ZIZZI PARTNERS WITH SAINSBURY’S TO BRING ICONIC PIZZA RANGE INTO STORES
Restaurant announces its debut in the grocery category with three strong range
Italian restaurant Zizzi has partnered with Sainsbury’s to launch its first ever grocery range. Zizzi will make its debut in the frozen grocery category with a trio of pizzas based on one of the restaurant’s most popular offerings on its menu, the Rustica Pizza.
The exclusive selection will include Piccante Pepperoni* (£4.00), Margherita Classic** (£4.00) and Vegan Jackfruit Pepperoni*** (£4.50).
The range takes inspiration from Zizzi’s iconic pizza offering: the Rustica – the original long pizza, hand-stretched in restaurants. The Rustica is a ‘Zizzi Favourite’ hero dish, featuring on the core menu and reimagined throughout the year as seasonal limited editions.
The three SKUs, launching on 13th September 2020 in Sainsbury’s, will feature premium restaurant quality ingredients to evoke the Zizzi restaurant experience at home. The range uses 100% Italian grain leavened dough, hand stretched to 30cm, topped with Zizzi’s restaurant recipe tomato sauce and then generously hand topped with premium ingredients to maintain the restaurant’s rustic appeal. Each pizza comes complete with a mini chilli or basil oil to drizzle.
The innovative partnership is part of Sainsbury’s Future Brands initiative and marks the start of Zizzi’s plans to make retail an important part of its business. The move was accelerated in response to an increase in demand for in-home occasions because of lockdown in the UK, and after Zizzi customers turned to social media to talk about how they craved their Zizzi Favourites during lockdown.
Harry Heeley, Managing Director at Zizzi, says: “We are delighted that our Rustica pizzas will be available exclusively at Sainsbury’s. This is an important step for us as a business as we grow beyond restaurants, and what better way to start than with a true Zizzi Favourite. This iconic Zizzi dish is always a popular choice with our customers, and we are proud that we have been able to bring the best of our menu to retail, while maintaining the same restaurant quality and premium provenance ingredients that our customers know and love. We can’t wait for Zizzi fans to try our first ever at-home range and hear what they think!”
Estom Ltd., with their twenty-year association with Zizzi, were integral to bringing the project to fruition, through their expertise in the pizza category in UK retail and wide network of pizza manufacturing partners.
Zizzi has always had distinctive innovation at its heart, with the Italian restaurant chain leading the way with its first to market trends and NPD, and its commitment to a market-leading plant-based and flexitarian offering.
In 2018, Zizzi was the first major restaurant to put Ruby Chocolate on its menu with the Ruby Chocolate Cheesecake. In 2019 it launched an exclusive partnership with jackfruit company Jack & Bry to develop the first ever jackfruit pepperoni pizza to hit major restaurants. The Rustica Jackfruit Italian Hot was voted as the ‘Best Vegan Pizza’ at the PETA Vegan Food Awards 2019. The new frozen vegan Rustica line features the same Jack & Bry jackfruit pepperoni and the same vegan MozzaRisella cheese as in restaurants.
Natasha Metcalf at Sainsbury’s says: “We have seen increasing demand for restaurant-quality food that consumers can enjoy in the comfort of their own home, and with recent events many more consumers are opting for options that gives them flexibility and allows them to recreate restaurant experiences at home. We’re confident Zizzi’s Rustica Pizzas will be a big hit and look forward to welcoming them into stores.”
The range will be rolled out into 307 Sainsbury’s supermarkets from 13th September.
– ENDS –
For further information or interview requests please contact the Zizzi press office on zizziteam@theacademypr.com / 0207 100 7100.
* Zizzi Rustica Pizza, Piccante Pepperoni – £4.00
A crowd pleaser and restaurant favourite, this hand-stretched Rustica pizza comes topped large salami, spicy pepperoni crumb and hot chilli peppers, accompanied by a mini chilli oil to drizzle.
** Zizzi Rustica Pizza, Margherita Classic – £4.00
A Zizzi top seller, this Rustica Pizza includes the signature 30cm hand-stretched dough, which is hand-topped with mozzarella and juicy cherry tomatoes, accompanied by your very-own mini basil oil to drizzle.
*** Zizzi Rustica Pizza, Vegan Jackfruit Pepperoni – £4.50
This plant-based pizza is a delicious vegan alternative, featuring the signature hand-stretched dough and hand-topped, with the same Jack & Bry’s jackfruit pepperoni and vegan MozzaRisella as found in Zizzi restaurants. Accompanied by a mini chilli oil to drizzle. The award-winning pizza first launched in restaurants in 2019, and was crowned PETA Vegan Food Award Winner.
Notes to Editors
About Zizzi
Zizzi is all about good old Italian food with a twist that surprise and delights all tastes. Since first opening its doors and firing up its first signature pizza oven in Chiswick over 20 years ago they’ve opened over 130 restaurants across the UK & Ireland, each individually designed with touches unique to the local area and perfect for all occasions.
Their ever evolving menu is made up of tasty dishes from pizza, pasta and risotto to salads and indulgent desserts. Whether you’re a meat-eater, veggie, vegan or non-gluten Zizzi has a dish to suit all tastes & requirements.
About Estom Ltd.
Estom is an importer and distributor of specialist food products to the foodservice, wholesale, retail and manufacturing sectors, proudly supplying British blue chip food companies with Hungary’s finest products for over 90 years. During Covid-19, Estom developed and is due to launch Properoni®, pepperoni made properly, to build upon their cured meat expertise and supply of pepperoni and salami to the most iconic restaurant chains. Furthermore, Estom has competencies in developing topped pizza for the UK retail market, and works with leading pizza manufacturers in Italy and Europe specialising in long rested dough, pizza bases, hand stretched and hand topped pizzas, pizza snacks and gluten free pizzas, as well as breads, pasta, ready meals and desserts.
About Sainsbury’s
Helping our customers get the most out of life has been at the heart of what we do since 1869 and we achieve this by offering our customers easy, affordable access to the things they need, like healthy food, quality clothes, stylish homewares, the latest technology and more ways to manage their money. We do all of this sustainably, so we can help our customers live well for less today and tomorrow.
We are a leading multi brand, multi-channel retailer, with a growing online and digital business, fast, convenient delivery capability and a structurally advantaged store estate of over 1,400 Sainsbury’s supermarkets and convenience stores and almost 900 Argos stores in stand-alone and supermarket locations. The Habitat brand is available in 16 locations and online.
We employ 172,000 colleagues who are integral to our success, now and in the future.