Shares for Domino’s are 6% higher compared to the same time last year, after the pizza provider announced their full year profits for the company would be in line with market expectations, which currently stands at £42.2 million.

Strong sales in the run up to Christmas helped Domino’s achieve impressive full year figures with the home pizza delivery provider reporting total orders of £145 million in the 13 weeks leading up to Christmas, £53.1 million of which were online sales. The figures are 9.5% higher compared to the same period 12 months previously.

Saturday night TV shows, such as the X Factor and Strictly Come Dancing, helped keep people at home on the weekends and ordering pizzas, which helped boost sales figures for Domino’s further. The economic downturn is still having an effect on the dining habits of Brits as many choose the cheaper option of a takeaway on the sofa as opposed to a night out in a restaurant.

Domino’s new Chief Executive says the business will be looking forward to 2012 with optimism, with plans to nurture growth further with the development of new products and the introduction of Domino’s branches in new locations.

An officer from the Northlade Police Department reportedly found the infant sitting strapped into a car seat, which was placed on the side of the car park, on Sunday evening. The authorities started trawling CCTV images of the car park outside the Domino’s Pizza takeaway in Roanake to try and determine how the baby came to be left there alone, however the mystery was quickly solved when a phone call was received by the nearby pizza store from the frantic mother of the child.

Explaining how the infant had come to be left alone in the car park, the father described how he had dropped his wife off to do some shopping, before heading to the Domino’s Pizza takeaway to collect an order. With four children to keep track of, the father accidentally forgot to load the fourth child into the car, leaving her in her seat on the side of the parking space.

When the family arrived home, they realised they were one child down, and quickly called the Domino’s Pizza store where they’d just collected their takeaway to alert staff to the fact they thought they’d left their child there.

Both parents were questioned by police who were satisfied the incident was a genuine mistake. The 6-month old baby girl has now been safely returned to her family and no further charges are being pursued by the police.

This will be the pizza company’s second bite at the cherry in terms of targeting the pizza takeaway market in the Bahamas after Papa John’s left the region several years ago. However this time around the pizza giant is hoping that by taking time to seek out excellent candidates to promote and carry the brand forward in the Bahamas, this attempt at targeting the market will pay dividends.

The Bahamas is a highly competitive market for takeaways and fast food outlets with a Domino’s Pizza franchise and a Marco’s Pizza franchise already operating successfully, therefore Papa John’s will have their work cut out in order to gain a foothold in the competitive climate.

Papa John’s is currently the third largest pizza company in the world, however the American brand is aiming to leap frog the competition to take ownership of first place, but in order to achieve this end, Papa John’s needs to expand further in the US and also in international markets such as the Bahamas.

The “Better Ingredients Better Pizza” company currently operates in 40 international markets with 37,000 units across the world, however Papa John’s is looking to increase this across the board as it attempts to reach its goal of becoming the world’s largest pizza company.

Roxy Yarnold, a 19 year old pizza maker from Domino’s in Brentwood, wowed the X Factor judges over the weekend with her rendition of Georgia on My Mind. Receiving four yeses from the panel, Roxy is now through to Boot Camp, the next stage of the top ITV1 singing competition.

Roxy has worked at the Domino’s store on Brentwood High Street for the past three years but dreams of taking the charts by storm as the next female singing sensation. Roxy’s influences include Joss Stone, Jessie J, Ella Fitzgerald and Nina Simone. Music has always been in her blood – Roxy started singing at the age of five and was encouraged to apply for this year’s show by her colleagues at Domino’s.

Roxy Yarnold said: “I’m always singing at work – sometimes I don’t even realise I’m doing it! – and my co-workers kept saying I should apply so this year, I thought I’d go for it. I was over the moon to get a ‘yes’ from each of the judges.”

Saif Alani, franchisee of Domino’s in Brentwood, said: “Not only is she a great pizza maker but Roxy is a very talented singer too. Everyone in the store is behind her and we really hope she does well at boot camp. We will be gutted if Roxy has to leave pizza making to pursue her music career but we hope she’ll still order plenty of Domino’s pizzas on her rider!”

The merchandising arrangement between Domino’s and Coca-Cola, begins this week with the first eviction of a celebrity contestant from the Big Brother house. Throughout the new series, Domino’s will be promoting a free Coke deal, whereby pizza lovers can grab a free 1.25 litre of Coke or Diet Coke on every eviction night with any purchase of a large Domino’s Stuffed Crust pizza.

The campaign will run across the Northern + Shell portfolio on TV and online including the Big Brother website, mobile app and Facebook page. Activity on Facebook will be bolstered with Big Brother viewers now able to vote for evictions via the Big Brother Facebook page for the first time.

Simon Wallis, sales and marketing director for Domino’s, said: “Domino’s is very excited to be the official Big Brother eviction night partner and we look forward to working with Channel Five as they breathe new life into this iconic show. The evictions will provide another great opportunity for us to reach our core target audience in their homes at a key ordering time. When it comes to a great night in front of the TV and waiting to see who the latest evictee will be, what more could you want than a piping hot Domino’s and a Coke?”

For more details on Big Brother, log onto www.channel5.com/bigbrother or to take advantage of the free Coke eviction night deal, visit www.dominos.co.uk

Two of the Domino’s Pizza branches most definitely participating in the week long promotion are South Wales Domino’s stores in Pontyclun and the newly opened Domino’s Pizza branch in Tonypandy. Both of these outlets boast their own Facebook profiles where fans of the pages can be the first to hear about exclusive offers such as this week’s any pizza for £9.99 promotion.

The exclusive offer runs from Monday July 25^th right through until 11pm on Sunday July 31^st so pizza fans can enjoy discounted pizza all through the weekend. The special offer applies to all Domino’s Pizzas including the “create your own option” with up to four toppings. However the ever popular Domino’s stuffed Crust, Dominator and Double Decadence pizzas will incur an extra charge.

If you’re not already a fan of Domino’s Pizza Tonypandy and Pontyclun on Facebook, head over to the pages now and sign up to be the first to hear about competitions, and special offers such as this week’s any Domino’s pizza for £9.99 delivered or any pizza £7.99 collected from the store.

Domino’s scooped the best use of affiliate marketing award for its Facebook Superfans initiative and social affiliate ‘widget’ which enables website owners to download the widget and receive payment for any pizza orders placed with Domino’s by clicking through it. Over 6,500 downloads of the widget have been made to date, while Facebook Superfans helped to create nearly 32,000 followers in just four months.

Superfans and the social affiliate widget were developed in association with Domino’s long-standing digital agency, Arena Quantum.

Chris Moore, Chief Executive of Domino’s Pizza, said: “We love winning awards like this. We’ve always been known for leading the way when it comes to digital activity since we launched online ordering ten years ago and we want to make sure we keep it that way.  These new initiatives are just some of the fantastic ideas we’ve been working on with Arena Quantum and interactive orders continue to be a key driver of our business.  Here’s to Domino’s next ground-breaking innovation!”

Dan Clays, Managing Director of Arena Quantum, said: “Domino’s has built on its track record in digital marketing and inventively used social media to regularly talk and listen to customers in a way that has, most importantly, resulted in measurable business growth for their franchisees.  Social media has become a mainstay of Domino’s wider communications strategy and future innovations promise to be even more exciting.”

Domino’s Pizza has 672 stores in the UK and Republic of Ireland. For more details, log on to www.dominos.co.uk.

Following customer feedback, Domino’s has today [March 7, 2011], launched PayPal as its newest payment method for pizza. Customers in the UK simply need to log in to their PayPal account once they’ve placed their pizza order, enabling them to pay just by entering their email address and password.

PayPal is free to use on all Domino’s orders and is a great way for people to buy pizza for friends and family too  – perfect if you’ve mouths to feed who are away at university or even if you just fancy treating someone to dinner.

Simon Wallis, sales and marketing director for Domino’s, said: “Online orders account for an increasingly large proportion of our sales and as part of this, we are continually looking for ways to improve the process and make it even more user-friendly. Our customers and Facebook fans told us they wanted an easier way to pay – we listened to them and we’re now pleased to introduce PayPal, which is fast, safe and secure. It’s great to be able to offer our customers the option of using PayPal to pay for pizza in just a couple of clicks!”

Cameron McLean, general manager, merchant services at PayPal, said: “We welcome Domino’s on board as our latest high street partner and one of the first pizza delivery companies to join us. This innovative partnership is a natural step for both companies, given Domino’s phenomenal growth in online orders and PayPal’s extensive experience with large retailers.”

Domino’s link up with PayPal will be communicated to pizza lovers and PayPal users through a range of digital platforms including social media, email and online advertisements.

Grab a slice of the action – order and pay online at www.dominos.co.uk in just a matter of clicks.

The survey was conducted by Brand Keys. The company say they set out with the aim of conducting a study which went beyond the usual figures and statistics, to get to the heart of a consumer’s emotional attachment to a brand.

Closely following Domino’s in the rundown of the pizza brands customers are most loyal to was another American company, Papa John’s, followed by Pizza Hut and Little Caesar’s, according to the study.

Chief Executive of Domino’s, J. Patrick Doyle welcomed the findings from the study. The Domino’s boss said that although the pizza giant is always looking to attract new customers, they realise that customer retention is vital to the success of their brand, and so they’ve made a conscious effort to develop brand loyalty over the course of the last few years by improving in store services and extending their menu.

According to one franchise expert, Craig Slavin, brand loyalty is established “from the ground up” and stems from customers receiving a great service from frontline staff members such as pizza delivery drivers and customer service advisers.

The survey aims to predict which brands will be a hit with consumers over the coming year, and so if the results are anything to go by, Domino’s looks set to enjoy yet another bumper year with a further rise in profits.

Taking advantage of Domino’s popular “two-for-Tuesdays” pizza deal which offers customers the chance to get two pizzas for the price of one, school pupils have been ordering as many as 70 pizzas in a single lunch break.

Pizza delivery drivers were initially dropping the pizzas off at the school car park, but the school kids had to change their collection spot to another area off the school premises after teachers go wise to their lunchtime takeaways.

The Domino’s delivery drivers have been regularly dropping off takeaway orders of 35 – 40 pizzas on a Tuesday, but the largest order the teens ever made was for 70 pizzas on the “Two for Tuesdays” offer, which would have cost £500 had it not been for the special deal.

However parents have complained to the school about the pizza deliveries and have asked teachers to do more to stop this practice from happening.

In reaction to the incident, Domino’s Pizza has announced they will not be delivering any pizzas to school children during lunch breaks as the pizza home delivery experts say they take their “social responsibility” very seriously. Domino’s added that they have worked with schools in the past to encourage healthy eating amongst pupils.