By Sean Dempsey
I’ve been in the restaurant industry for more than 25 years as the owner of the full-service Dempsey’s Brewery, Pub & Restaurant in Watertown, South Dakota, as well as pizzerias in other towns. Over the years, as we explored new marketing ideas to create some buzz, we eventually zeroed in on Pi Day (March 14) for a major annual event.
I’d seen a lot of Pi Day promos, such as $3.14 cheese slices, $3.14 off a whole pizza, and $3.14 beers. But none of them seemed to really grab people’s attention. Sure, we all like to save money, but that price isn’t enough to pull me away from whatever I’m doing and send me running to Pizzeria X (not usually, anyway.)
So, we decided to try something wild several years ago. Pi Day fell on a Monday that year. We ran a promo offering whole 12” cheese pizzas for $3.14—no limit on the number of pies you could order. We advertised it, made about 600 dough balls to get ready, and went to task.
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In most ways, it was awful. For one thing, the staff didn’t enjoy the experience at all. The customers who came in early loved it, but, as we plowed through the day, we fell further and further behind, until we were sold out. There were wait times in excess of one-and-a-half hours. Not to mention we were baking the pies on a double-deck Marsal + Sons MB60 oven. Baking that many pizzas—I’m talking well over 100 per hour—from dough to cooked was a nightmare. The oven couldn’t retain enough bottom heat to crisp up the pies. I think two of our guys needed Tommy John surgery from stretching all that dough, and the kitchen resembled a war zone at the end.
We also received quite a lot of blowback: overly long waits, too many customers who couldn’t get pizzas at all, and some who received their pizzas but at a low quality. It was just an overall failure.
At the same time, however, we had turned a dead Monday night into an occasion that generated some buzz. And that gave me a better idea.
Fine-Tuning the Promo
We ran the same promotion the next year, but this time we partnered with our local Humane Society and donated 100% of all the cheese pizzas sales to them.
As you might expect, we again had long waits and other issues, but now we were able to mollify the unhappy customers with a reminder: “Well, the good news is, it’s all going to the cats and dogs at the shelter.” That saved us hard. We ended up hitting 900 pizzas sold from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m., selling out early again. Meanwhile, people were less angry about the wait times and more excited about the community giveback as we documented the check presentation to the Glacial Lakes Humane Society (GLHS). And that was social media gold.
We also saw more guests buy items that they might not normally buy: upsells on fancier drinks, desserts, appetizers, etc. We’d turned a normally quiet day into a monster that once again earned a ton of publicity. And, to boost the promo’s impact, we featured a live link from our social media pages to the GLHS website for anyone who wanted to donate directly to the cause.
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Nailing It
Fast forward to 2026. This year, Pi Day fell on a Saturday. There is NO WAY I’m offering $3.14 cheese pizzas on our busiest day of the week. In these situations, we pick the Tuesday or Wednesday before and celebrate Pi Day a little early.
Additionally, for this year we made 1,500 par-baked pizza crusts. All they needed was a touch of warm red sauce, cheese and then straight into the oven. This cut our time in half.
Also for 2026, we chose to donate 75% of all the cheese pizzas sales to the GLHS (instead of 100%) to help cover our cheese and box costs. I was thrilled this year to present a check for $4,237.05 to them, based on a total of 1,567 pizzas sold.
I’m fairly certain I’ll never have to pay to adopt a cat again.
Want to try this promo at your pizzeria in 2027? Here’s the scoop on how to do it:
- Reach out to local businesses or food providers to potentially help fund or defray the costs of the promo. In our case, Bacio donated some cheese, while PFG (Roma) donated directly to the GLHS live link.
- Explain and promote the offer clearly and repeatedly: You’re donating 75% of cheese pizza sales to a great cause on either Pi Day itself or the preceding weekday that you choose. And make sure to partner with a well-loved and worthy nonprofit. I’ve focused on Humane Societies as well as a local women’s shelter. (Scroll to watch the Instagram Reel below.)
- Get a lot of boxes. Our staff starts folding 12” boxes for weeks ahead of time so we’re prepared for the big day.
- Open it up to “no limit” on the number of whole pies at the $3.14 rate. Why? This offer gets the larger local businesses involved—they can afford to buy 40 to 50 pizzas for their staff—and it creates bigger buzz.
- Set a live link to the nonprofit’s website on your social platforms to increase donations. “Can’t make it in? Want to help? Here’s a live link to X charity if you’d rather make a direct donation.”
- Make pizza skins. This saves on heat retention and ensures that your team members won’t have to go to the hospital for a torn rotator cuff.
- Hype it up internally! Our staff loves PI Day. There is something to be said for spending an entire day just making pizzas nonstop, and it’s even better when it’s for a good cause. Everyone just vibes better—they feel like they are making a difference. It’s great for team building.
- We made the offer available for online orders and for pickup, dine-in and delivery. For delivery we required an $18 minimum order, and the offer wasn’t available for third-party delivery.
- Remember to document and share the results. Wait a week, then post the final numbers on social media—how many pizzas you sold and the amount raised—along with photos or a video of the check presentation to your local charity.
- Got multiple locations or other stores? Run the offer there too! We run this promotion at our other two locations on different days. For example, Pi Day is celebrated on Wednesday at spot 1, Monday at spot 2 and Tuesday at spot 3. Our Brookings Location (Danger von Dempsey’s BRKS) gave $1,308 to Margo’s Place, a women’s shelter, this year, while our Danger Von Dempsey’s ATY location was grouped in with the main store for the GLHS).
Overall, I’ve found that the money we spend on product and labor for this Pi Day promotion is paid back 10 times over with the amount of press coverage we get and the teamwork we achieve. And all thanks to offering cheap pizzas on what used to be a non-crazy day!
Sean Dempsey is the owner of Dempsey’s Pub, Brewery & Restaurant and Danger Von Dempsey’s in Watertown, South Dakota. He is also a member of PMQ’s U.S. Pizza Team.
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