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A Winnipeg staple since 1977, Pasquale’s Ristorante and Pizzeria has taken numerous steps in rebuilding their brand with a change in owners and a fresh approach to marketing and entertainment. Current owners Joe and Sandro Loschiavo purchased the failing restaurant in 1990 and says there were a number of things he had to do in order to restore the clientele base. “We were in rough shape. The restaurant sales had decreased rapidly over the last couple of years, so our main goal was focusing on getting the confidence level back from the clients and to put the highest quality Italian meal on the table,” Joe said. “We worked very aggressively at changing the menu, developing recipes that reflected our traditional Italian roots, and just getting the food quality back to where it should be in order to get our confidence level back with the customers.”
Change or No Change?
Joe said that straight out of school he worked at a local restaurant in his hometown of St. Andrews, Manitoba. “I was able to gain a lot of experience from my mother who ran an Italian pasta factory called Alfonso Foods,” he added, “Plus, I come from a huge family of 9 children, so I had a knack for feeding large groups.”
Pizza is about half of the sales at Pasquale’s with just about 500 sold each week. The pizza is a traditional thin crust made from 100 percent olive oil and whole-wheat flour, dough made fresh daily, and cooked in a deck oven. They offer three types of sauces: tomato sauce, pesto sauce, and a Parmesan white sauce. Although the restaurant was in shambles when Joe purchased it, he said he decided to stick with the name because of his heritage. “The name of Pasquale’s has been in Winnipeg for a long time. It was known as the number one restaurant in Winnipeg back in the 70’s and did really well, but just fell off with sales because of poor management,” Joe said. “It took us about five years to regain the customer confidence, but we managed to do that through several tough times, such as the 1992 recession and when the Canadian GST (Goods and Services Tax) was introduced in ’91,” he said. “It really took a toll on me at a young age, but it also made us stronger to know that we can succeed through the hard times.”
Marketing
Joe says that marketing aggressively and having presence in the restaurant (not leaving it for managers to run) contributes to most of their success now. “We’re here all the time,” he said. “We’re aggressive in everything, and although we realized word-of-mouth is the best marketing tool, we’ve done everything we could to get the customer back to try the food.” Joe said once the customers started coming in, and then repeat customers, who are a huge part of their clientele, “We offer them in-house promotions and discounts to get the customer into the restaurant and let the food do the talking for us.”
Joe said they have a 65 percent regular customer base that he sees not just once a month, but two and three times a month because of the VIP card. “It’s a thing we do for the regular clientele that come in on a standard basis. We give a 20 percent discount every time they come in,” Joe said. “It’s just to show our appreciation for their dedication and their support over the years.” Joe said he gets people signed up by having everyone that comes in fill out a card with their names, phone numbers, and address. “Every card has a number, so each time a guest comes in with one, we mark down their number and we are able to track that information. We’ve seen a great increase of people coming in just because they have the card,” he said.
“We just recently teamed up with the Safe Way in town to have our specials printed on the backs of the receipts,” Joe said, “But we’ve found that you cannot coupon and discount yourself to death all the time. It’s good in the beginning for getting people in, but there are so many different avenues.” Joe said they use comment cards in the restaurant because they mainly want to find out how customers have heard about them. He says lots of times people say, “I’ve been driving by here for a while, so we finally stopped in”, which he owes to the fact that Pasquale’s is located in a main area of the city where there’s plenty of traffic. Taking advantage of their busy location, Joe says they use sandwich boards near the streets where they post their daily specials. “This especially works well during lunch hours and rush hour,” Joe said.
Community
Pasquale’s sponsors several functions in the community of St. Boniface, where the restaurant is located in Winnipeg, including the Summer Concert Series, a celebrity boxing tournament, and a Spaghetti-eating contest which helps Cancer Care Manitoba. “I’m involved in the business association in our local area here, and I network with the other businesses in the area and always try to get involved in the community,” Joe said. The Summer Concert Series is within a couple blocks of Pasquale’s, and there, according to Joe, they are able to assertively network and advertise with giveaways since it takes place every Friday during the summer. “Because we’re getting anywhere from 500 to 1,000 residents in the area to come out and listen to our entertainment, we’re seeing a lot of these people afterwards in the restaurant,” he said.
Joe also explained how Pasquale’s personally hosted a boxing tournament in Winnipeg with celebrity boxer and heavyweight contender Butterbean. “We had a local boxing match where he appeared. Afterwards, we teamed up with the local football team, our local bombers, and Butterbean to host a spaghetti-eating contest. It helped us raise money for cancer research, and really helped generate positive buzz about Pasquale’s.” The spaghetti-eating contest consisted of 10 contestants eating as much spaghetti as possible. “For each bowl they ate, we donated two dollars, and at the end, we threw in a little extra and donated about 800 dollars to the hospital.” Joe said because of their involvement in these events, they were featured on local sporting news, newspapers, and later, on the radio. “It was unusual,” Joe said, “But it worked out well.” Joe said they have plans of making that charity an annual event.
Staying Ahead of the Game
“We just had a local chain move into the area right down the road from us, and they’re big. They do the blitz and they’re hitting the area hard with flyers and direct mail and all that.” Joe said, in response to the larger chain’s efforts, his reply is nothing—“We just do what we do. We have great customers, and some are going to try that more affordable pizza, but they’re always going to come back because we have the quality, the tradition, and the personality that our true clientele love so much.” Joe said if they try to compete, and blast the city with coupons and special offers, that ruins the loyalty of the customer base. “You just stay focused on what you’re doing, stay consistent, and you’re going to come out a winner because loyalty goes a long way—especially in Winnipeg and Manitoba,” he said.