When Zepeddie’s Pizzeria closed in 2001, the original owners wanted the unique neon sign that hung outside of the business. Maybe they knew one day they’d reopen the business, but they probably didn’t think they’d do it a whole 23 years later.
On Nov. 1, the Zepsa family reopened Zepeddie’s Pizzeria in the Lower South End (known locally as “LoSo”) neighborhood of Charlotte, North Carolina. The original neon sign, now restored, sits atop the pizzeria.
“I think we always had in our hearts and minds to revive it one day again,” Brian Zepsa told Queen City Nerve, the city’s alternative weekly paper. “It was more of a pause, so to speak.”
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Here’s a brief history of the pizzeria: In 1994, the Zepsa family opened the New York-style pizza joint in the LoSo neighborhood of the city. The neighborhood was less popular back then—thanks in part to a light-rail transit system, it has since become a coveted area—but Zepeddie’s made a name for itself all the same.
In fact, according to Zepsa, who back in the 1990s was a teenager who sometimes drove delivery for Zepeddie’s, business was so good that the family put it up for sale. The Zepsas also ran several other businesses and felt they couldn’t give the pizzeria the time and resources it needed to continue to operate. In 1999, the Zepsas sold the business to new owners. Just two years later, the business was shut down.
“We’re not ones to just open something up and let it run,” Zepsa told Queen City Nerve. “We’re [typically] heavily involved in every aspect of everything and when we can’t be, we don’t like that.”
The way the Zepsas have gone about rebooting the business is a testament to their attention to detail. Zepsa said the family, along with general manager and head chef Chris Gianino, worked for over a year to perfect a new dough recipe. Ownership also acknowledges how much the industry has changed since 1999—from the quality of the average pizza, to the emphasis on DELCO channels.
“I think now we are heavily, heavily focused on the quality of what we’re putting out,” Zepsa said. “We spent probably close to a year just perfecting our dough and our bread. We’re making everything in-house, fresh daily and we have gone ’round and ’round to really keying in on high-end, local, organic ingredients in everything that we do over there.”
Having been open for several weeks, the pizzeria has already established its bestseller: The Big Gabagool, featuring red sauce, pepperoni, housemade meatball, capicola, mozzarella, Parmesan and garlic herb oil. In addition to its signature thin-crust pizzas, Zepeddie’s will also offer a “thick-crust” variety of pie that appears to resemble a Roman-style pizza. Its best-selling thick-crust pie thus far is the Bianca, featuring white sauce, tallegio, pear, hot honey and garlic herb oil.
In a way, the restaurant’s menu and operations have been retrofitted to better serve the modern version of the city it calls home. It’s a city that has changed a lot over the past 23 years and seen explosive growth.
“I think that’s the way that the area is going,” Zepsa told the Queen City Nerve. “They don’t want just the normal plain chain thing that everyone can do and they can get around every corner and whatnot. They want something funky and unusual and different, but at the same time, good for you and doesn’t have all sorts of additives, and this and that in it, and everything else. I just think that’s the cultural change in people, so to speak, from 30 years ago to today.”
