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Sharing growth objectives
sme stories
Alice Pizza is a story of passion and tradition. In 1990, in a small place in Rome, Domenico Giovannini, founder, entrepreneur and pizza maker, created the first Alice Pizza. Thanks to his ideas, the quality of the ingredients and the recognizability of the brand, Alice Pizza soon expanded and many other pizzerias were opened in different districts of Rome. The key to success lies in the ancient recipes and techniques used in each Alice pizzeria.
Once reached the success in the streets of Rome and Lazio, Domenico decides to expand the company. And so, in 2012, Alice Pizza becomes a franchise and opens new pizzerias throughout Italy and overseas: Milan, Turin, Genoa, Cagliari, you can enjoy Domenico's pizza even in Philadelphia.
But passions and knowledge have to be shared, and that's why in 2013 the Pizza Academy was born and dedicated to staff training and cooking courses for all enthusiasts. People are a particularly important capital for Alice, in fact they are the pizza makers who prepare the dough every morning and ensure the goodness of the products. To date, the Academy has two locations, in Rome and Milan, offering a course that goes beyond training because it takes staff to work directly in the kitchens, alongside expert pizza makers.
Alice Pizza was founded with a precise entrepreneurial idea: to create a chain of quality pizzerias in Italy, the country of pizza. The strengths of the company are the quality of the product and the offer: you can choose pizza slices of many different flavors, from the most classic to the most particular ones.
"From a financial and economic point of view, Alice Pizza requires low investments and has an equally low breakeven point. This allows a wide scalability of the format and a wide distribution of the chain on the territory" says Claudio Baitelli, CEO of Alice Pizza, who adds "in 2022 we expect a turnover of about 100 million euros and we aim to open between 30 and 40 pizzerias. Mostly in, and around, Milan. The Alice ecosystem, as of today, has about 180 outlets of which more than a third are directly managed and the rest are franchised."
And this is how Alice Pizza plans to conquer the palate of Italians and all lovers of the traditional Made in Italy meal.
"The support of illimity has been crucial," says Claudio, who adds: "I always remember what the CFO of a listed company I worked for told me at the beginning of my career: debt is a blessing. Not only in terms of its primary function, which is the development and growth of the company, but also in terms of educating people to better manage their resources, especially when these resources are of a third party. I'm talking about all the KPIs and information we need to exchange with our partner to understand how best to manage the capital at our disposal. This helps the company to grow, to structure its processes and to be more aware of where value is being created, also for the benefit of all the stakeholders involved."
