Pasquale Presa, the immigrant pizza king of Rochester, proves pandemic-proof

Pasquale Presa, owner of Pasquale's Neighborhood Pizzeria in Rochester, was stressed in early 2020 even before the pandemic forced many restaurants to close or shift to takeout and deliveries.

A little over three years earlier, Presa raised $525,000 from three local investors as part of the $1.25 million it took to start the restaurant.

But differences over the management of the business began to appear. Presa felt like he was working again for corporate managers. So Presa secured an SBA-insured loan with Home Federal Savings Bank to buy out the partners. Marty Mixell, the loan officer, liked Presa's plan and operating results.

"I bought [the partners] out and they made a 20% profit," Presa said. "More importantly, my fear and anxiety about making it for my family and community lifted. I was able to make decisions myself. We pandemic-proofed the business last year."

Before starting Pasquale's, Presa, 48, spent years as a corporate chef, building a career that required nine moves and took him from hotels in New York to Los Angeles, Hawaii and Rochester. He worked for Kahler Hospitality before taking a job as executive chef at the Kalahari Resort in the Wisconsin Dells, making $120,000. However, the time away from his family wasn't worth it.

He modeled Pasquale's somewhat after Posa Posa, a pizza joint run by Italian immigrants near Spring Valley, N.Y., where Presa, also an Italian immigrant, got a job at age 11.

Pasquale's popular pizzas and Presa's warm personality helped the business quickly build sales, which hit $2.5 million in 2019. As the pandemic unfolded, Presa hurried to make a deal to sell premium $10 Pasquale's frozen pizzas through a Rochester Hy-Vee supermarket.

A relationship with a co-packer who uses Pasquale's recipes later enabled him to profitably expand to seven Hy-Vees in the Rochester area.

"COVID was ramping up and we were looking to help restaurants and others with income losses," said Bret Peterson, a Hy-Vee manager in Rochester. "Pasquale's product is authentic and there's passion behind it. You get the same quality 12-inch pizza for $9.95 every time. Pasquale was in the store for months for samplings. He's authentic and fun.''

Pasquale's revenue dipped to $2.2 million in 2020, but that was far better than the deep plunge in revenue that many restaurants experienced last year. Presa said he expects 2021 revenue to be close to 2019, and he hopes to build it to $5 million by 2024.

Presa donates 5% of the restaurant's food to charities and needy diners. "You get back what you give," he said. "We never charge those who can't afford to pay." The restaurant operates what it calls a "common table," in which it collects donations to provide meals for people in need.

He employs at good wages a workforce of 35, mostly Mexican immigrants. "I treat them like family," he said. "That was once me."

Presa's parents moved him and three older brothers in 1981 to New York, where they had cousins, to make a better life than they knew in Grumo Appula, a tiny village in southern Italy.

After several months crowded into an aunt's apartment, the Presas got their own two-bedroom apartment for six. Pasquale's dad and teenage brothers then started their own masonry business. His mom was a part-time school-crossing guard.

Presa struggled with English and school. He started working at a neighborhood pizza shop at 11 and worked afternoons and evenings while in high school, as the family pooled their money to save for a return to Italy with enough to build a house.

Presa credits his acclimation to America to a Black family that owned a house across the street from his building. Lucius Abrahams, a school custodian at night who had his own floor-sanding business by day, and his wife, a teacher, had moved north from Selma, Ala., in 1963 to escape the Jim Crow South and for greater opportunity for their four kids.

Tim Abrahams, the couple's youngest child, was an excellent high school athlete and student who is now an accounting partner with PwC in Chicago.

"I was 11 and Patzy was 8 and I had just gotten a red ten-speed bike," Abrahams said. "Patzy came across the street, didn't speak English well and wanted to ride my bike. I thought 'Who is this?' I let him ride it. He became part of our family."

Lucius Abrahams took Presa fishing, and the Abrahams kids taught him to play sports. Tim Abrahams helped Presa with homework for years. They stay in close touch.

"He is my mentor," Presa said. "I talk to Timmy about everything."

Abrahams described Presa as hardworking, funny, creative and humble.

Presa returned, reluctantly, to Italy with his family upon graduation from high school in 1992. His parents built the house they wanted.

But Presa, in love with his high school girlfriend Valerie, returned to New York. They married and had three children, now ages 12 to 18.

He worked his way through the prestigious Culinary Institute of America, then began his career as a corporate chef and eventual pizza king of Rochester.