Traditional Companies Can Become Digital…Just ask Domino’s
Originally published as part of, “The Day Before Digital Transformation” by Phil Perkins and Cheryl Smith
“In a revolution, as in a novel, the most difficult part to invent is the end.”
– Alexis de Tocqueville
Executives from digital organizations find they are already operating in the ways we describe in our book. Their reaction has been: “what’s the big deal? There is no ‘secret sauce’ or magic being described here.” But if you point out many of the principles and practices outlined in the book to a typical executive from a non-digital organization, you will hear “that’s not how we do it” and “we are not them.” Today’s organizations are dying because they have not yet bought into the new normal, but it is not too late.
Let’s start with a quiz. If in 2010 you could put $1,000 into any of the organizations below (Figure 17), which would return the most by 2017?
Domino’s for the win![i] (Figure 18)
Domino’s is a great case study in digital transformation in which a non-digital organization is not only keeping pace but using digital to out-innovate the giants in its industry. Domino’s is implementing digital technologies not only to improve its customer-facing and back-end management processes but also to provide real-time aids in restaurant temperature monitoring, food safety, customer satisfaction, and predictive maintenance.
Domino’s was founded in 1960 in Ypsilanti, Michigan, 20 years before the start of the Digital Age. It has a long list of competitors that were founded in the same timeframe, including Pizza Hut (1958) and Little Caesars (1959). But only Domino’s used digital to define its future. Domino’s changed little about its core product. Domino’s changed everything else around its product and became so good at digital customer engagement that it could change its pizza recipe today and still stay locked in as the leader in pizza delivery.
[i] “Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is—Present value of $1,000 invested in the following U.S. stocks in January 2010,” www.statista.com, March 23, 2017.