Buy A Mattress, Get The "Gift" Of 12 Papa John's Pizzas

This is a dumb marketing campaign. It is a deceptive marketing campaign. It is a (somewhat entertainingly) petty marketing campaign. But hey, we're writing about it, so Papa John's: 1, The Takeout: 0.

Business Insider reports that America's favorite purveyor of underwhelming pizza and, okay, greasily delicious garlic sauce has a new partner in the wild world of cross-brand marketing opportunities: Raymour & Flanigan, a furniture retail chain that happens to sell mattresses. One suspects the company is getting absolutely pummeled by mattress-in-a-box retailer Casper, because the entire point of this ploy seems to be setting up this sick marketing burn:

According to BI, that's a statement directly from a Raymour & Flanigan spokesperson, who went on to add, "A mattress is something you should feel and experience firsthand. Additionally, every person is different, from body shape to body temperature. That's why we're focused on pairing each customer with the right mattress."

Here's the hook, mattress-shoppers: If you buy a mattress that costs more than $500, you get what they call "free Papa John's pizza for a year!" Technically, it's one large pizza a month for 12 months, which feels like the mattress-marketing equivalent of throwing an all-you-can-eat pizza festival and then handing out, like, two slices. To be even more specific, here's the official word from BI: "Customers will only get one large pizza a month, from July 2018 to June 2019. Additional toppings will cost extra."

Listen, Papa John's got dumped by both Peyton Manning and the entire NFL this year. It's allowed a rebound. Okay, two rebounds.

A regional marketing manager for the chain had this piece of poetry to share about the partnership:

"Papa John's is looking forward to partnering with Raymour & Flanigan to deliver quality. They'll deliver the mattress and we'll deliver BETTER INGREDIENTS. BETTER PIZZA."

Sure, Jan.