A nation of pizza addicts: Domino's reaps the benefits

In a past life I lived in a flat with a communal hallway. Among the post permanently littering the floor was the usual junk mail detritus: estate agent leaflets, double-glazing pamphlets and takeaway menus. In a development I don’t like to talk about at parties, I used to receive envelopes from the local takeaway addressed to ‘Pizza Eater’. All these missives contained was a menu. Nothing else. It was a shameful indictment on my love of Hawaiian specials.

But it’s behaviour like mine that has boosted sales at Domino’s. Today the pizza chain revealed ‘excellent’ results thanks in large part to a massive increase in online orders.

Reporting a pre-tax profit of £73.2 million compared with £62.1 million a year earlier, Domino’s also announced that it has hiked its annual dividend by 21.3 per cent to 11.75p a share. Although it reported an underlying operating loss of £1.3 million for the year, the chain has continued to open stores – 61 new outlets in 2015 compared to 40 the year before.