1960s–1990s In 1960, in
Ypsilanti, Michigan, near
Eastern Michigan University. The deal was secured by a $500 down payment, after which the brothers borrowed $900 to pay for the store. The brothers planned to split the work hours evenly, but Jim did not want to quit his job as a full-time postman to keep up with the demands of the new business. Within eight months, Jim traded his half of the business to Tom for the
Volkswagen Beetle they used for pizza deliveries. By 1965, Tom Monaghan had purchased two additional pizzerias; he now had a total of three locations in the same county. Monaghan wanted the stores to share the same branding, but the original owner forbade him from using the DomiNick's name. One day, an employee, Jim Kennedy, returned from a
pizza delivery and suggested the name "Domino's". In 1975, Domino's faced a lawsuit by
Amstar Corporation, the maker of
Domino Sugar, alleging trademark infringement and unfair competition. On May 2, 1980, the
Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in
New Orleans found in favor of Domino's Pizza. During the lawsuit, Domino's opened fifteen new stores under the name Pizza Dispatch, while also converting other stores to the name. In 1998, after 38 years of ownership, Monaghan announced his retirement, sold 93 percent of the company to
Bain Capital, Inc. for about $1 billion, and ceased being involved in day-to-day operations of the company. A year later, the company named
Dave Brandon as its CEO.
Leaning Tower of Pizza The Leaning Tower of Pizza was a proposed 30-story slanted
skyscraper that would have housed Domino's Pizza's operations at its Domino's Farms campus near
Ann Arbor, Michigan. In the mid-1980s, Monaghan asked
Taliesin Associated Architects, the inheritors of
Frank Lloyd Wright's practice, to erect a structure based on an un-built tower that Wright designed in 1956 for
Chicago called the Golden Beacon. Sometime during the planning of the tower, Monaghan and the Taliesin architects parted company, allegedly because both parties felt the project may have not served justice to the spirit of Wright's architecture.
International expansion On May 12, 1983, Domino's opened its first international store, in
Winnipeg, Manitoba,
Canada. That same year, Domino's opened its 1,000th store, at 8086 E. Mill Plain Blvd. in
Vancouver, Washington. In 1985, the chain opened their first store in the United Kingdom in
Luton. Also, in 1985 Domino's opened their first store in
Tokyo, Japan. In 1993, they became the second American franchise to open in the
Dominican Republic and the first one to open in
Haiti, under the direction of entrepreneur
Luis de Jesús Rodríguez. By 1995, Domino's had expanded to 1,000 international locations. In 1997, Domino's opened its 1,500th international location, opening seven stores in one day across five continents. By 2014, the company had grown to 6,000 international locations and was planning to expand to pizza's birthplace, Italy; this was achieved on October 5, 2015, in
Milan, with their first Italian location. CEO Patrick Doyle, in May 2014, said the company would concentrate on its delivery model there. After having faced tough competition from local restaurants and falling behind on its debt obligations, Domino's exited the country in 2022. In 1995, Domino's Pizza entered China through the Pizza Vest Fast Food Group, which also owned the rights to operate Domino's Pizza in eleven Southeast Asian countries. In February 2016, Domino's opened its 1,000th store in India. Outside the United States, India has the largest number of Domino's outlets in the world. The first mainland China store was located in the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone 4 and the first Beijing location opened in
Haidian District in May 1997. In December 2006,
Taiwan's Jinghua Hotel Group invested NT$500 million to acquire the rights for Domino's Pizza in Taiwan and Beijing. The 200th store in Shenzhen, was also the 10,000th Domino's store internationally. In 2017, Dash Brands Ltd., a foreign investment company specializing in restaurant chains, obtained the exclusive rights for
Hong Kong and
Macau. In China, more than 90% of orders are placed online. Orders can be made in the stores and on the company website, via app, and through the messaging app
WeChat. Despite insisting that its own distribution system has greater advantages in safeguarding service quality and data retention, Domino's has already opened up a model of cooperation with third-party take-out platforms such as
Taobao Shangou and
Meituan.
2000s–present In 2004, after 44 years as a
privately held company, Domino's began trading common stock on the
New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol "DPZ". Industry trade publication
Pizza Today magazine named Domino's Pizza "Chain of the Year" in 2003, 2010, and 2011. In a simultaneous celebration in January 2006, Domino's opened its 5,000th American store in
Huntley, Illinois, and its 3,000th international store in
Panama City, Panama, making 8,000 total stores for the system. In August 2006, the Domino's location in
Tallaght, Dublin, Ireland, became the first store in Domino's history to hit a turnover of $3 million (€2.35 million) per year. , Domino's has 8,200-plus stores worldwide, which totaled $1.4 billion in gross income. In August 2012, Domino's Pizza changed its name to simply Domino's. At the same time, Domino's introduced a new logo that removed the blue rectangle and text under the domino in the logo, and changed the formerly all-red domino to be blue on the side with two dots and red on the side with one dot. This was done because the company wanted to "expand" menu choices rather than simply rely on its traditional pizza. In April 2022, Domino's Italy franchise operator EPizza SpA filed for bankruptcy at a Milan court after two years of declining sales caused by the
COVID-19 lockdowns in Italy. In addition, Domino's Pizza faced competition from local pizza chains and restaurants, which had begun using food delivery app services such as
Glovo,
Just Eat and
Deliveroo. The reason for the failure, however, is mainly that the customer rating of Domino's outlets is very low in Italy, which explains the difficulty of competing with the high quality of Italian pizzas. After the 90-day grace period expired in July 2022, Domino's closed all its Italian stores on 20 July. In 2023, following the
Russian invasion of Ukraine, Domino's Russian operations also filed for bankruptcy and Domino's ultimately announced their withdrawal from the country, closing down all of their restaurants shortly after the announcement. On December 12, 2024, Domino's announced that it would transfer its stock to the
Nasdaq Global Select Market which took effect on January 2, 2025 at the stock market open. The company retained the ticker symbol "DPZ". Domino's announced on February 7, 2025, that it plans to close more than 200 stores worldwide, 172 of them just in Japan, where Domino's Pizza Japan operates 1,000 stores. The decision comes after CEO and Managing Director Mark van Dyck took the reins of the company. The reason given for the closure was low sales in the selected stores. Of all the markets that include the brand, Australia–New Zealand was the only market to report positive growth. With the closures, Domino's expects to reduce costs by approximately $9.8 million. == Products ==