Today we’d like to introduce you to John Garrett.
Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
My wife Nikki and I were married on Long Island in 2003. We had a few simple dreams; to build a family, to travel the world and serve people with the same grace we know from Jesus, and to one day open a restaurant like my family. Things have kind of worked out in that order. Our daughter Angelina was born in 2004. Nikki came in 2006. In 2008-09 while growing as young parents, we lost a lot in the mortgage crisis. We lost our home, cars, and what was at the time my career in mortgages. It felt like we lost our dreams. We were serving in our local church youth ministry but soon, that would end too. But right around the time my wife Nikki’s was pregnant with our son Giuseppe, I got back into the pizza business and got a chance to open our own restaurant-or leave everything to help Nikki’s parents with a ministry they were building in Tanzania. In 2011, we sold the little we had left after losing everything in ‘09 and went to live in Africa serving villagers by sharing the love of Jesus in whatever ways we could. We trained people vocationally and spiritually. We brought charitable projects for water and housing and various services. We also had our last child, Eliana, in 2012.
By 2016, our work and ministry was expanding internationally. In that year, we served from Tanzania into eight nations around the world, including working in the crisis and border zones from the ISIS conflict in the Middle East. Suddenly we were living out many of our dreams. By late 2016, we began to consider returning to Orlando to base our ministry and to build community with some friends who shared much of the same ministry work and were young parents like us. But we didn’t know we were really coming home to eventually start work on the restaurant dream. Coming home, our primary focus was to build a community of people who could do life and learn to grow together. All people of faith, our desire was to see our families rally to serve each other, our city, and the world. How that would work for our family began to shift as we looked for ways to become grafted into the local community. In 2017, the pizza business came calling again. This was a perfect way to invest our lives!
On July 16, our oldest daughter Angelinas 14th birthday, we opened Pienezza Pizza. It has become a hub of service for us. Through the pandemonium, our community has chipped in and helped us give hundreds of pizzas to local healthcare workers, civil servants, and struggling families. Our church community is growing and we are learning to work together more deeply with every passing day. And our family has really grown into the community. We have grown the business over 100% since the end of the first year, surviving and even thriving through COVID and employing a growing team of amazing people. We have actually recently bought a second wholesale food business which we eventually want to grow in partnership to Pienezza and other restaurant concepts. Now, as we see this all happen, we are watching our kids dream and looking forward to the time that they call us to another horizon!
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Life is full of struggles. I lost my father to drug addiction as a teenager. I struggled myself with the same before being totally and miraculously healed in 2001. Both of our families have faced financial difficulties. We lost everything in 2009. Houses, cars, everything. Living overseas was a constant struggle. At times we lived without clean water and electricity and didn’t know if donations would cover food budgets. In 2018, we were close to being homeless in a way after we started the business, having to live out of a hotel a friend arranged for us while we waited to see if we could get approved as renters. There were many months we paid workers but only ate pizza and salads bc we could grocery shopping ourselves. Starting a business is the definition of struggle.
We’ve been impressed with Pienezza Pizza, but for folks who might not be as familiar, what can you share with them about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
We are a family-style NY pizzeria. We have real family history and love face-to-face service and contact. We do everything fresh and source as much locally as possible. We also hire as many untrained people as possible and work to bring them into new vocation. We give- in COVID, our pizza donation program has accumulated and given almost 1000 pizzas away for free. We want people to see the love and grace Jesus has shown us in everything we do through our service and excellence. Oh, and try the Sicilian. The Bruschetta (vegan) and the classic Sicilian are something special.
How do you think about luck?
Luck… LOL. I can’t say we really believe in luck. What you might call bad luck, we really believe has taught us patience, resiliency, determination and has freed us from believing that we can control everything. Bad luck has helped to teach us values and to recognize that you can have joy in struggle. What you might call good luck, we have always found to be someone else’s investment in us. Whether it’s God or someone God sends our way, Good luck seems to always happen because someone else has intentionally given of themselves. We don’t believe that’s luck. We believe that’s grace.
Pricing:
- We serve slices and lunches under $5
- We serve combos to feed the family under $25
- Pizza Pies range from $10-$25
Contact Info:
- Email: Pienezzapizza@gmail.com
- Instagram: @pienezzapizza
- Facebook: @pienezzapizza
- Twitter: @pienezzapizza
