Planet Money · Friday, September 18, 2026
David Hallbin Stricker and his IT colleagues at Domino's faced internal resistance when proposing the pizza tracker. They recognized its potential to manage customer emotions and improve the waiting experience, but corporate leadership was hesitant due to the significant time investment required and whether it was worth building a 'gimmick' for marginal anxiety reduction.
“But they also knew that corporate would never go for it. Because it would be really time consuming to build something that would track literally every pizza at every single Domino's.”
“Plus, was it really worth it spending so much effort on basically a gimmick to maybe make some customers a little less anxious?”
“So instead, David and his IT colleagues, they cooked up a tool. That would allow their customers to obsessively monitor their pizza's progress.”