Dominos has rolled out a drone pizza delivery test in New Zealand, in conjunction with the Flirtey drone delivery service. The service is initially available to ‘select customers’ with plans to scale the service up going forward.

The drone delivery service is designed to work alongside Dominos current delivery fleet and is being fully integrated into its online ordering and GPS systems. A recent customer poll found that 70 per cent of Dominos customers would use DRU Drone by Flirtey for their deliveries.

“We are moving closer and closer to widespread store-to-door drone delivery,” said Flirtey CEO, Matthew Sweeny. “To conduct these deliveries in an urban environment while delivering a hot, fresh pizza, is a validation of our delivery system that assures Flirtey is prepared for mass market deliveries around the globe.”

Dominos Group CEO and managing director Don Meij said the firm had invested in the partnership and the technology because it believes drone delivery will be an essential component of its pizza deliveries going forward.

“Drones offer the promise of safer, faster deliveries to an expanded delivery area, meaning more customers can expect to receive a freshly-made order within our ultimate target of 10 minutes. This is the future,” said Meij.
The Flirtey drone is constructed from carbon fibre, aluminium and 3D printed components. It lowers its cargo via tether and has built-in safety features such as low-battery return-to-safe-location programming and auto-return-home commands in case of low GPS signal or communication loss.

Domino’s and Flirtey first demoed the pizza delivery by drone service in Auckland, New Zealand on 25 August in front of (and above) NZ Minister of Transport, Simon Bridges.