Grimaldi's Pizzeria is an American pizzeria chain from the New York City area with several restaurants throughout the United States. Its most famous restaurant is under the Brooklyn Bridge in Brooklyn at 1 Front Street, next door to its original location. Zagat Survey rated Grimaldi's the No. 1 Pizzeria in New York in 2007. With a carry-out and delivery service model in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, in 2022 it had 43 restaurants in operation overall. It does not sell slices, only whole pies, which are cooked by coal-fired brick oven. It also sells wines and appetizers, as well as calzones. Among deserts are cannoli and tiramisu, as well as New York–style cheesescake.
History
Original ownership (1990–1994) Patsy Grimaldi, the founder of Grimaldi's Pizzeria, learned to make pizza at age ten at Patsy's Pizzeria, his uncle Patsy Lancieri's restaurant in Italian Harlem in 1941. Decades later, Grimaldi decided to go into business for himself and originally planned to own his own restaurant in Manhattan. However, Grimaldi believed coal-fired brick ovens produced the best pizza and knew coal ovens were illegal in Manhattan. As a result, Grimaldi began planning to open a restaurant in Brooklyn.
Grimaldi opened Grimaldi's Pizzeria in Brooklyn, New York, in 1990, in a location under the Brooklyn Bridge, at 19 Old Fulton Street in Brooklyn. It was named Patsy's Pizzeria, unassociated with the Patsy's Pizzeria in East Harlem where Grimaldi had previously worked as a teenager. Only selling pies, not slices, it became popular and expanded into Hoboken. It expanded to have two locations in New Jersey: both operated by Patsy Grimaldi's business partner Sean McHugh, in Hoboken and Verona, New Jersey. It became known for having lines around the block for people waiting to order. A jukebox played Frank Sinatra.
In 1996, there was a conflict over naming rights. I.O.B. Realty, then the owner of Patsy's Pizzeria in East Harlem, and Patsy Grimaldi's Patsy's Pizzeria in Brooklyn. I.O.B. sued Grimaldi so he would pay them for use of the name Patsy's. In October 1996, "to disassociate themselves from the new restaurants and to end the court fight, the Grimaldis changed the name of their pizza house to Patsy Grimaldi's. They replaced their signs and their awning. And they printed hand-held menus, removing the place mats that served as menus and that recounted—part seriously, part tongue-in-cheek—Mr. Grimaldi's quest to open his own parlor."
New owners and expansion (1995–2011)
In the late 1990s, Patsy Grimaldi retired, selling the Grimaldi's name and franchise (except for the Hoboken locations) to restaurateur Frank Ciolli. In 2000, Ciolli's son Joseph became CEO. Ciolli and Greenwald opened a new outlet in Tempe, Arizona, then moved headquarters to Scottsdale. In 2003, wait-times at the original Brooklyn restaurant, which didn't take reservations, could be up to an hour for a table. By 2008, it had expanded into Dallas. By 2010, the company had expanded into Arizona, Florida, and Texas. That year, the BBC named it as one of the best pizza restaurants in the United States. In 2010, after the 2009 announcement that a possible Grimaldi's in the FiDi (Financial District) had been dormant for a year and might be evicted, the store signed to open a new 24-hour branch in the Limelight Marketplace in Manhattan. There were also plans to re-open 135 John Street.
In July 2008, the restaurant was briefly seized and shut-down by tax authorities. In 2010, Grimaldi's Brooklyn location was facing eviction, with the case going to court. In 2011, the building's owner declined to renew Ciolli's lease in Brooklyn, so he renovated an abandoned bank next door and moved the restaurant over: the landlord attempted to evict the original location for falling behind on rent and taxes, but a judge ordered the landlord to keep the location open until the lease expired on November 30, 2011. The location closed on November 29, opening the next day at 1 Front Street next door, a building opened in 1869 that had served as the first safety deposit bank in Brooklyn. Also in 2011, a Grimaldi's outpost in Chelsea, Manhattan, was opened. In 2012, Patsy Grimaldi came out of retirement and opened a new pizzeria called Juliana's Pizza in the original building that Grimaldi's had been evicted from in 2011, resulting in enmity between himself and Ciolli.