MARCELLUS — Chocolate Pizza Company, Inc. has opened its brand new production and retail facility at 3774 Lee Mulroy Road (N.Y. Route 175) in Marcellus, between the Ultimate Goal Indoor Sports complex and a NAPA Auto Parts store. The new 8,500-square-foot location opened the first week of October. The growing company previously operated in […]
MARCELLUS — Chocolate Pizza Company, Inc. has opened its brand new production and retail facility at 3774 Lee Mulroy Road (N.Y. Route 175) in Marcellus, between the Ultimate Goal Indoor Sports complex and a NAPA Auto Parts store.
The new 8,500-square-foot location opened the first week of October. The growing company previously operated in a 3,500-square-foot space at 60 E. Main St. in the village of Marcellus.
The firm’s lease was set to expire at the end of 2015, says Ryan Novak, owner of the Chocolate Pizza Company.
The space wasn’t big enough to accommodate the company’s growth and manufacturing operations.
Novak called it an “expensive” space to rent and “wasn’t in a good location” for truck traffic and deliveries.
Novak started thinking about the move near the end of 2013 and early 2014 because the business was running out of space.
Chocolate Pizza Company spent 2013 servicing a contract with Kansas City, Missouri–based Hallmark Cards, distributing products to “over a thousand” Hallmark franchise stores.
“And that really took every inch of space we had,” says Novak.
New HQ
After considering about a dozen possible spaces, Novak eventually decided it was time to move his business away from that space and build a new location.
“Let’s move out to a place where we can really manufacture our product,” says Novak.
He eventually decided on a vacant piece of property next to the Ultimate Goal.
“I thought … maybe we could just build our own place, start from the ground up and design it the way we want it to be,” he says.
Chocolate Pizza Company paid $180,000 to buy the property from Richard Shea, who manages the NAPA store next door, says Novak.
Novak says he chose the location because it kept the company in its Marcellus “roots,” and it has a customer base that “really” likes the chocolate pizza his firm makes.
In addition, the location next to the Ultimate Goal “drives a huge amount of traffic” from the Syracuse area, he notes.
Lake Country Construction & Contour, LLC of Skaneateles built the structure in about four months, says Novak. Architect David Mosher of the Syracuse–based architectural firm Harrington & Mosher designed the building.
Chocolate Pizza Company had to secure approvals from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) and Town of Marcellus, which took about a year to complete because it would be a newly constructed building.
Novak had to deal with issues that included storm-water calculations and 100-year flood-insurance coverage through the DEC because the structure is located near Ninemile Creek.
Novak declined to disclose how much Chocolate Pizza spent on construction of the new building. The firm used its own cash and a loan from Chemung Canal Trust Company. Novak declined to disclose the loan amount.
Operations
Chocolate Pizza Company has 24 total employees — 14 full-time workers and 10 seasonal workers. The full-time employee count also includes two workers at the company’s location in Cincinnati, Ohio.
The company has added two full-time workers and a seasonal employee since opening the new headquarters in October, according to Novak.
Besides Marcellus and Cincinnati, Chocolate Pizza Company also has a licensed store in Cornelius, North Carolina, which is near Charlotte.
The Cornelius location, which opened in 2012, licenses the use of the Chocolate Pizza Company name and logo, but the owners operate the facility “at their own discretion.”
“The chocolate has to come from us, and then they can use our name and logo and marketing materials. It’s a new concept we were trying out for them,” he says.
The Cincinnati store is part of Jungle Jim’s International Market, which Novak describes as the “world’s largest grocery store,” which includes smaller retail businesses as well.
“It’s just a very high traffic location,” he says.
Chocolate Pizza Company sells its products in retail locations, on its website, and through wholesale accounts, which generate about 70 percent of the firm’s revenue.
“We’re about four times larger than when I bought the business [in 2010],” says Novak.
Chocolate Pizza Company had operated a small retail store in Manlius for about four years but closed it down when it opened the new headquarters.
Since retail revenue only generates about 30 percent of the firm’s revenue, Novak decided that maintaining the Manlius location didn’t make economic sense.
“…putting [investment] into gaining new wholesale clients made a lot more sense for us,” he says.
He declined to disclose specific revenue amounts but says the cash flow was “pretty steady” in 2014 compared to 2013, the year that Chocolate Pizza Company worked on its contract with Hallmark.
It added wholesale clients such as Altoona, Pennsylvania–based Sheetz, Inc., a chain of gas stations and convenience stores; and Buffalo–based Delaware North.
Delaware North manages and provides food and beverage concessions, dining, entertainment, lodging, and retail at many large venues, according to its website.
“So this has been a big, big year for us,” says Novak.