Domino’s has said it will pass lower costs on to customers through better discount deals.

It came as the pizza delivery giant recorded a drop of orders over the first half of 2024, with bosses blaming a “slow start” to the year.

Shares in the company dropped on Tuesday morning as result, with the hospitality firm cautioning that underlying earnings are on track to be at the “lower end” of forecasts.

On Tuesday, Domino’s said it was witnessing a recovery in customer confidence and hopes to drive stronger sales with improved pricing.

The pizza business, which has 1,344 sites across the UK and Ireland, said it has witnessed lower food and energy costs, although these have been offset partly by a rise in the national living wage.

Domino’s chief executive officer Andrew Rennie said the company is passing through easing food costs to customers through discounts.

“Customer confidence is improving but we definitely think it is important for us right now to back our customers,” he said.

“We’re rolling out more deals, like our £4 lunch deal and 50% off midweek deal, to do that.

“We think with these deals and the quality of our product we are offering good value.”

Domino’s reported that group revenues dropped by 1.8% to £326.8 million for the six months to June 30, compared with the same period a year earlier.

It was partly linked to a 0.9% drop in total orders to 35.1 million after a particular drop in orders over the first quarter of the year.

Mr Rennie said: “Following a slow start to the year, we now have good momentum in the business with our strategic initiatives gaining traction and our trading performance accelerating steadily against strong comparatives from last year.

“In Q2 we grew orders, with a notable improvement from the middle of May and importantly have halted the trend of declining delivery orders.”

He added that good trading momentum continued though June and July, as it was boosted by “good” sales during the Men’s Euro 2024 football tournament.

Domino’s was also supported by its continued store opening plan.

The company opened around 60 sites last year and said it is expecting to surpass this with 70 new stores for the current financial year.

Shares in Domino’s Pizza group were down 8% at 284p.