X Factor final boosts Domino's pizza sales
Pizza delivery chain Domino's has credited the X Factor finals with helping it to achieve strong sales over the Christmas trading period.
Domino's said it saw a 25% surge in sales on Saturday 2 December when the X Factor final was broadcast. The pizza delivery chain said the X Factor sales boost demonstrated "the growing trend for combining ordering in with family entertainment". Restaurant chains have suffered due to consumers eating out less frequently. Celebrity chef Jamie Oliver said earlier this month that he would close six of his 42 UK Jamie's Italian restaurants. Similarly burger chain Byron said it could close up to 20 restaurants as part of a financial rescue plan. At the same time, take away restaurants have seen sales rise. In October, Zizzi and Ask Italian owner Azzuri credited the expansion of takeaways via app Deliveroo with helping to drive a 12.5% rise in annual sales. Ordering in Takeaway app Just Eat is one of the sponsors of the X Factor. Only 4.4 million viewers tuned into the X Factor final, a far cry from the 19.4 million that tuned in at the peak of the show's success in 2010. "We're a trade-up from cooking at home, and a trade-down from eating in a restaurant," Domino's chief executive David Wild told BBC Radio 5 Live's Wake Up to Money programme earlier this month. "People are happy to eat in the home, because in-house entertainments are so much better than they've ever been before." Domino's said that due to its strong trading performance in the last 13 weeks of 2017, it now expects its full year underlying profit before tax to be slightly above the current range of market expectations. Booming sales Group sales rose 18.2% to £321.8m in the 13 weeks to 24 December 2017, compared with the same period the year before. UK and Ireland sales rose 10.1% to £294.7m, with 43 new stores opened during the period. The pizza chain now operates 1,045 outlets in the UK, as well as 145 stores in five other markets including Ireland, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Liechtenstein and Sweden.