like, I just install it on demand and then uninstall it after using it. There's no way I'm keeping it around.