The owner of Big Poppa’s Food Truck is expanding his business with the opening of Big Poppa’s Pizza on Minnesota Avenue. The new pizzeria will take over the former Bella Cucina space at 2300 S. Minnesota Ave., with plans to open in December.
Owner Anthony Axtell said the focus of the new pizzeria will be on freshly made, from-scratch dishes. “Everything will be made from scratch. That’s our motif,” Axtell said. The menu will feature hand-tossed and Chicago-style deep-dish pizzas, as well as garlic knots and calzones.
To stand out in the competitive pizza market, Axtell is offering deep-dish pizzas in 12- and 14-inch sizes, alongside 12-, 14-, and 16-inch hand-tossed pizzas. A gluten-free option will also be available in a 10-inch size. The pizzeria will also sell pizza by the slice.
Axtell, who has a background in restaurant management, previously owned Blue 42 Sports Grill in Hartford and started Big Poppa’s Food Truck in 2022. He has always had a passion for pizza. “We’ve been doing pizza for years, and that’s always been my personal passion,” Axtell said.
In addition to traditional pizza options, Big Poppa’s Pizza will feature specialty pizzas like Philly cheesesteak, taco, buffalo chicken, and chicken bacon ranch. Axtell also plans to introduce a signature item: a 3-foot pizza slice, which will come in a custom box with a special pizza cutter.
“We intend to provide high-quality pizza at affordable prices,” Axtell said, adding that the pizzeria aims to offer budget-friendly options for families. The restaurant will also continue the tradition of offering free meals to on-duty law enforcement officers, firefighters, and paramedics, as they do with the food truck.
The pizzeria will feature a lunch special with pizza slices and soda, as well as a rotating daily lunch menu with items like Italian beef sandwiches and pasta. Additional menu items will include garden salads, cheese bread, dessert pizzas, and cheesecake.
Customers will order at the counter, with both Coke and Pepsi bottled drinks available, but no beer or wine will be served. The remodeled restaurant will seat about 50 people. The pizzeria will offer online ordering, carryout, delivery, and catering services.
Axtell plans to keep the pizzeria open from 11 a.m. to midnight Sunday through Thursday, and from 11 a.m. to 2 a.m. on Fridays and Saturdays. He is planning soft-opening events in early December, with a grand opening scheduled for December 20.
Big Poppa’s Pizza is currently hiring for both full- and part-time positions. Axtell noted that the location near Augustana University and the University of Sioux Falls presents a good opportunity for students looking for work. Employees will be paid “above the market rate to get the best of the best.”
The decision to open a pizzeria came about quickly after a conversation with real estate broker Steve Herman. “It was one of those strange things that happen,” Herman said. “We went to the food truck for lunch one day, and when we finished, I gave them a card and asked if they had ever considered a brick-and-mortar location. The timing was really good.”
Axtell hopes to expand Big Poppa’s Pizza with two more locations in the next two years, likely on the northwest and southeast sides of the city. Additionally, he plans to grow the food truck business, adding a new concept called Cheat Day, which will serve ice cream, edible cookie dough, and mini-doughnuts.
The food truck fleet will be joined by Big Poppa’s Kitchen, a rebranding of On the Spot Catering. The catering business, which has been operating out of a commercial kitchen in Tea, will soon relocate to a larger facility in Tea that will house both the catering service and the food trucks.
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