Dodo Pizza: media coverage
17 December 2019
Maxim Kotin
Chief storyteller
Thanks to our policy of radical transparency, we at Dodo Pizza share a lot of stories and data on this blog and on social. But sometimes it’s nice to have a different perspective and see everything through the eyes of an impartial observer. So, in this post we collect links to the latest media publications about Dodo from all over the world.
Russia’s pizza king wants to use the cloud to take over the world
Once you crack the profit code for delivering hot pizzas in the Arctic, where blocks of cheese arrive on nuclear icebreakers, expanding into more hospitable climes like Britain and Nigeria is as easy as pie. Or so says Fyodor Ovchinnikov, the freshly crowned franchise czar of Russia and soon, he’s betting, beyond. From a single basement oven in his native Syktyvkar in the Far North, the failed bookseller and serial blogger has turned Dodo Pizza into one of Europe’s fastest-growing restaurant chains, leapfrogging Papa John’s, Domino’s and Pizza Hut in his home market in just eight years.
These Russians want to conquer Germany—with pizza
What unites an ex-investment banker from Merrill Lynch, some top Russian programmers formerly employed by Intel and a marketing expert from Poland? They’ve joined forces in a start-up office on the outskirts of Moscow—and they’re making pizza. A lot of it. Working out of a brick building on the site of a former Soviet boiler factory, the Dodo Pizza team has 130 employees: among them are young marketing and finance experts and—somewhat unusual for a fast food chain—more than 70 programmers.
My 500-unit pizza business started as a “delivery only” shop and I don’t believe in dark kitchens
Cheap rent won’t make food cheaper, building brands online is hard and quality is tough to maintain, argues Fyodor Ovchinnikov of Dodo Pizza
Fedor Ovchinnikov, founder of Russian chain Dodo Pizza, may just be the “Steve Jobs of pizza.”
Fedor Ovchinnikov may have a name that’s hard to pronounce, but it’s one worth remembering. As founder of a fast-growing Russian chain called Dodo Pizza(dodopizza.ru), the 33-year-old entrepreneur has reinvented the pizza business in his native land. Using cloud-based computer technology, webcams, guerrilla marketing techniques and a highly influential blog, Ovchinnikov is building an empire worthy of the old czars, attracting ambitious franchisees and, better yet, money men willing to fund his dream of global expansion.
The pizza chain you haven’t heard of that’s trying to take over the world
Everything about Dodo Pizza seems improbable. The fact that the global franchise was born in a tiny town in Russia, well north of Helsinki. The fact that a pizza chain could lead Russia’s largest crowdfunding campaign to date. And the fact that it was among the first to pull off pizza drone delivery (for actual customers, not just on video) in 2014. The feat, which was covered by international media, ended with the Russian police coming to founder Fyodor Ovchinnikov’s garage laboratory to fine him 50,000 rubles ($1500) for disturbing the peace, according to the company. Eight years since its founding, the startup world keeps talking about Dodo.
Inside Dodo Pizza’s innovative strategy to dominate the pizza market
Dodo Pizza might not be the most well-known pizza chain, at least not in the UK. However, it is in fact one of the fastest-growing restaurant chains in Europe, and the largest pizzeria in its native Russia. The chain currently has 549 pizzerias in 13 countries, and plans to add another 1,000 in Europe, Asia, and Africa over the next five years. It’s a bold aim, but one that its founder – who has been described as “the Steve Jobs of pizza” – seems intent on achieving. So what exactly makes Dodo Pizza different to all the rest? Here’s a look at the chain and the reasons behind its flourishing success.