Pizza Today - November 2017 - 73

piquanté peppers finished with
tomatoes and basil pesto at $16)
to the impressive Steak Dinner pie
(peppercorn demi glace, shaved prime
rib, cheddar and mozzarella, roasted
Yukon potatoes, crimini mushrooms
and caramelized onions at $20).
"Basically, we've got three different
sauces," says Hustad. "You've got
our Pomodoro sauce, which is our
housemade red sauce, we have a Parm
cream sauce and we have an herb oil
that we use as a base. From there we
just use our toppings. It makes it super
easy when everything is housemade."
The top seller is the Fireball Pizza,
which features a Pomodoro sauce,
Italian sausage, pepperoni, Kansas City
bacon, a house cheese blend, sweet
piquanté peppers, serrano peppers,
Parmesan cheese, red chili flakes and
a drizzle of sriracha ($18). The Works,
The Boiler Room's version of a supreme
priced at $18, is also popular, as is the
Casa Blanca (Parmesan cream sauce,
shaved prosciutto, crimini mushrooms
and fresh arugula and white truffle oil at
$18) and the BBQ Chicken (also $18).
"I have a huge regular following, and
when I see those families come in, and
they're here twice a week (or) three
times a week, I ask them to look at
the menu," Hustad says. "Is there stuff
that you like? Stuff that you don't like?
Nine times out of 10 they'll give us a
suggestion here or there."
The newest addition to the menu
-- and perhaps the wackiest -- is the
Mac and Cheeza, which features -- you
guessed it -- a Parmesan cream sauce,
Gruyère, cheddar, mozzarella, Kansas
City bacon, cavatappi pasta and chives
($18). "It's the most amazing pizza I've
ever had, especially in the fall," Hustad
says.
Sauce and dough are made in-house,
produce is ordered fresh every day, "even
down to the pineapple," Hustad adds.
"We cut and roast our own pineapple."

With so much made in house,

how does Hustad manage to wrangle
labor costs? "Washington state has
an extremely high minimum wage,
especially in Spokane where Janaury 1st
the minimum wage went from $9.47 to
$11 an hour," he says. "For the next three
years it goes up 50 cents an hour. It's a
lot of work to figure out what works best
for us and honestly, it's finding the right
people who care about the food. They
know what they're doing, and they work
fast. My prep guy that's in the back right
now, he's been here two years and he's
just a machine. ... We're kind of able to
divvy up our prep list throughout the
day, and at most we might have two or
three people on and that's it. One guy
does the dough. The next guy that comes
in preps chicken or so. We've made it
work, so it's a system throughout the day
instead of all in the morning."
Hustad admits labor has been a
challenge in Washington state, "at least
from the front-of-the-house side, but
we've made it work" he adds.
There's no delivery, but The Boiler
Room utilizes Uber Eats, which recently
entered the Spokane market. Dine-in
accounts for 90 percent of business. That
third-party business has been a huge
help, as it puts the expectations on that
company and lessens the burden on The
Boiler Room's employees.
Uber Eats has a guarantee for every
order, "but every to-go item that sits
up here (on the outgoing counter) is
actually physically inspected and we
initial it," Hustad explains. "That way
we know that when it gets to the house
and I have a customer that calls and says
'hey, my pizza's upside down' or 'it looks
horrible,' I can ask what was the initial
on the front of the box. If it says 'JH', I
know that's myself and I inspected it,
and I redirect my call to Uber Eats, and
Uber Eats issues a full refund. ... We
haven't had many issues at all. Thirdparty has been a huge help for us."

Social media is a huge part of
the company's brand, and they also

offer a popular birthday club in which
the customer gets a free personal-sized
pizza of his or her choice.
Every Thursday, they kick out an
email special to around 5,000 people,
and they're able to track the success
rate of those specials (such as playing
Rock Paper Scissors with your server
and if a customer wins, he or she gets
half off a pizza. If he or she loses? A
free appetizer. It's a clever win-win
situation for both the customer and the
restaurant).
"We try to base that a lot with the
interaction with our service," Hustad
says, adding that they avoid cookiecutter service in lieu of personal
interaction, like asking the customer to
sing a holiday carol to his or her server
for a discount.
"It gets everyone involved, and
everyone enjoys it," Hustad adds.
The Boiler Room and its staff are also
heavily involved in the community, and
often host fundraising events and make
donations to local charities.
The ultimate goal for Goodwin

and his management team is

to expand the The Boiler Room
concept outside of Washington into
the Northwest region like Idaho and
Montana first. "When we opened this
place, the goal was to take this and
make multiples," Hustad says. "The
(raise in minimum wages) kind of
slowed that process down, so we were
able to hone in on this a little more.
Our owner owns several locations,
but they're all different. Our goal is
to take The Boiler Room and make it
franchise-like." n
 
MANDY WOLF DETWILER is managing
editor at Pizza Today.

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Pizza Today - November 2017

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