diff --git a/tasktiger/__init__.py b/tasktiger/__init__.py
index a5973e47..d44cc2f5 100644
--- a/tasktiger/__init__.py
+++ b/tasktiger/__init__.py
@@ -132,10 +132,17 @@ def __init__(self, connection=None, config=None, setup_structlog=False):
 
             # If non-empty, a worker only processeses the given queues.
             'ONLY_QUEUES': [],
+
+            'SERIALIZER': json.dumps,
+
+            'DESERIALIZER': json.loads
         }
         if config:
             self.config.update(config)
 
+        self._serialize_data = self.config['SERIALIZER']
+        self._deserialize_data = self.config['DESERIALIZER']
+
         self.connection = connection or redis.Redis(decode_responses=True)
         self.scripts = RedisScripts(self.connection)
 
diff --git a/tasktiger/task.py b/tasktiger/task.py
index 87e6be8b..0c0df26b 100644
--- a/tasktiger/task.py
+++ b/tasktiger/task.py
@@ -1,5 +1,4 @@
 import datetime
-import json
 import redis
 import time
 
@@ -12,7 +11,7 @@ class Task(object):
     def __init__(self, tiger, func=None, args=None, kwargs=None, queue=None,
                  hard_timeout=None, unique=None, lock=None, lock_key=None,
                  retry=None, retry_on=None, retry_method=None,
-                 _data=None, _state=None, _ts=None, _executions=None):
+                 _data=None, _state=None, _ts=None, _executions=None, deserialize=json.loads, serialize=json.dumps):
         """
         Queues a task. See README.rst for an explanation of the options.
         """
@@ -269,7 +268,7 @@ def delay(self, when=None):
 
         # When using ALWAYS_EAGER, make sure we have serialized the task to
         # ensure there are no serialization errors.
-        serialized_task = json.dumps(self._data)
+        serialized_task = self.tiger._serialize_data(self._data)
 
         if tiger.config['ALWAYS_EAGER'] and state == QUEUED:
             return self.execute()
@@ -330,8 +329,8 @@ def from_id(self, tiger, queue, state, task_id, load_executions=0):
             serialized_executions = []
         # XXX: No timestamp for now
         if serialized_data:
-            data = json.loads(serialized_data)
-            executions = [json.loads(e) for e in serialized_executions if e]
+            data = tiger._deserialize_data(serialized_data)
+            executions = [tiger._deserialize_data(e) for e in serialized_executions if e]
             return Task(tiger, queue=queue, _data=data, _state=state,
                         _executions=executions)
         else:
@@ -369,8 +368,8 @@ def tasks_from_queue(self, tiger, queue, state, skip=0, limit=1000,
                 results = pipeline.execute()
 
                 for serialized_data, serialized_executions, ts in zip(results[0], results[1:], tss):
-                    data = json.loads(serialized_data)
-                    executions = [json.loads(e) for e in serialized_executions if e]
+                    data = tiger._deserialize_data(serialized_data)
+                    executions = [tiger._deserialize_data.loads(e) for e in serialized_executions if e]
 
                     task = Task(tiger, queue=queue, _data=data, _state=state,
                                 _ts=ts, _executions=executions)
@@ -379,7 +378,7 @@ def tasks_from_queue(self, tiger, queue, state, skip=0, limit=1000,
             else:
                 data = tiger.connection.mget([tiger._key('task', item[0]) for item in items])
                 for serialized_data, ts in zip(data, tss):
-                    data = json.loads(serialized_data)
+                    data = tiger._deserialize_data(serialized_data)
                     task = Task(tiger, queue=queue, _data=data, _state=state,
                                 _ts=ts)
                     tasks.append(task)
diff --git a/tasktiger/worker.py b/tasktiger/worker.py
index 890a9013..4920afb1 100644
--- a/tasktiger/worker.py
+++ b/tasktiger/worker.py
@@ -1,6 +1,5 @@
 from collections import OrderedDict
 import errno
-import json
 import os
 import random
 import select
@@ -242,7 +241,7 @@ def _execute_forked(self, tasks, log):
                     ''.join(traceback.format_exception(*exc_info)) if exc_info != (None, None, None) else None
             execution['success'] = success
             execution['host'] = socket.gethostname()
-            serialized_execution = json.dumps(execution)
+            serialized_execution = self.tiger._serialize_data(execution)
             for task in tasks:
                 self.connection.rpush(self._key('task', task.id, 'executions'),
                                       serialized_execution)
@@ -359,7 +358,7 @@ def _process_from_queue(self, queue):
             tasks = []
             for task_id, serialized_task in zip(task_ids, serialized_tasks):
                 if serialized_task:
-                    task_data = json.loads(serialized_task)
+                    task_data = self.tiger._deserialize_data(serialized_task)
                 else:
                     task_data = {}
                 task = Task(self.tiger, queue=queue, _data=task_data,
@@ -492,7 +491,7 @@ def _mark_done():
                 self._key('task', task.id, 'executions'), -1)
 
             if execution:
-                execution = json.loads(execution)
+                execution = self.tiger._deserialize_data(execution)
 
             if execution.get('retry'):
                 if 'retry_method' in execution:
diff --git a/tests/__init__.py b/tests/__init__.py
index c9d8b08d..7c7ce0b1 100644
--- a/tests/__init__.py
+++ b/tests/__init__.py
@@ -1,3 +1,4 @@
+import pickle
 import datetime
 import json
 from multiprocessing import Pool
@@ -32,7 +33,7 @@ def _ensure_queue(typ, data):
             for name, n in data.items():
                 task_ids = self.conn.zrange('t:%s:%s' % (typ, name), 0, -1)
                 self.assertEqual(len(task_ids), n)
-                ret[name] = [json.loads(self.conn.get('t:task:%s' % task_id))
+                ret[name] = [self.tiger._deserialize_data(self.conn.get('t:task:%s' % task_id))
                              for task_id in task_ids]
                 self.assertEqual(list(task['id'] for task in ret[name]),
                                  task_ids)
@@ -46,6 +47,22 @@ def _ensure_queue(typ, data):
             'scheduled': _ensure_queue('scheduled', scheduled),
         }
 
+
+class CustomSerializerTestCase(BaseTestCase):
+    def setUp(self):
+        self.tiger = get_tiger(SERIALIZER=lambda x: pickle.dumps(x).decode('latin1'), DESERIALIZER=lambda x: pickle.loads(x.encode('latin1')))
+        self.conn = self.tiger.connection
+        self.conn.flushdb()
+
+    def test_simple_task(self):
+        self.tiger.delay(simple_task, queue='custom_ser')
+        queues = self._ensure_queues(queued={'custom_ser': 1})
+        task = queues['queued']['custom_ser'][0]
+        Worker(self.tiger).run(once=True)
+        self._ensure_queues(queued={'custom_ser': 0})
+        self.assertFalse(self.conn.exists('t:task:%s' % task['id']))
+
+
 class TestCase(BaseTestCase):
     """
     TaskTiger main test cases.
diff --git a/tests/utils.py b/tests/utils.py
index 627dd397..770a5cd4 100644
--- a/tests/utils.py
+++ b/tests/utils.py
@@ -5,7 +5,7 @@
 
 from .config import *
 
-def get_tiger():
+def get_tiger(**kwargs):
     """
     Sets up logging and returns a new tasktiger instance.
     """
@@ -15,7 +15,7 @@ def get_tiger():
     )
     logging.basicConfig(format='%(message)s')
     conn = redis.Redis(db=TEST_DB, decode_responses=True)
-    tiger = TaskTiger(connection=conn, config={
+    config = {
         # We need this 0 here so we don't pick up scheduled tasks when
         # doing a single worker run.
         'SELECT_TIMEOUT': 0,
@@ -27,7 +27,9 @@ def get_tiger():
         'BATCH_QUEUES': {
             'batch': 3,
         }
-    })
+    }
+    config.update(kwargs)
+    tiger = TaskTiger(connection=conn, config=config)
     tiger.log.setLevel(logging.CRITICAL)
     return tiger