Pizza Magazine - December 2013

James Markham has helped launch three different fast-casual
concepts, including MOD Pizza ( modpizza.com) in Seattle,
Pieology ( pieology.com) in Southern California and the afore-
mentioned Project Pie. “I think it’s universally appealing,” he
says. “People want to be able to get it the way they want it. You
can’t get it exactly the way you want it when someone’s making
it in the back kitchen.”
What took pizzeria operators so long to come up with the
idea? “As we were developing Top That! Pizza, we were wonder-
ing the same thing,” Walderich says. “One possible reason is
that pizza operators over the years have been afraid of losing
money due to the assumption that guests would overload their
pizzas with too many expensive ingredients. Or perhaps they
just flat-out didn’t think of it since pizzas have been done the
same way for all these decades. So many pizza places focus on
delivery, convenience and cheap pricing and achieve a good
level of profit, so why change?”
Technological advances helped pave the way, too, Walderich
observes. “There have always been wood-fired ovens that can
cook pizzas in as little as 90 seconds. But the advent of the
Turbo Chef ultra-fast impinger oven really set things in motion
because of its ease of use and affordability.”
You know an innovative concept has broken through to
the mainstream when the big chains hop on the bandwagon.
Dallas-based fast-casual eatery Pie Five Pizza ( piefivepizza.com)
is a Pizza Inn Holdings company, while Sbarro ( sbarro.com),
long known for its low-priced pies served in malls and air-
ports, recently opened Pizza Cucinova ( pizzacucinova.com) in
Columbus, Ohio. But the pizza giants don’t have the field to
themselves. Matt Andrew, co-founder and former president of
Moe’s Southwest Grill, launched Atlanta-based Uncle Maddio’s
Pizza Joint ( unclemaddios.com), while Smashburger master-
minds Tom Ryan and Rick Schaden, as previously mentioned,
brought Live Basil Pizza to life in Denver. Even Buffalo Wild
Wings has gotten into the act, purchasing a minority stake in
PizzaRev ( pizzarev.com) in Los Angeles. All of these companies
have aggressive growth strategies, and the Wetzels’ Blaze Pizza
has even attracted well-connected celebrity investors, including
Maria Shriver and LeBron James.

The Old-World Ways

Of course, no one knows the concept of “better pizza” like the pizzaioli from Naples, which may explain why Neapolitan pizza has become booming business. “Neapolitan is still really big, and it’s getting bigger,” Wiener says. Neapolitan authenticity means following strict rules dictating quality and origin of ingredients, dough making and proofing methods, even the size and specs of the wood-fired oven. But that hasn’t discouraged celebrity chefs—such as Nancy Silverton, Mario Batali and Mike Isabella—from signing on, notes Jay Jerrier, owner