8 Oven-Ready Facts about DiGiorno

Since the mid 1990s, DiGiorno’s frozen pizzas have provided a convenient way to eat tasty pizza without ordering delivery. Owned by Nestle, DiGiorno sells a variety of frozen pizzas, from thin crust pepperoni to four cheese deep dish to garlic bread pizza. Read on for eight cheesy facts about DiGiorno.

1. IN CANADA, “IT’S NOT DELIVERY. IT’S DELISSIO.”

DiGiorno has an entirely different name in the great white north: Delissio. Although Nestle now owns both brands of frozen pizzas, the previous owner, Kraft, sold pizza products in Canada under the Delissio name way back in the late 1980s. Nestle kept the familiar name for its Canadian distribution.

2. THERE'S A GOOD REASON WYNGZ IS SPELLED LIKE THAT.

In 2011, DiGiorno introduced a Pizza & Boneless Wyngz combo box, and The Colbert Report immediately poked fun at their creative spelling of "wyngz." Technically, wyngz are a boneless white meat chicken fritter product that is made of chicken, but not necessarily meat from the wing. Colbert's "Thought For Food" segment pointed out that the spelling was really a government-mandated way for the company to get around the fact that the product doesn’t contain actual wing meat. So you can blame the USDA for the weird spelling, not DiGiorno.

3. DIGIORNO GOT PROPS FOR LIVE-TWEETING THE SOUND OF MUSIC LIVE.

DiGiorno stays current on social media by tweeting about pop culture events, injecting pizza jokes into the conversation every chance it gets. In 2013, when NBC aired The Sound of Music Live, DiGiorno surprised people by tweeting legitimately funny commentary throughout the show. “Can’t believe pizza isn’t one of her favorite things smh,” they joked during the famous song, while at other times they rewrote lyrics: "Climb every mountain, ford every stream, follow every rainbow, until you find a supreme (pizza from DiGiornoooooo)."

4. UNFORTUNATELY, THEY AREN'T IMMUNE TO SOCIAL MEDIA BLUNDERS …

In September 2014, DiGiorno’s social media team made a big mistake. Without first checking what the hashtag #WhyIStayed was in reference to, they posted the tweet: “#WhyIStayed You had pizza.” However, this was right after a video surfaced of football player Ray Rice punching his fiancée in an elevator, and victims of domestic violence were using the Twitter hashtag to share their stories and offer support to other victims. Because DiGiorno regularly posts cheeky tweets about current events, the careless tweet was even more upsetting to people who saw it.

5. … BUT PEOPLE PRAISED THE COMPANY FOR ITS SINCERE APOLOGIES.

Offended Twitter users immediately posted angry tweets aimed at DiGiorno, and though the company quickly deleted the tweet, the damage had been done. DiGiorno tweeted an apology—“A million apologies. Did not read what the hashtag was about before posting.”—and began replying to individual users one by one. The company also released an official statement to apologize, and most people praised the company for handling the situation in an upfront and honest way.

6. DIGIORNO'S PARENT COMPANY TOOK A STAND AGAINST ANIMAL CRUELTY.

In 2013, the animal rights organization Mercy For Animals shot undercover video of workers abusing cows at the Wiese Brothers Farm in Greenleaf, Wisconsin. The farm supplied milk to Foremost Farms USA in Appleton, Wisconsin, which is DiGiorno’s cheese supplier. Because of the video, Nestle decided to stop accepting cheese made with milk from the Wiese Brothers Farm, and Foremost Farms USA stopped getting milk from Wiese Brothers. Deborah Cross, a Nestle spokesperson, said, “Nestlé is outraged and deeply saddened by the mistreatment of animals shown in this video.”

7. THE PIZZA & COOKIES BOX COMBINES DINNER AND DESSERT.

In 2011, DiGiorno started selling Pizza & Cookies, a box with one full-size frozen pizza and enough Nestle Toll House cookie dough to make 12 break-and-bake cookies. The ease of having dinner and dessert in one box—and possibly sticking both in the oven at the same time—was too much for Consumerist, though. The blog called the delicious combo box "a watershed moment in American obesity."

8. THE DESIGN-YOUR-OWN-PIZZA MODEL DIDN'T WORK FOR THEM.

LizaLagman Sperl via Flickr // CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

In 2014, DiGiorno debuted a new frozen pizza product called “Design A Pizza Kit.” Giving customers the freedom to customize their pizza, the box came with a variety of meat and vegetables: pepperoni, sausage, chicken, peppers, onions, spinach, and tomato. Each kit also came with a seasoning packet and shredded cheese. But, much to the dismay of lazy but creative frozen food chefs everywhere, DiGiorno doesn’t sell the Design A Pizza Kit anymore. Good thing there's still delivery, or … DiGiorno!