SUCCESS STORY
October 2019
At Angelo’s Pizza, the Sanfratello family has satisfied Matawan, NJ, locals for nearly fifty years with consistently superior food and warm, responsive service!
Their efforts to further deepen their neighborhood roots include creating opportunities to help the community. By leading these efforts, rather than just contributing to someone else’s cause, the family concentrates its impact on their immediate neighborhood. Alerting their customers about these efforts via regular Facebook posts makes each event more successful. It also subtly reinforces how much Angelo’s supports and appreciates its neighbors.
KEY IDEA – To help provide service animals to local military veterans suffering from PTSD, the restaurant helps organize, host, and cook an annual fundraising dinner at a local school. In past years, they also hosted fundraisers to send care packages and reminders of home to neighborhood soldiers stationed overseas.
KEY IDEA – As fall weather turns cold, the family collects “lightly used” shoes for the needy at the restaurant. They encourage customers to come participate by rewarding donations with free garlic knots and pizza. When winter sidewalks grow slippery, Angelo’s reminds housebound seniors that their delivery drivers can also pick up milk or other convenience store items for them on the way to delivering their pizza. Focusing the restaurant’s Facebook content on worthy neighborhood events and acts of kindness (not just self-promotion) reinforces the restaurant’s identity as a community cornerstone.
KEY IDEA – To help neighbors find missing pets, John Sanfratello started his “Lost Pets on Pizza Boxes” project. It started when a customer asked John if she could post a “Lost Cat” sign in the restaurant’s window. Wanting to do more, John offered to spread word faster by taping any flyers she provided onto his boxes. Many of John’s customers praised the flyers. Now John uses Facebook to regularly remind “Anyone in the Matawan area who has a missing pet” to bring their flyers to the restaurant for distribution. Eventually, the program caught the attention of local newscasters, leading to local TV coverage and even more community goodwill. Spearheading local charitable efforts and spreading the word via social media helps Angelo’s Pizza improve its neighborhood (and further deepens their community roots)!
BRAVO!
