Inked Mag Staff
June 19th, 2017
Popular Restaurant Chain Sets Up Shop in NYC
Go for the Pizza, Stay for the Experience When Michael Lastoria opened up the first location for &pizza in Washington D.C. in 2012, he originally set out to provide an…
Go for the Pizza, Stay for the Experience
When Michael Lastoria opened up the first location for &pizza in Washington D.C. in 2012, he originally set out to provide an entirely different experience than the one you’re typically used to at every other pizza place. With its chic inner design, award-winning pizzas, craft beverages, hip, tattooed employees and its dedication to charity, &pizza quickly won over the public, and in about five years grew into over 20 locations across the East Coast. Now, this includes their New York shop [in the NoMad neighborhood href=”https://www.google.com/maps/place/15+W+28th+St,+New+York,+NY+10001/@40.7452599,-73.9902982,17z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x89c259a60fbb945b:0x20322429d21fe25a!8m2!3d40.7452599!4d-73.9881095″ target=”_blank”], which is having their grand opening tomorrow (June 20), which will include giveaways and free tattoos!
Photo: &pizza.
“&pizza is what we call an anti-establishment establishment,” co-founder of &pizza, Michael Lastoria told Inked. “Our pizzas are personal in that our guests walk up in an assembly line and customize their own pizzas, and they cook in about 90 seconds. It’s kind of this fun and funky shop that sort of reflects the communities that we serve.”
Photo: &pizza.
The tasty, oblong-shaped pizzas are prepared by &pizza’s employees, who are known as “tribe members.” Clad in t-shirts with giant ampersands on them, the stylish tribe members are also encouraged to freely express themselves through the ink they wear on their skin. Some tribe members – over 75 of them to be exact – also wear the restaurant’s bold ampersand logo on their skins, a tradition that goes back to when they opened their first location.
Photo: &pizza.
“One of our tribe members approached me within a year of the first pizza shop opening and basically said, ‘I want this logo tattooed on me,’” Lastoria recalled. “He gave me a very heartfelt and touching story about what this meant to him—so much so that I offered to foot the bill for him to get the ampersand tattooed on him. It’s really a special tradition, the idea of people having this emotional, heartfelt connection and wanting to get that permanently tattooed on their bodies,” Lastoria expressed.
Photo: &pizza.
The tradition of getting the ampersand tattoo eventually made its way onto the customers, who began to show interest in expressing their devotion to &pizza as well.
“Time and time again, we would have customers who would talk to tribe members who had the ampersand tattoos on them, and our tribe members would tell them the stories of why they got them. From those conversations between our tribe members and our guests, I finally started hearing from our guests that they wanted to get the ampersand tattooed on them,” the restaurateur said.
Photo: &pizza.
And so, for the opening of their Baltimore location, &pizza offered free pizzas for an entire year to the first five customers to show up with ampersand tattoos! Due to its success in Baltimore on opening day, the ampersand tattoo promo became a tradition with every new location that &pizza opens up—and that includes New York! In fact, for the grand opening in NYC tomorrow, the first 22 people to have or get an ampersand tattoo will be gifted free pizza for a year (22 because this will be their 22nd location). Artists from First Class Tattoo in Chinatown will be ready to ink the ampersand emblem on you if you’re down with the cause. And, did we mention that the tattoo is free? That’s right! &pizza will also foot the bill for your ampersand tat!
Photo: &pizza.
Lastoria himself will even get in on the ink fun and get his own ampersand tattoo, as he previously promised himself he would when he opened up an &pizza in his hometown of NYC.
“We have had a tremendous amount of success just kind of marching to the beat of our own drummer. We’ve just been doing our own thing, and it’s worked,” Lastoria said, “It’s been one hell of a journey, and one that we look forward to continuing.”
The Ampersand is About Unity
https://www.instagram.com/p/BVVXruRhPPJ
Limited edition unity “andana” with art work by Kelly Towles and DoobyFaimes for sale by &pizza. Photo: &pizza.
“One of the cool things about the ampersand, even given the political environment that we’re in today, is that this is a symbol that stands for connection, for diversity, for inclusion and for acceptance. I think the message is loud and clear to anyone that gets that ampersand tattooed on them, and it’s that they’re supporting something bigger than just themselves or &pizza or their communities. They’re making a statement about how they see the world, and I feel that that’s very powerful, and that is what our ampersand represents to us,” shared Lastoria, adding, “That’s another cool thing that we didn’t realize at first—how powerful that was going to be until recently. People have really aligned behind it in a big way.”
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