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Some mascots are beloved by all—fixtures of Americana. Some make you want to punch a wall. We think Domino’s “The Noid” is the latter.
Huh? For starters, Domino’s released its “Avoid the Noid” campaign in the late ’80s. The “Noid” in question was a creepy villain who made life difficult for Domino’s delivery drivers faced with the franchise's 30 minutes or under promotion, which was wildly popular at the time...but resulted in reckless driving, crashes, and injuries (one of which led to a lawsuit that cost the franchise millions).
The Noid was also connected to a hostage incident at a Domino’s restaurant, which takes up a sizable chunk of the mascot’s Wikipedia page.
So, it’s a wonder the brand brought the ’80’s fixture back last week. Now, he’s disrupting the brand’s new autonomous delivery vehicles.
“We just trusted our guts that there’s just a love and a nostalgia that would make this successful,” Kate Trumbull, Domino’s VP of advertising, told Ad Age. “It hasn’t gone away in culture and people’s psyches and minds.”
Our take: It’s risky to try and cash in on nostalgia if your brand (and mascot) has a bit of a shady past. Maybe Domino’s thought people would forget the bad and remember the good? But Marketing Brew forgets nothing. — RB