When business is bad, ask a woman how to give it a boost. Better yet, ask a group of women.
It worked for Steven Oleksy. He’s the owner of Planet Pizza in Plano, Illinois, which opened in June 2022. Oleksy, a former mechanic and U.S. marine who got bit by the pizza bug, bakes outer space-themed pies with names like Venus (beef and giardiniera), Jupiter (Italian sausage) and Asteroid Belt (a meat lovers pie), all featuring his own sauce recipe.
It’s a grabby concept for a town of about 12,000 people. But Planet Pizza was as deserted as Mars during what should have been a busy dinnertime rush on Thursday, December 5.
“It was kind of sad,” Oleksy told 5 Chicago earlier this week. “I had a friend of mine—he called some other places, and they had an hour-and-a-half, two-hour waits, and I didn’t have a single customer.”
Exasperated, Oleksy jumped onto Facebook and created a post. It has apparently been removed since then, but, as 5 Chicago reported, Olesky asked his followers why he had no “absolutely no business” on a Thursday night. He went on to inquire, “What can I do as a business to draw in customers?”
Cue the women who get stuff done. An unidentified member of the 12,000-member Yorkville Area Moms (YAMS) group on Facebook spotted Oleksy’s post. She shared it on the group’s page, and, according to another member, Andie Groff, those women were quick to express their love for Planet Pizza’s food.
“Hundreds and hundreds of ladies [said], ‘I’ve eaten there. It’s great. He supports the community. We love his food. Why isn’t he getting the business?’ And it just literally blew up.”
Suddenly, Oleksy was having the same “problem” his competitors had been experiencing: more orders than time to fulfill them. Planet Pizza had gone from black hole to supernova within a matter of hours.
On the following night, Oleksy returned to Facebook and posted about “the overwhelming response of our community,” noting that “order pick-up times and delivery times were a little slower this evening. We are super excited that you guys are ready to try Planet Pizza, and we thank you for your patience. We apologize to all customers we had to turn away tonight. We hope that you will give us another try in the future.”
That post earned 367 reactions, 30 comments and six shares.
“Ever since it’s been pretty busy,” Oleksy told 5 Chicago. He added, “I’m really appreciative of what they’ve done. I couldn’t be any happier.”
On December 11, Oleksy launched a new holiday-themed promotion based on The 12 Days of Christmas. Starting on December 12, he wrote, he would offer a different deal every day through Christmas Eve. That post garnered 275 reactions, 18 comments and 12 shares.
“I’m hoping business keeps coming in and I can [hire] staff to finally make this into something,” Oleksy said.
The turnaround at Planet Pizza is a testament both to the power of social media and to women who care about their community. As Groff noted in the 5 Chicago interview, “We have great women in our community, and when they take a minute to lift up somebody else, everybody rallies around them. If every community did this, the whole world would be a different place.”
