Pizza of restaurant caliber at the push of a button
Deglin Kenealy, a Stanford University graduate school of business alumnus with over 25 years of experience as a financial executive in Silicon Valley, joined the premium frozen pizza industry in 2016 after meeting Roberto Villani, the vice president and founder of Basil Street, Los Angeles’ innovation. After taking over as chairman and CEO, Mr. Kenealy changed course and added “robotic machinery” to the company’s mission statement after determining early on that retail did not want another pizza brand.
Mr. Kenealy stated that “automated food kiosks are accepted globally as a viable option for meals on the go.” The US is seeing an increase in demand for contact-free products as a result of the pandemic. We have successfully merged the most popular dinner in America with patented technology to provide restaurant-caliber cuisine at the push of a button.
In just three minutes, the 22-square-foot automated pizza kitchens (APK) from Basil Street can prepare 10-inch flash-frozen pizzas. The business has one patent covering the full procedure, and the oven has another one pending.
Mr. Kenealy stated, “We designed an oven that cooks a pizza like a brick-oven procedure.” “The robotic arm inserts the frozen pizza into the oven, which opens from the bottom and closes to create a sealed oven. While the toppings cook by convection, the par-baked crust cooks from the bottom up. This guarantees an even and crisp baking.
The kiosks change the temperature and duration based on what the consumer orders because different pizza types require varying cooking periods. For pizzas with tomato chunks, for instance, an additional blast of hot air is needed to make sure the pieces don’t freeze in the middle when the pizza is pressed out.
There are three varieties of thin-crust pizzas available in each Basil Street APK, with prices varying based on location and variation from $4.95 to $14.95. Pizza of the month, a breakfast selection, and traditional pizzas like four-cheese, pepperoni, and supreme are among the rotating offerings. The baked pizza arrives in a cardboard box with a throwaway plastic cutter for the customer to use. Customers can pay and place orders contactlessly by using their phones to scan a QR code.
Basil Street has partnered with a Chicago-based manufacturer that produces the pizzas. The sauce is a simple recipe of crushed tomatoes, olive oil, basil and salt.
“The pizzas are flash frozen and remain frozen until they are placed onto the oven floor,” Mr. Kenealy said. “This is a critical design element from a food safety perspective. Flash freezing also helps preserve nutrients, flavor and freshness.”
Each APK holds 141 pizzas. They are restocked by the company’s partners, who also provide maintenance and cleaning on an as needed basis.
The business did not arrive at this point without making mistakes. Five APKs in California, Nevada, North Carolina, and Texas were part of a trial program that Basil Street finished after the brand’s inaugural $10 million fundraising campaign in April 2020.
“We made hundreds of tweaks and received a ton of great feedback,” Mr. Kenealy stated. Actually, the kiosks were designed to hold three racks of fifty pizzas each, but we had to remove a few inches from the top when we discovered the machines were too tall for some entryways. That is how we arrived at 141.
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In order to have the kiosks authorized, the company also collaborated with Underwriters Laboratories Inc., Holland, Mich., and the National Sanitation Foundation, Ann Arbor, Mich.
Mr. Kenealy stated, “It took nearly nine and a half months to get these certifications.” “But thanks to them, we can now safely expand into a wide range of places, including hospitals, universities, airports, and private office buildings.”
In the next months, there will be fifty units deployed, up from the existing seven. By the end of 2021, there ought to be around 100. The Regulation A+ crowdfunding, which was submitted to the US Securities and Exchange Commission on July 26, will enable future expansion.
“We’re thrilled to move forward and invite our supporters to join the pizza robotics community by contributing to our crowdfunding campaign,” Mr. Kenealy stated. “With more than $47 With the US pizza industry generating billions of dollars in sales, there is a chance to change this sector.