Three Minds On Digital Marketing @ Organic

A few days ago two Domino's employees took it upon themselves to document a pretty distasteful (literally) joke -- or so they're calling it now. If you haven't seen the video that many sites grabbed before YouTube pulled it down, you might want to pass.

One employee plays the old prank of putting something that doesn't belong into an order he's making while the other employee captures it on video. To make it worse, they act like this isn't the first time they've done this. Just check out their other videos. Not good for Domino's or the fast food world in general.

But the crowdsourced sleuthing came to the rescue. The Consumerist stepped in, helped locate the store and the employees, then alerted the manager and Domino's headquarters. Dominos responded quickly by firing the employees. That's what we'd expect, but that doesn't help skeptics like me who wonder if there are copycats out there messing with orders right now. (And I'm sure there are.)

So could Domino's have avoided this mess to begin with? What should they do now to make sure it doesn't happen again? A few Organic employees weighed in:

"Honestly, any attempt like that just looks like duct tape. The real source of the problem is disengaged employees. It reminds me of that great training game where you managed a Kinkos full of unsatisfied and unhappy employees.

The real solution here is training and programs that incentivise and motivate employees. If that happened at a Starbucks, the problem would have been rectified before it ever got that bad."
-Chad Stoller, Executive Director, Emerging Platforms

"...Disengaged employees, or just bad hires? It's naïve to think this kind of crap doesn't go on everywhere. I worked in a restaurant during college, and well, it's a wonder we don't all get sick more often. The best way to deal with this proactively is to hire folks with the right attitude, first and foremost. Although it's interesting, that girl who made the video was perky and happy as hell and probably interviewed well, same as the booger guy. But they were both missing a chip or two, clearly. Certainly, good training programs and involved management make a huge difference, but in certain industries, maybe what a company like that needs to do is institute some kind of prescreening psych test."
-Tracy Coté, Executive Director, Human Resources

No matter what, Domino's will definitely take a hit. I'm sure there are many people who side with these comments:

"Wow. This really gives me pause. Guess I will be eating at home tonight and far into the future."
-Jeff Bossardet, Associate Creative Director

"I just threw up in my mouth a little. You hear things like this and I think a lot of times, you brush them off. No more, I say!"
-Tara Williams, Copywriter

Do you think Domino's did all that they could? What should/could they do now to increase customer trust? And the big question, will you ever eat at Domino's again?

Thanks to Chad Stoller and Jay Bain for the links.

Sarah Jo Sautter