By Tracy Morin
On the heels of celebrating 35 years in business, second-generation pizzeria owner Giuseppe Carollo, who oversees Frank’s Ristorante & Pizzeria in Richmond, Virginia, sat down with PMQ to discuss the secrets of its success.
In Part One of this three-part series, Carollo detailed some of his most popular innovations, including a Secret Pizza Menu, Thursday Detroit-Style Pizza Nights and a recently unveiled scratch-made bread program. Here, in Part Two, Giuseppe discusses the history of Frank’s, what practices he needed to change when taking over the family business in 2013, and what values will always stay the same.
PMQ: Tell us about how Frank’s started.
Carollo: My dad [Frank Carollo] came from Italy to United States in the late ’60s. He was living in Brooklyn with his aunt and started working in a pizzeria. My mom was from a neighboring county, 20 minutes away from each other [back home], but they met in New York. They got married, and after they had my sister, they decided that New York was expensive and not where they wanted to raise their family.
They spent a little time in Scranton and then Lynchburg, Virginia, and there was a pizzeria for sale in Richmond in 1978. In 1990, they sold that restaurant they had, and we went to Italy for the summer, just trying to figure out the next step. They hadn’t had a vacation in years. They weren’t sure if they wanted to go back to Italy or if they wanted to move to Philadelphia to be close to my uncle. So we went to Italy for the summer, and we quickly realized that we wanted to stay in Richmond.
PMQ: So they actually had a different pizzeria from 1978 till 1990?
Carollo: In 1978, they bought Brothers Pizza. In 1985, the shopping center decided that they were going to become an enclosed mall, and they kicked everybody out. It was kind of like, they bought this business and they had really started to rock and roll, and then the carpet was pulled from underneath it, and they had to start over again. In 1988, I think they had another Brothers Pizza. And after two years, I think they were just burned out—seven days a week, no vacation—and someone came in one day and said, “I’d like to buy your pizzeria.” My dad was like, “Make me an offer.”
That’s when we went to Italy for the summer. I think they took eight or nine months off after that, and then they found the spot where Frank’s is.
PMQ: Did the whole family help out at Frank’s?
Carollo: Yeah, [I and my sister] definitely grew up in the pizzeria—there were plenty of naps on bags of flour when I was little. In 2000, I graduated from high school and decided I was going to take a year off to figure out if I really wanted to do the restaurant. My parents were very against it, because we knew once I got in that I wouldn’t go back to school. They wanted me to finish college before going into the restaurant, just to have a backup plan, but I was determined to do what I knew I wanted to do, and so I started working at Frank’s. In 2009, I had opened a restaurant on the other side of town, just to do my own thing. We kept that for four years, and then I realized I wanted to go back to Frank’s.
Here’s the story I tell people all the time: My wife and I had gone to Frank’s on a Sunday night to see my parents, and they were a little busy, so I jumped behind the counter, and the phone rings. They go, “Giuseppe, is that you? Don’t put my order in. I’m gonna come in, and I wanna drink a beer and catch up with you.”
I haven’t talked to this guy in five years, and he recognizes my voice on the phone and was so excited. I was like, “I think I want to come back to Frank’s,” because Frank’s is one of those places that doesn’t come around too often. It’s a very special restaurant, because we have made so many connections over the years. It’s very Cheers; it’s very homey. On a Friday night, it’s like everybody knows each other. I realized that magic, and that’s where I needed to be.
PMQ: Are your parents still involved with the business today?
Carollo: I’m the full owner now. They still come in one or two days a week to hang out. My dad likes to sit at the bar and chat with customers and stuff. So, on Sundays, I usually take the day off, and they come in and just hang out.
PMQ: Do you have any kids who are involved in the business?
Carollo: I have two sons, 11 and six years old. My oldest especially is taking an interest lately. He’s not too interested when I tell him to make pizza boxes, but as soon as he sees a pizza dough, he’s all over it.
PMQ: Maybe he’s got a culinary future ahead of him.
Carollo: It’s funny, because [when I was a kid], I was like, “Why is my dad being so hard on me about school and this and that?” Now that I am a father, I’m like, “Oh, I get it.” My son was like, “I’m going to work in the restaurant when I’m older. You’ll never be able to fire me.” And I was like, “First, you’re going to college, so we have a backup plan.”
PMQ: When you took over in 2013, did you update anything?
Carollo: We are definitely a restaurant with technology now. I’d opened the other place with a POS system, so when I came back to Frank’s and they were doing pen and paper, I was like, “This is like going back 20 years! I can’t do this.” So the first thing we did was put in a POS system.
Frank’s was definitely old-school. Recipes were like, take two cups of sugar with the Coca-Cola cup and one cup of salt. So we transitioned to everything being measured. My dad wouldn’t say anything in the beginning, but I could definitely tell that he was thinking, “What’s this guy doing?” But once he realized that the things we were doing were working, he totally jumped on board. So it was nice to have the support.
I remember when we put the POS system in, he was like, “I’m not gonna be able to learn how to do this. I’m too old.” And then I ran out for a minute. When I came back, the guy that was installing the POS system was sitting with him, and they were going over everything. I was like, “Yep, there we go. Jump on board!” I feel like, in this day and age, you have to be able to track everything.
PMQ: Have you also added things like online ordering and social media?
Carollo: Yeah, with online ordering, we thought, “Should we do it? Do we make the jump?” And then when COVID hit, literally the first week, I called Toast and added it. I was like, “Now we’re absolutely gonna need it,” and it’s been awesome. I love online orders. They just go directly to the kitchen, to the pizza station. It’s definitely made it easier for people to order, and one less person to stop and answer the phone.
Also, since then, we’ve introduced the bar program. We’ve renovated the restaurant twice since 2013. We have around 100 seats, plus the bar. When we did our last renovation, we had an outdoor patio that we enclosed, and that seats 40 people. On the weekends, we’ll open that room up, so we seat 60 in the main room and 40 in there.
We do a lot of rehearsal dinners. In the spring, we do graduation parties, Christmas parties. I’ve already booked two Christmas parties for this year, so we get a lot of use out of that, whereas before, with the weather here, you were really maximizing that room one or two months a year.
That and the bar were a huge game changer for us. Four years ago, when we renovated, we closed for a month—added the bar, enclosed the patio—and that was huge. We redid the whole kitchen. I was like, “Well, I’ve done everything, now it’s time to do the pizza ovens.”
We came up to the pizza show in Atlantic City to talk to Pizza Masters and check out everything there, and we ended up buying their ovens. They have steam induction for the bread we make now.
PMQ: What lessons have you learned, either from your parents or personal experience, about how a business stays successful over 35 years?
Carollo: My parents were always very big on quality. If you buy good quality products and you’re consistent, then the people will come. I think what I could add to that is, you have to consistently innovate; you have to come up with new ideas. The food scene here is pretty good. There are a lot of good pizzerias. There are a lot of good Italian restaurants. I feel like you’ve got to stay up to date with the new things, the new trends, and just consistently put out good product that the customers expect from us.
In Part Three of this three-part interview, Carollo shares how he creates a sense of community at Frank’s, from give-back efforts to generous employee perks.
Tracy Morin is PMQ’s associate editor.
