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Food and beverage operators are no stranger to opening and closing locations as the flow of business changes over time. But a few major chains have recently decided to pull their operations out of certain markets entirely and shutter their spaces there.
On May 23, Starbucks announced that it would close all 130 locations in Russia and “no longer have a brand presence in the market” due to the country’s ongoing invasion of neighboring Ukraine, CNBC reported. The move marked the end of a 15-year run in Russia for the iconic coffee company, even though its operations there made up less than one percent of its annual revenue.
Days prior, on May 16, McDonald’s announced it too would be leaving the Russian market. The decision saw more than 850 locations closed, which were sold off to a Siberian franchisee and now no longer carry the company’s logo, branding, or product, CNBC reported. Now, another beloved restaurant chain is making moves of its own.
According to a recent report from the company, Domino’s Pizza has closed the last of its 29 remaining locations in Italy, Bloomberg News reports. The shutterings end a relatively brief run for the American company, which entered the country in 2015 with plans to open 880 locations offering American-style toppings such as pineapple, bacon, and chicken to a national market famously credited as the birthplace of the beloved pie.
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At the opening of the initial location in Milan, the company’s Italian franchiser, ePizza SpA, said that “we’re going where no major pizza brand has gone before” and promised to use “100 percent tomato sauce and mozzarella” on its pies, per CBS News. But after borrowing heavily to fund ambitious expansion plans, the chain struggled to move pizzas during the country’s COVID-related lockdowns—especially as many smaller shops signed up with third-party delivery services to meet local demand.ae0fcc31ae342fd3a1346ebb1f342fcb
“We attribute the issue to the significantly increased level of competition in the food delivery market with both organized chains and ‘mom & pop’ restaurants delivering food, to service and restaurants reopening post-pandemic and consumers out and about with revenge spending,” the franchiser said in its investor report outlining its fourth-quarter 2021 results, per Bloomberg News.
Based on social media posts made by customers to the Italian locations’ social media pages, it appears the closings came as a surprise to some devotees of the imported chain, Bloomberg News reports. But predictably, other takes on the development poked fun at the fact that the closures should have been anything but surprising in a country with no shortage of authentic pizza options.
“Trying to open Dominos Pizza in Italy is like trying to sell snow in the North Pole,” one user tweeted, per The Washington Post.
Another Twitter user quipped: “If you ever suffer from imposter syndrome, just know that some highly paid executives thought Domino’s should expand into Italy.”
Even mainstream Italian media weighed in on the development. Under a headline from Aug. 8 reading “Italians don’t like pineapple pizza: Domino’s is shuttering all pizzerias in the country,” daily newspaper Il Messaggero reported that the offbeat menu items never seemed to take off in the traditional market. “These products would turn up the nose of traditional pizza lovers, while intriguing xenophiles,” they wrote, per The Post.
