Central Pizza Pie &

PopUps for Good

We build community by bringing people together over great pizza and supporting great nonprofits

What's the Central Pizza Pie story?  We have a passion for helping make our community a better place and for investing in the nonprofits that make all the difference. We also love pizza and, a couple of years after moving to Chicagoland, we decided to contribute to its pizza legend and serve our own version of pizza to our fellow residents. Central Pizza Pie, a public benefit corporation, is the result.

What is a public benefit corporation and why is Central Pizza Pie one?  A public benefit corporation is a business, but its top goal is to achieve good in the community where it operates (that's Evanston, Illinois in our case). It does make money too, but never at the expense of the good it can do. Central Pizza Pie works to meet rigorous social and environmental standards, to be accountable and transparent to our community. We bank, buy and barter locally, doing business with women- and minority-owned, and community-oriented businesses -- in every way that we can. We also care about those that work with us and for us and act accordingly.

Why the name Central Pizza Pie?  People come together around food they love. Everybody loves pizza and we think that good pizza can bring people together -- that it can be central to building community. We also live right near Central Street in Evanston and operate out of the beloved Curt's Café located on Central Street. As we got into making the pizza, we started affectionately calling it "Pizza Pie," as in "Now, that's a good Pizza Pie!"

What's unique about the Central Pizza Pie pizza pie?  Our pizza pie is made in the style we learned to love while living in California. It has a thin, crispy crust (we're serious geeks about this), topped with garden fresh ingredients that make for dazzling flavor. We go easy on dough and cheese, but don't hold back on flavors. The result is pizza that is healthy and light, but that emphasizes lush flavor and gastronomic delight. The easy-on-the-dough-and-cheese part means that you can eat more pieces!

What are PopUps for Good?  We wanted to get started on our vision of bringing community and great pizza together in support of great Evanston nonprofits. So, every month we bring Central Pizza Pie to life with the help of Curt's Café students that we hire, along with a passel of volunteers that includes wonderful friends and neighbors. To our delight, what we've found out is that the PopUps for Good are not only fun and delicious, but that everyone who participates feels real community spirit that goes way beyond having good food.

Honestly, what could be better than eating great pizza while making your community a better place? Try it, you'll like it -- and know exactly what we mean!     -- Hòa Voscott and Ned Schaub