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Pizza delivery
Pizza delivery is a service in which a pizzeria or pizza chain delivers a pizza to a customer. An order is typically made either by telephone or over the internet to the pizza chain, in which the customer can request pizza type, size and other products alongside the pizza, commonly including soft drinks. Pizzas may be delivered in pizza boxes or delivery bags, and deliveries are made with either an automobile, motorized scooter, or bicycle. Customers can, depending on the pizza chain, choose to pay online, or in person, with cash, credit card, debit card or cryptocurrency. A delivery fee is often charged with what the customer has bought.
Ordering
Ordering pizza for delivery usually involves contacting a local pizza restaurant or chain by telephone or online. Online ordering is available in many countries, where some pizza chains offer online menus and ordering.[1]
The pizza delivery industry has kept pace with technological developments since the 1980s beginning with the rise of the personal computer. Specialized computer software for the pizza delivery business helps determine the most efficient routes for carriers, track exact order and delivery times, manage calls and orders with PoS software, and other functions. Since 2008 GPS tracking technology has been used for real-time monitoring of delivery vehicles by customers over the Internet.[2]
Some pizzerias, such as the Ontario-based Canadian chain Pizza Pizza, will incorporate a guarantee to deliver within a predetermined period of time.[3] For example, Domino’s Pizza had a commercial campaign in the 1980s and early 1990s which guaranteed orders in 30 minutes. The guarantee was for 3 dollars off the order if broken but is often misremembered today as “30 minutes or its free”. This was discontinued in the United States in 1993 due to the number of lawsuits arising from accidents caused by hurried delivery drivers, but is still offered in some countries. Pizzerias with no time guarantee will commonly state to the customer an approximate time frame for a delivery, without making any guarantees as to the actual delivery time.[citation needed]
According to Domino’s, New Year’s Eve is the most popular day for its pizza deliveries; others are Super Bowl Sunday, Halloween, New Year’s Day, and the day before Thanksgiving.[4] Unscheduled events may also cause an increase in pizza deliveries; for example, Domino’s stated that its sales during the O. J. Simpson slow-speed chase were as large as on Super Bowl Sunday.[5]
Charge
For decades, “free delivery” was a popular slogan for almost all pizza stores.[citation needed][6] In Australia, a portion of the delivery charge is given to the driver as the store is required to reimburse the driver for the use of a personal vehicle.[citation needed]
Domino’s Pizza is credited with popularizing free pizza delivery in the United States.[7] Pizza Hut began experimenting in 1999 with a 50-cent delivery charge in ten stores in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.[8] By mid-2001 it was implemented in 95% of its 1,749 company-owned restaurants in the U.S., and in a smaller number of its 5,250 franchisee-owned restaurants.[9] By 2002, a small percentage of stores owned or franchised by U.S. pizza companies Domino’s and Papa John’s were also charging delivery fees of 50 cents to $1.50, and some of Little Caesar’s franchisees charged delivery fees.[9] In 2005, Papa John’s implemented delivery charges in the majority of its company-owned stores.[10]
In some countries, it is common to give the pizza deliverer an optional tip upon paying for the order. In Canada and the United States, tipping for pizza delivery is customary. Opinions on appropriate amounts vary widely.[11][12][13] Employees are legally obligated to report tips to their employer for income tax purposes, while independent contractors, who may charge a per-delivery fee to a restaurant, are legally obligated to report tips to the Internal Revenue Service.[14]
Delivery technology
An electrically heated pizza bag, plug at the bottom
Delivery bag
Bags used to keep pizza hot while being transported are commonly referred to as hotbags[15] or hot bags.[16] Hotbags are thermal bags, typically made of vinyl, nylon, or Cordura, that passively retain heat.[15] Material choice affects cost, durability, and condensation.[15] Heated bags supply added heat through insertion of externally heated disks, electrical heating elements, or pellets heated by induction from electrically generated magnetic waves.[15]Innovations in delivery bag designs have allowed without the usage of a fixed box for bike delivery, such as a hard frame, back straps, and waterproofing. These systems proved to be cheaper, more efficient and faster to use.[citation needed][17]
Pizza box
Pizza in a box, with a pizza saver in the middle
Modern pizza boxes are made of corrugated fiberboard.[18] Corrugated board has a number of advantages for pizza delivery: it is cheap, recyclable, and disposable, it is stiff yet light, it is absorbent thus keeping oil and juice from leaking, and the channels of air in the cardboard have excellent insulation properties.[19]
The history of the pizza box began in Naples during the 1800s where bakers put pizzas into metal containers called stufas: round, vented tin or copper containers with shelves that held the pizzas apart from one another.[18] Since the 1940s pizza take-out was done with the pizza sitting on a round cardboard base and covered with a paper bag.[18] It is believed Domino’s developed the modern corrugated flat square pizza box in the early 1960s, but they never patented it.[18] Patent designs for pizza boxes date to at least 1968.[20] Innovations since have included various venting configurations;[21] built-in holders for extra sauces; designs for easier recycling; and perforated tops so wedge-shaped pieces of cardboard can be used as plates.[18][19] The lid of the box is often supported by a disposable plastic tripod on top of the pizza known as a pizza saver.
Pizza boxes have a large amount of corrugated fiberboard, individually and in total volume produced each year, but they are not accepted by some municipal recycling programs because the cardboard is often soaked with grease, making them unsuitable for some forms of recycling.[22] Boxes may thus be commonly thrown away with household waste into landfills; a more environmentally friendly disposal option that has been proposed is a form of composting for pizza boxes. It is also possible to tear off unstained or unsaturated sections such as the lid and/or sides of the box and recycle those.
Pizza saver
In 1985 Carmela Vitale was issued a patent for a plastic 3-legged tripod stool that would sit in the middle of the box and keep the top from sagging into the pizza.[19] Vitale called her device a “package saver” and used that term also as the title of her patent, but it has since been renamed the “pizza saver“.[19] Variations on the device have since been invented, such as a disposable plastic spatula whose handle holds the box top up; and a plastic tripod like that made by Vitalie, but with one of the legs serrated like a knife, making for easy cutting of stuck cheese and bread.[19]
Statesboro
Statesboro is the largest city and county seat of Bulloch County, Georgia, United States,[5] located in Southeast Georgia. A college town, Statesboro is best known as the home of Georgia Southern University, a Carnegie Doctoral-Research University.
As of 2015, the Statesboro Micropolitan Statistical Area, which consists of Bulloch County, had an estimated population of 72,651.[6] The City itself had a population of 28,422 in the 2010 census.[7] The City had an estimated 2015 population of 30,721.[8]
The city was chartered in 1803, starting as a small trading community providing the basic essentials for surrounding cotton plantations. This drove the economy through the 19th century, both before and after the American Civil War.
In 1906, Statesboro and area leaders joined together to bid for and win the First District A&M School, a land grant college that eventually developed as Georgia Southern University in 1990. In 1908, Statesboro sold more cotton bales than did Savannah, Georgia, but the boll weevil infestation of the 1930s required a shift to tobacco as a crop. Statesboro inspired the blues song “Statesboro Blues“, written by Blind Willie McTell in the 1920s, and covered in a well-known version by The Allman Brothers Band.[9]
In 1801, George Sibbald of Augusta donated a 9,301-acre (37.64 km2) tract for a centrally located county seat for the growing agricultural community of Bulloch County. The area was developed by white planters largely for cotton plantations, worked by slave labor. In December 1803, the Georgia legislature created the town of Statesborough. In 1866 the state legislature granted a permanent charter to the city, changing the spelling of its name to the present “Statesboro.”
During the Civil War and General William T. Sherman’s famous March to the Sea through Georgia, a Union officer asked a saloon proprietor for directions to Statesboro. The proprietor replied, “You are standing in the middle of town,” indicating its small size. The soldiers destroyed the courthouse, a crude log structure that doubled as a barn when court was not in session. After the Civil War, the small town began to grow, and Statesboro has developed as a major town in southeastern Georgia. Many freedmen stayed in the area, working on plantations as sharecroppers and tenant farmers.