PI,
First, I WON’T put anything on a pizza, I just love the idea of putting anything on a pizza because iot represents endless possibilities and potentials to satisfy and amaze an endless number of people . . . .it is the Tao of the food world (how’s that, WA Dave?)
To the point, your statement of wanting to “make good pizza fast and at low cost” really does cut right to the heart of the connundrum. Good Pizza and Low cost" are often competing elements in the pizza world, and are actually more opposing concepts needing balance. Tll us who you want to be when you are making pizzas and we can help give more meaningful answers. Search the database (top right of the pane) for key words and you’ll see lots of us talk on lots of topics. We are as a group willful, confident (sometimes overly so), opinionated, rude, occasionally insightful, rarely brilliant, passionate about our industry, playful, wise, we are polite, we are @sses, some of us are fat and bald. We are all “pizza people” who have slugged it out in the marketplace. we all bring our good and bad to the game. If you hang around and spend enough effort to match what you are asking us to give, then you will get support, guidance, confrontation, information, opinion, rants and occasional praise.
Once you decide where you want to position yourself in the marketplace and what sort of product you intend to develop, then there are answers we can give and directions we can suggest you look. As you know, Customer impression, branding and price point are all interconnected. Many of us consider “good pizza” to contain expertly developed and managed dough, high quality tomatoes, and flavorful whole milk cheeses made by reputable suppliers. Then we seek out the best toppings and ingredients we can afford. Essentially, you can mitigate and manage the costs in all this . . . find best price and balancing it all . . . . but “low cost” doesn’t enter into it. How much your customers are willing to pony up for a pie will dictate in large part how much you can invest in the goods to make the product.
You planning a delco, delivery only, dine-in, combination of all? What’s the marketplace look like? That business plan really should give you the direction you want to go. Find out the demographics of the market ou plan to serve and lok at who is currently serving them. You will get a feel for where you can enter and make profitable action.
It is my considered belief that today, in this particular economy, it is too difficult to enter the marketplace with economy, production, low-cost pizza products to compete against PJ, PH, LC and Dom. The expense to survive will be far more than positioning in a higher price point and market position than the “price guys”. they are successful, and do not play well with others.
I am in the process of writing the business plan now. I need any resources you know of that would be helpful on the process of making pizza, supply info and hints, anything… As far as money post, with all businesses money is limited to some degree. I want to make good pizza fast and at a low cost. I am open when it comes to equipment. I am sure in this economy, a person could find some good equipment at low cost maybe at an auction or something.
