Pizzerias support their neighbors by feeding local athletes and donating pizzas for events
Few actions generate better goodwill than feeding people. Pizza is the perfect food for bringing people together, and pizzeria owners that offer free or discounted pies to local groups say it’s a great way to build relationships in the community. Sponsoring events also brings many benefits, and the only downside is that once word gets out about a pizzeria’s generosity, the eatery ends up fielding many requests for free food. The way to prevent being overwhelmed, operators say, is to ask the recipients to follow some guidelines.
Champ Pizza, which has six locations in the Vancouver, Washington and Portland, Oregon areas, provides free team dinners for local high school sports teams. The pizzeria’s website has a list of requirements, such as two weeks advance notice, high school teams only (not middle school), and the requests must be made by e-mail. “We had to do that because too many people were calling the stores,” says founder Tyson Cook. “This week alone I had six requests for free team dinners.”
The pizzerias need to know the number of kids and adults to feed, and the date and time the parent or athlete will pick up the pizzas, as the busy locations will not deliver these free pies. Champ Pizza even accommodates requests for gluten-free pizza, which Cook says happens with almost every team order. A typical week might include requests for a 25-person cross country team, 150 kids at a marching band camp, and a football team with 100 team members. The pizzerias send enough pizza for two or three slices per person, and asks the school to include Champ Pizza in social media, such as by posting photos of the team eating pizza.
“We put the focus on local athletes,” says Cook, who opened the first Champ Pizza location four years ago. “They need all the help they can get. Our school district got hit hard with budget cuts.”
A new initiative for Champ Pizza is to provide pizzas to the concessions at local high school sports. The schools raise money by selling slices for $2 to $3 during games. The pizzeria provides the pizzas for free, and in return, the school puts up a Champ Pizza banner on the field. Also, the proceeds must go to athletics-related expenses, such as sending the wrestling team to a tournament or paying for cleats for students who cannot afford them.
Cook says he is very liberal with giving out pizzas, but he does not donate money. The food-only strategy has benefited the schools and the pizzerias. “I often get parents who order from us and say, ‘I saw you donated to my kid’s soccer team,’” he says. “We built a lot of loyalty because of that.”
Loyalty can last a long time.
Annie’s Pizza in Coral Springs, Florida, has been sponsoring teams for 24 years. “It helps out the community, and it helps out parents because it keeps costs down,” says owner Bobby DeFroscia. “We sponsor teams and then years later the kids come work for us. Their picture is still on the wall.”
The high school teams include football, baseball, cheerleading and others. The schools offer different sponsorship packages, DeFroscia says, such as paying $500 to have an Annie’s Pizza banner on the field, the name of the pizzeria mentioned in an announcement during the game, and posts on the team’s social media. “Some of the sponsorship goes towards uniforms,” he says. “The money you are giving them is being used, not just going into a bank account.”
Annie’s Pizza also participates in community events, such as Coral Springs’ Largest Pizza Party celebration of its 60th anniversary in 2023. The city paid a discounted rate to area pizzerias to provide pizzas, and the city gave out free slices to thousands of event attendees. “We knew weeks prior we would prepare a couple hundred pizzas,” DeFroscia says. “We sent 25 pies every half hour to keep up with demand.”
Donating food for nonprofits’ fundraisers is another way to engage with the community. Last October Annie’s Pizza donated 2,000 garlic rolls to the Coral Springs Fire Department for its pasta dinner, a fundraising event for a local breast cancer nonprofit.
One key to success is to focus on the pizzeria’s surrounding area.
“The whole idea is to think locally and act locally,” says Bill Daniels, owner of Dayton’s Original Pizza Factory in Dayton, Ohio. “Wouldn’t it be a beautiful world if everyone took care of their corner of the world?”
Open since 1986, Dayton’s Original Pizza Factory’s corner of the world is the two-mile radius delivery area, which Daniels uses as the geographical limit when selecting schools or events to support. “We don’t use third-party delivery,” he says. “We look at our primary delivery area as our neighborhood.”
One nearby art-focused high school has after-school activities Monday through Thursday. The pizzeria provided heavily discounted pizzas, and the school sold slices to raise money for the prom. Dayton’s Original Pizza Factory has been doing that for more than 20 years, Daniels says, to help the students and staff members enjoy a nice formal event.
Dayton’s Original Pizza Factory supports local sports teams and also hosts pizza parties for the coaches, volunteers and referees. The pizzeria also provides food for events hosted by local nonprofits, such as a recent dinner for donors of a charity that the pizzeria has supported for years. The restaurant sent pizza, which the event caterer cut into smaller slices and served as hors d’oeuvres.
Daniels finds out about local nonprofits from reading the neighborhood newsletters, and by asking employees if they have a charity they are supporting. “If they believe in something, chances are it’s legit and worthwhile,” he says. The pizzeria’s point of sale system has a way to enter the donations to make tracking expenses easier, but Daniels is not worried about how much money he is spending on community pizza.
“It’s become something that is really gratifying,” Daniels says. “Pizza can’t change your life, but it can make your day brighter.”
Nora Caley is a freelance writer who covers small business, finance and lifestyle topics.