Alex Isitfo (pronounced “Ish-toff”) and his brother, Daniel, say the secret to their pizza success is being at the store day after day and acting on what they see and hear from their customers. The brothers operate two Sardinia Family Restaurants in Saskastoon, a bustling city of 240,000 on the banks of the South Saskatchewan River in west central Saskatchewan. If yearly sales are any indication – the two stores combined did around a million dollars last year – the Isitfo brothers are very good listeners indeed.

COMPLY WITH DEMAND
The brothers opened the first store in 1990 and the second nine years ago. Alex says listening to his customers has shaped his operation in key ways, particularly his menu.

“There was a while where people weren’t eating so much beef,” he recalls, “but they wanted to eat chicken, so we added quite a few chicken dishes. More people are watching what they eat and chicken has a reputation of not being fattening. Chicken Francisco and Chicken Cordon Bleu are very, very popular. Chicken Mezethaki is very popular. We sell it with sautéed mushrooms on top of a noodles mix.

“We buy the chicken breasts clean, low on water, and get the quality cuts. We are blessed with good distributors.”

Soon, he says, there were requests for stir-fry. “We had already added seafood dishes and then I began hearing calls for stir fry. Our stir-fry has been very successful. When I added stir-fry, like with chicken, and I think this is key - I didn’t just add one dish, I added several: beef, shrimp and vegetarian.”

Not content to wait for customer suggestions, Alex encourages his staff to experiment in order to keenly gauge the response.

“We make most all our specials from scratch,” he explains. “When I start something as a special, I watch it very carefully. If it seems like it’s selling very well, or we get compliments, I add it to the menu. If it doesn’t work very well, I drop it.”

For a place known for its pizza and named after an island in Italy, Alex says one curious failure was Italian pizza, which failed to make the cut.

“Yes, we tried an Italian pizza one time and it didn’t work so well so we took it out and added a Mexican and Greek pizza. The Mexican is very popular. The large (16” for $18.95) will feed four and five people. My scampi is also really popular. What I found after experimentation is the scampi works well in combo dishes. We offer Greek ribs and scampi, baby back ribs and shrimp, as well as shrimp scampi.”

While some operators may keep their finger on the pulse of their clientele through surveys and evaluation cards, Alex gets his feedback from the customers in person, face-to-face.

“Very rarely is there a group of customers who come in here and I don’t check on them at the table as they’re eating. Every table. In this way you get to know your customers.”

Alex says such personal attention comes in handy when the kitchen makes a mistake.

“If we get an order wrong or make some kind of mistake, I’ll step in and make it right. The kitchen forgot something today and we had a pizza come out late. I told the customers I’d buy their drinks but they told me I don’t have to, but I still do. I look after my customers very well.”

HANDS ON, DAY-TO-DAY
The brothers have divided their responsibilities, which are extensive given the size of their operation. There are 20-25 employees at each store with each location seating about 200. Both businesses are open from 11am until 2 am. Alex runs the kitchen operations, including scheduling and hiring. Daniel does the shopping and deals with the salesmen.

 “I’m here everyday, I put in 16 hours a day,” says Alex. “I have a good staff. We try to hold on to our best employees by paying them well. The not-so-good ones don’t stay anyway. Our food costs run around 38-45 percent and labor costs, 25 –30 percent.”

Curiously, for all his attention to detail, Alex uses a very old school method to hold his food costs down – he eyeballs it.

“We don’t weigh our portions,” he admits. “But I watch every dish before it goes out to customers. Also, if we need to raise prices on our menu, we do it. Sometimes customers complain, but not very often because people realize the reality. Everything is going up. They go to the store to buy a block of cheese, and its now $8 or $9.”

Sardinia offers delivery utilizing a delivery service consisting of 30 drivers, which covers both stores. After gas prices spiked last fall, Alex says a 25 cent charge was placed on each delivery. Such confidence to adapt to harsh business realities is, for the Isitfo brothers, born out of experience.

“My brother and I were both in the food industry prior to 1990,” Alex says. “We both started out as line cooks. There was an opportunity to take the store where we are now. The previous tenant declared bankruptcy and after six months the owner gave us a deal to get the place open, so we jumped on it.

“Sardinia is an island in Italy,” he says of the name. “I lived there for a while. I visited the island one day. Years later when we opened, the name popped into my head. I think it’s very catchy, it’s different. So I did some research on it, found that it was available. I asked some designer friends and they suggested I use it. I picked it out from my heart.”

Alex says the first two or three years were “really hard. But we never looked back. After six years we turned it around enough to open the second location.”

The flagship store at 102nd Street also benefits from a strategic location. “We’re in a mixed residential and industrial area,” Alex says. “We get more families than college kids, although there is an auto mechanic school down the road from us. But our main business is from families

“We’re on the main road that runs into the airport,” he continues. “We’re also right down the road from our big civic arena in town. People come in after hockey games or concerts, whatever the event might be. We also have ten very major hotels near us and we take out full color, half-page ads in the hotel guide books for about $1,000 to 1,500 a year.”

ADS UP
Unlike many operators who shy away from advertising, Alex Isitfo believes in it and puts his money where his pizza is.

“Besides the ads in hotel guides, I also take out a full page ad in the phone book, which is a $1,000 a month. We also buy a quarter page in the city restaurant guide. On special occasions, like Valentine’s Day and Mother’s Day, we usually run a special to bring the mamas in and the lovers in.”

The original store recently celebrated its 15th anniversary. Alex decided to trumpet the occasion with two radio campaigns and also took out a full-page ad in the local paper.

“For the 15th anniversary, we offered steak and lobster for $15.95 (normally $29.95) for a month and it worked really well, really brought the people in. That was a good attention-getter.”

Alex says that recently he has noticed an uptick in his Sunday business, therefore he invoked his strategy of coming up with something special for the extra crowds.

“Like most places, Friday, Saturday and Sunday are our biggest days, but recently we’ve been having bigger and bigger Sundays. Our Chicken Souvlaki has been very popular. So for Sunday lunch I put it on a special for $5.95 and we had an hour wait.”

PUTTING THE SPECIAL IN SPECIALS
Being at the store, and more importantly, on the floor, has made the Isitfo Brothers million dollar pizza sellers. When asked if there are plans for a third location, Alex sighed.

“Do I need to work anymore? We’ll see. Maybe if an opportunity came up, but I’m too busy paying attention to this store.”

Paying attention has paid off for this pizza parlor by the river. Alex noted the first blizzard of the season as we talked and said the harsh Canadian winter doesn’t necessarily hurt his business.

“We had a good lunch crowd today, despite the snow.”
 Obviously his food and attention to detail keep the crowds coming even when the weather is frightful. As we finished our conversation, Alex remembered one more operating expense he says is worth adding on to his ledger.

“I buy several dozen roses every year. On Mother’s Day when a family comes to the counter to pay their bill, I have a rose for each mother. Mothers only. It’s different, you know.”

It’s special too.