‘Bring back our strangest ad character!’
The restaurant industry has birthed its share of bizarre marketing figures, from Herb the Nerd (a loser whose only redeeming quality was loving Whoppers) to Quiznos’ sponge monkeys. Squarely in that pack is the Noid, a buck-toothed troll outfitted in a fire engine-red jumpsuit with strange rabbit-like ears.
He was supposedly a mischievous but lovable superpower who could wreck any pizza delivery that didn’t start with a call to Domino’s. The chain adopted the marketing tag line, “Avoid the Noid,” and spread awareness (of the character, at least) by putting the Noid in a video game. Rights were even negotiated for a Noid TV program, though the producers backed away because of accusations they were trying to sell pizza to children on the sly.
The Noid’s run ended in tragedy when a deranged man named Kenneth Lamar Noid held two Domino’s employees hostage for five hours in a unit outside Atlanta, demanding $100,000 for what he alleged was a personal attack from the chain. After the real Noid was apprehended, Domino’s decided to mothball the cartoon character.
But, like Elvis, the Noid may still be with us. Domino’s announced this week that it would award two packages of Noid memorabilia as the top prizes in a sweepstakes accompanying the rollout of a $7.99 seven-days-a-week pizza deal. Domino’s said it scoured the internet to dig up goodies like a Noid lunchbox. “If you don’t know who the Noid is, stop reading,” Domino’s advises on a special website, PizzaPayback.com, that was set up to tout the offer.