&pizza COO breaks down the business-building power of activism – QSRweb.com

Subscribe to the Podcast: SoundCloud | YouTube | iTunes

Today's podcast is sponsored by...

Are you a supplier or a brand working to elevate the customer experience? The Interactive Customer Experience Associationconnects brands, suppliers, agencies and more who are working to create transcendent customer experiences. Let's work togetherto create a better customer experience ecosystem for us all. Join the ICX Association today at icxa.org.

Become a podcast sponsor - sign up here for more information!

There may be no more appropriate day this year to publish a podcast focused on one of the most outspoken and socially active restaurant brands, &pizza, than today, June 19, also known as Juneteenth. On this same date in 1865, a Union army general proclaimed all slaves in Texas the last and then most remote of the so-called "slave states" to be free. The day preceded the official abolition of slavery in the U.S. on Dec. 6 of that same year.

This year, of course, Juneteenth has particular relevance following the past month of nationwide protests and other forms of social activism that have highlighted the violence and injustice still levied on black Americans some 155 years after that first Juneteenth.

And of course, Washington D.C.-based &pizza has been a part of that national discourse, even providing its employees known as its Tribe paid time off from work if they wished to take part in activism pushing for changes in what has been described as the institutional victimization of blacks, following the death of Minnesotan George Floyd in police custody last month.

"&pizza is, and has always been about unity,"&pizza COO Andy Hoopersaid during the podcast. "As we celebrate Juneteenth this year, issues of racial inequality, policing, and community feel particularly poignant. The parallels between this day in 1865 and today in 2020 are too similar and the work is nowhere near finished, which is why &pizza is offering its employees PTO for activism, PTO for Election Day, and the opportunity to make the changes they want to see in the world.

"As a representative of the food service industry which employs 10% of the American workforce &pizza is championing activism at the most grassroots level: its own staff. This year on Juneteenth, it celebrates the Black community and stands in unity with their continued fight by encouraging its peers in the QSR space to do the same."

In today's podcast, Hooper discusses the brand's activism, along with how it fits into the company's larger business picture, especially during this protest- and pandemic-pocked year.

Read the original here:

&pizza COO breaks down the business-building power of activism - QSRweb.com