It happened during a conference call. That’s the short answer. But if you’re looking for the messy, corporate-downfall version of whether did papa john say the n word, the context is actually weirder than most people remember. It wasn't a leaked video of a heated argument or a caught-on-mic moment at a pizza shop. It was a role-playing exercise gone horribly, inexplicably wrong.
John Schnatter was the face of the brand. He was the guy in the commercials, the guy on the pizza boxes, and the guy who built an empire from a broom closet in the back of his dad’s tavern. Then, in May 2018, he sat down for a media training call with a marketing agency called Laundry Service. The goal was simple: keep John from saying things that would get him in trouble.
Irony is a cruel thing.
The Call That Changed Everything
So, let's get into the weeds. During this specific training session, Schnatter was asked how he would distance himself from racist groups online. This was a sensitive time for the company because Schnatter had already stepped down as CEO months earlier after criticizing the NFL’s handling of national anthem protests. He was trying to rehab his image.
Instead of doing that, he went off-script.
According to reports first published by Forbes, Schnatter complained that Colonel Sanders—the KFC guy—had called Black people the n-word without ever facing a public backlash. Except, he didn't just refer to the word. He said it. Full stop. He also reportedly talked about his upbringing in Indiana, mentioning that people used to drag Black people from their trucks as a way of illustrating how much things had changed (or hadn't).
It was a disaster.
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The marketing agency, Laundry Service, was so mortified by the exchange that they moved to terminate their contract with Papa John’s almost immediately. When the news leaked to the public in July 2018, the fallout was instantaneous. Within hours, Schnatter resigned as Chairman of the Board. His name was stripped from the communications school at the University of Louisville. The "Papa" was effectively evicted from his own house.
Did He Use It as an Insult?
This is where the nuance gets lost in the headlines. If you ask Schnatter, he'll tell you he was quoting someone else to make a point about double standards. He wasn't "using" the word to attack anyone in the room. He was "mentioning" it.
Does that matter?
In the world of high-stakes corporate PR, not really. You don't say that word in a professional setting. Period. The Board of Directors didn't care about his intent; they cared about the stock price, which was cratering. The company had spent decades building a brand around a friendly, neighborhood pizza guy. That image evaporated the second the Forbes report hit the wire.
Schnatter later expressed regret, but he also went on a bit of a warpath. He claimed he was "pushed" into saying the word by the marketing firm. He basically argued that it was a setup. He told reporters that the agency was trying to bait him into a controversial statement. Whether you believe that or not depends on how much you trust a guy who thought bringing up Colonel Sanders' alleged vocabulary was a good idea during a sensitivity training session.
The Immediate Aftermath
The company didn't just fire him. They erased him.
- They pulled his face off the pizza boxes.
- They painted over murals at the headquarters.
- They changed the marketing strategy to focus on diverse voices, eventually bringing in Shaq (Shaquille O'Neal) to sit on the board and act as the new brand ambassador.
It was one of the fastest "un-brandings" in American history. One day he’s the king of pepperoni; the next, he’s a persona non grata in the very building he paid for.
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The "Day of Reckoning" and the 20-Month Pizza Binge
If you think the story ended with his resignation, you haven't been following the post-2018 saga of John Schnatter. He didn't go away quietly. Instead, he became a sort of bizarre internet figure. He gave an interview to a local news station in Louisville that went viral for all the wrong reasons.
He looked... sweaty. He looked intense. He claimed he had eaten "40 pizzas in 30 days" and that the quality of the pizza had gone downhill since he left. He warned that a "day of reckoning" was coming. It was high drama. It was strange. It was peak "divorced guy energy" on a multi-million dollar scale.
He also sued the company. He sued the marketing firm. He spent a lot of money on lawyers trying to prove that his removal was a coup orchestrated by internal enemies. He even hired a private firm to investigate the board members. To this day, he maintains that the way the "n-word" incident was reported was a "hit job" designed to steal his company from him.
What We Can Learn from the Papa John Disaster
There are real lessons here for anyone in business or public life.
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First, intent doesn't override impact. You might think you're making a historical point or a linguistic comparison, but some words carry so much weight that they crush whatever context you try to wrap them in.
Second, the "Founder's Trap" is real. When a brand is tied entirely to one person's face and personality, that person becomes the company's biggest liability. Papa John's (the company) had to spend millions of dollars and several years just to prove they weren't "the racist pizza place." They had to change their entire internal culture, appoint a Chief Equity Officer, and rebuild their supply chain relationships.
Actionable Takeaways for Brand Safety
If you're managing a personal brand or a business, here is the blueprint for avoiding a "Papa John" moment:
- Separate the Creator from the Company: Ensure the legal structure allows the business to survive the founder’s mistakes. Papa John’s was lucky they had a board with the power to act quickly.
- Understand the "Live Mic" Rule: In 2026, there is no such thing as a "private" training session. Assume everything you say in a professional capacity—especially on a Zoom call or a recorded line—will be heard by the public.
- Context is Not a Shield: If a word is radioactive, don't touch it. Even if you're quoting someone else. Even if you're making a point about history.
- Own the Mistake Immediately: Schnatter’s initial apology was followed by years of blaming others. This kept the story alive. If he had genuinely apologized and disappeared for five years, the "day of reckoning" memes wouldn't be his primary legacy.
The saga of John Schnatter and the n-word serves as a permanent case study in crisis management. It’s a reminder that it takes thirty years to build a reputation and thirty seconds to set it on fire with a single sentence. The pizza might still be there, but the "Papa" is officially a ghost of corporate history.
To stay updated on how the company has moved on, look into their recent ESG reports or Shaq’s involvement in their "Better Day" foundations. The pivot from a single founder to a community-focused brand is a massive shift that most companies never successfully pull off. Papa John’s is the rare exception that survived its own namesake.