Dive Brief:

• Pizza Hut is offering to help job seekers stand out by printing their resumes on pizza boxes and then delivering those boxes — along with a medium-sized cheese pizza — to prospective employers, per a press release.
• The “ResZAmes” promotion is based on the insight that 75% of resumes sent to prospective employers are never read, according to CareerMinds.com, and the idea that a resume coupled with pizza is harder to ignore.
• The promo is limited to New York City. The company will be accepting resume details and employer addresses via a dedicated website through Sept. 22. Pizza Hut will review the submissions and choose a limited number to print on boxes to be delivered to prospective employers.

Dive Insight:

Pizza Hut is no stranger to using its packaging to attract attention. Just a few weeks ago the chain refashioned its delivery boxes so that they could be shaped into temporary tables for consumers moving into new apartments. Just as that promo was tied to the fall surge of apartment switching, the ResZAmes promo is timed to a surge in hiring that typically happens across industries at the beginning of the fourth quarter.

Both efforts address a challenge consumers face: the hassle of moving in one case and the difficulty job-seekers face in getting their resume noticed in another. By offering a supportive solution that ties back to pizza delivery, the brand has an opportunity to drive earned media and customer loyalty.

Job seekers interested in putting their bona fides on a pizza box will be asked to enter their resume details, along with their prospective employer’s delivery address, at a dedicated website. If the employer’s ZIP code falls within the promo’s delivery boundaries, the resume will be put into a pool of contenders, from which a limited number will be selected to put on pizza boxes.

“We know finding a job can be daunting, especially during this key hiring season, so we wanted to lend a hand to our job-seeking customers and help them break through the clutter,” said Pizza Hut Chief Marketing Officer Melissa Friebe, in a statement.

Pizza Hut is no stranger to outré marketing tactics. Earlier this year, the company offered up “Goodbye Pies” for Valentine’s Day breakups and had its delivery drivers target competitors’ drive-throughs in cars printed with QR codes to get consumers to “cheat” on their fast food loyalties. In a promotion running in the United Arab Emirates, the chain turned TikTok content into real-world currency.

The company itself has recently weathered a corporate shakeup in the spring amid declining sales that saw former Wendy’s chief marketing officer installed as its U.S. president and Kalen Thornton and Melissa Friebe as the company’s global chief brand officer and U.S. chief marketing officer, respectively.