Mike · @MBHORNSFAN
18th Apr 2016 from TwitLonger
Austins Pizza being replaced at DKR
A year or so ago, UT was trying to expand local food options at DKR. So they asked Austin's Pizza if it would be willing to set up shop there. Austin's Pizza, which is owned and operated by a UT alum and supporter of UT sports named JD Torian, said sure. It would take a few years for the investment to pay off, but it seemed like a great opportunity. Austin's Pizza set up facilities at DKR and also the Erwin Center and sold a lot of pizzas to soaking wet UT football fans.
Recently, Austin's Pizza received notice from IMG saying get out -- we're giving the pizza spaces to Double Dave's. No bidding, no matching, no negotiations. Just get out. And that notice came by text message. No phone call. No letter. No explanation.
JD reached out to his contacts at UT with whom he had dealt throughout the process and had always had good relations (even with Patterson's team) to ask what was up. They said they had no knowledge of IMG's initiative to replace AP and would look into it. They later got back to him and said, yep, sorry, IMG decided to replace you. Nothing we can do about it. IMG gets to make these decisions.
Now JD Torian isn't just any UT alum. He is the current chair of the UT Libraries Advisory Board, and in 2015, he brought in over $50k in donations to the UT libraries. And when he's not selling pizzas (and donating pizzas to just about every fundraiser in town) or working to improve UT's libraries, he's playing bass guitar in Kevin McKinney’s band and promoting music events around Austin. The kind of guy who represents what is great about UT and Austin. And this is how IMG treats him and his business in its soulless and tone-deaf management of UT athletics.
So Austin's Pizza will no longer be in DKR. Or the Erwin Center. Instead, you will get the pride and joy pizza rolls of Aggie-owned Double Dave's, which proudly touts its "Aggie Bloodline" and the Aggy credentials of its management on its web page. The pizza provider for UT Sports will no longer be an Austin-born and bred company owned and operated by a UT alum and benefactor, but will instead be the company run by this guy:
Charles M. (Chuck) Thorp, Jr., class of '88, is the Chief Executive Officer of DoubleDave's Pizzaworks Systems, Inc. Chuck is related to Pinky Wilson, who wrote the Aggie War Hymn in a World War I trench. Chuck was, indeed, born with maroon blood.
http://www.doubledaves.com/ourstory/aggiebloodline.php
Thanks, IMG. Hope you made a nice commission off that deal.
This isn't just about Austin's Pizza and JD Torian. This is about how the UT Athletic Department has mortgaged the soul of UT athletics to the marketing mercenaries at IMG, who couldn't care less about that soul and will wring every dime out of it before it dies.