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Super Bowl fans get big, horizontal, cheesy


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Once a football fan starts completely redesigning their TV viewing experience, they also often decide the old threadbare sofa no longer makes the cut.

At La-Z-Boy Inc., January and February are among the strongest months for sales of recliners and sofas with reclining sections, said Doug Collier, chief marketing officer.

La-Z-Boy doesn't release sales figures for specific weeks of the year, but it does run special football-related promotions around the Super Bowl — and has historically been affiliated with pitchmen such as former NFL quarterback Joe Namath and coach Don Shula — to try to position its sofas and recliners as game-time necessities.

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Of course, football maniacs who have procured all the viewing, listening and reclining gear necessary typically find they need something to eat and drink while watching the game. Domino's Pizza sales jump 30 percent on Super Bowl Sunday compared to a typical Sunday, said Tim McIntyre, vice president of communications at Domino's Pizza LLC. The company expects to deliver more than 1.2 million pizzas across the country on Sunday.

"We look forward to Super Bowl Sunday with great anticipation," McIntyre said via e-mail. "It is one of those days we circle on the calendar and prepare for."

Domino's hires help in advance for game day, orders more food to meet the demand and stores will schedule everyone on the payroll to work that day, he explained. Domino's also offers special game day promotions: This year, the chain is selling any pizza of any size with any number of toppings for $10.99 on Super Bowl Sunday.

The day is such a seminal event for Domino's that former delivery drivers often return to work that day just to partake in the Super Bowl rush, McIntyre said.

Like Domino's, rival Papa John's International Inc. also staffs up and buys extra ingredients to get ready. Super Bowl Sunday is often one of its top sales days of the year — though, oddly, along with Halloween and the day before Thanksgiving.

On average, Papa John's will sell 50 percent more pizzas on Super Bowl Sunday than on a typical Sunday, said spokesman Chris Sternberg. That translates to 750,000 pizzas and more than 1 million chicken wings.

The biggest surprise about Super Bowl Sunday may be that, despite the abundance of game time beer ads, it is not the biggest day of the year for beer sales. Sales of cases of beer during the two weeks preceding the big game rank seventh overall, behind comparable periods preceding Memorial Day, July 4th, Labor Day, Christmas, Easter and Thanksgiving, according to ACNielsen figures provided by the Beer Institute, a trade group.

That's probably a function of the winter weather, said Marc Destito, spokesman for the Beer Institute.

"People tend to drink more beer when the weather's warmer," he said.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.


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