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Say Cheese: New Pizza Franchise Hopes To Be Part Of Upper Crust

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By GEORGE WILKENS, The Tampa Tribune

Published: October 29, 2007

LIVE OAK PRESERVE - Another Midwestern pizza franchise soon will make its Hillsborough County debut with a New Tampa store.

Ohio-based Marco's Pizza has leased 1,400 square feet at 20305 Bruce B. Downs Blvd., a shopping center space flanked by a Bruster's ice cream shop and HP Interiors.

Glenn Ajmo, president of the company developing Marco's Pizza franchises statewide, said plans are to open 200 in Florida over 12 years.

The New Tampa Marco's scheduled to open by early January will be Hillsborough's first, but 10 others are planned for county locations.

'We're looking to blanket Hillsborough County as quickly as we can,' Ajmo said.

Florida's only Marco's Pizza stores are in New Port Richey and Spring Hill.

Ajmo, a New Jersey native who moved to Westchase last year, acknowledged that Marco's enters a highly competitive pizza market as an unknown but said he is optimistic this newcomer can rise to the occasion.

'We have a far superior product any way you look at it, yet our price point is very similar to theirs,' Ajmo said of the big three - Pizza Hut, Domino's and Papa John's. 'We make our own dough; we make our own sauce. It's all fresh cheeses; it's a three-cheese blend.'

Marco's debuted in Toledo in 1978 and now has 160 stores in eight states.

Marco's markets heavily within the 2 1/2 -mile radius surrounding its stores, keeping the company name before those in the delivery area, Ajmo said.

'We get the name out pretty quickly' through advertising, coupons, local store marketing and promotions benefiting surrounding schools, Ajmo said.

Ajmo sees New Tampa as an ideal Marco's market.

'The demographics are there. It's a growing area, as opposed to a stagnant area. It seems to have everything going for it,' he said. 'You have the clientele we're looking for: mostly families, our typical demographic of 25 to 50 years old, and the income level is where we want it to be.'

The New Tampa store's delivery area will extend into Pasco County, as every store has a delivery radius of at least 1.5 miles.

Delivery range can be extended to up to 4 miles, depending upon driving times. 'We typically don't want a driver one way in his car for more than eight minutes; we have an eight-minute max on how long it should take to get to that delivery,' Ajmo said.

The store will employ about 25 mostly part-time workers, many of them drivers, Ajmo said.

The corporation Ajmo heads, Dough Developers of Florida, includes partners John Gaudineer of Odessa and Scott Decker of Hunter's Green. The partnership also actively is seeking potential franchisees for Marco's Pizza locations throughout Florida.

Anyone interested in franchise opportunities or employment can call the store at (813) 907-6400.

The storefront being remodeled for Marco's originally was occupied by family-owned Brothers Market, which opened in July 2006 and recently closed.

Reporter George Wilkens can be reached at (813) 865-4847 or gwilkens@tampatrib.com.

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