Raising prices on operators’ minds “If you’ve got the power to raise prices without losing business to a competitor, you’ve got a very good business. And if you have to have a prayer session before raising the price by a tenth of ...

Selling pizza in stadiums and arenas When you’re building your brand in your local area, there are many traditional ways to do this. Whether it is being entrenched in your community or using the typical forms of advertising. For making a huge i...

Factors that affect cash flow “What you are afraid of is never as bad as what you imagine. The fear you let build up in your mind is worse than the situation that actually exists.” – Dr. Spencer Johnson, Who Moved My Cheese? Cash Flow is the he...

What is a Pro Forma and why is it critical to your business? We have never opened a restaurant without having a pro forma fully vetted before debating anything we would do. In fact, my brother and business partner Jim and I have had many conversation...

Learn to Flex Your Buying Muscles It is one of the many challenges for independent pizzerias. You are competing for the customer’s pizza dollar with franchises of large corporations who can purchase the same ingredients for less money. Let’s face...

When you go over all the different thoughts in your head about buying a pizzeria, buying the real estate may be the last one to cross your mind. In the beginning, securing the funds to just open a shop is hard enough. You may be more interested in ma...

Buying a pizzeria with seller financing So, you want to own a pizzeria, or maybe you want to open another shop, but you don’t quite have the capital. The most important thing to remember is this: as much as you want to buy a pizzeria, somebody ...

Choosing the right location takes research and luck When Giuseppe Amato walked into a bakery in Ocean View, Delaware, he saw a For Lease sign in the window. He chatted with the business owners, who said they had outgrown the space and were moving the...

An overview of the current capital environment for restaurants and how operators can best position themselves to capture the cash they need Uneasy. Cautious. Still. Just a few of the words describing the current financial climate for pizzeria operato...

Hitting Walls or Ceilings with Growth From routine seasonal slumps to a global pandemic, there are many reasons for restaurant sales to flatten or decrease occasionally. Whether it’s due to the initial excitement of a grand opening wearing off, or ...

There comes a point for every business when it feels like you just need more money in the bank. That’s what I am addressing in this three-part series. One of the best lessons that I learned early on in my career was that sales fix everything. It ca...

What happens to the business if something happens to you? Estate planning is one of the easiest things for most folks to procrastinate, because, let’s face it, most of us don’t think we are going to die anytime soon. But, as business owners, we n...