International pizza chain Dodo Pizza has launched an ingenious soccer-inspired marketing campaign across more than 100 restaurants in 13 countries. Instead of issuing one execution to all markets, Dodo’s international team built a flexible creative platform covering collectible character albums, match-day happy hours and limited-edition packaging—and gave local restaurant teams the authority to choose what fits.
Customers in Spain, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan, Nigeria and Kyrgyzstan collect character stickers with every order and complete a soccer-inspired album for prizes. Eight other markets—UAE, Türkiye, Bulgaria, Serbia, Slovenia, Lithuania, Mongolia and Indonesia—join the campaign through locally selected mechanics.
From PMQ’s perspective, it’s a clever—and fun—marketing campaign timed for one of the biggest sports events on the planet. Perhaps best of all, the collectible component gives customers a reason to order more than once, turning a single promotion into an ongoing game with a built-in reward at the end. By pairing that repeat-visit incentive with locally chosen prizes and offers, Dodo Pizza has created a campaign that should resonate with customers from diverse cultures.
“Football is a shared cultural language, but the way people watch, celebrate and order food around it differs from country to country. Our goal was to give local teams a strong creative platform they could make their own—from combos and collectible mechanics to packaging, promotions and prizes,” said Ekaterina Bochkareva, international marketing manager at Dodo Pizza.
What’s in the toolkit:
The collectible album: Customers receive an album and a character sticker with each order. The album features 10 original characters created by Dodo Pizza. Guests who complete the collection are eligible for prizes selected by their local market, including soccer tickets, limited-edition merchandise, free pizza or gifts from local partners.
National-team packaging: In Nigeria and Uzbekistan, Dodo has produced limited-edition pizza boxes featuring illustrated soccer players in colors inspired by each country’s national team.
Match-day happy hours: Select markets are offering discounts of up to 20% during match windows, alongside soccer-inspired combo packs developed around local product preferences.
“Our approach to international marketing is built on balancing global consistency with local relevance,” said Ilya Kholodnov, Dodo Brands’ head of international marketing and sales. “The central team creates scalable concepts and a clear activation framework, while local operators tailor the execution to market dynamics and their commercial priorities. This model allows us to move faster across multiple countries without treating them as identical markets.”
Dodo Brands operates more than 1700 restaurants across 26 countries, with $1.8 billion in revenue in 2025 and 22% year-on-year growth, according to a press release. Dodo Pizza ranks 6th among the world’s largest international pizza chains by unit count and was named among the fastest-growing restaurant chains globally by Bloomberg.
PMQ Pizza featured Dodo Pizza founder Fedor Ovchinnikov on its June 2015 cover. At that time, the chain had 43 franchise and five corporate-owned locations in Russia, Romania and Kazakhstan.
