What is it about pizza and beer that appeal to so many people?
The taste? The experience? The creativity? The nostalgia? For Nolita Joe’s entrepreneurs Patrick Santos and Joey Viray, it’s all that and more.
“I just wanted to be cool and make my own beer,” laughs Viray, sharing that his beer appreciation started early when his grandmother used to give him small sips of cerveza negra. From then on, the reserved brewer studied the craft at University of California, Riverside and University of California, Davis on separate occasions before eventually returning to launching his own brand in 2014 and opening a now-defunct taproom in Poblacion three years later.
You could quite easily relate Viray’s motivations with Santos’ overwhelming affinity for pizza.
After serving roughly 20,000 pizza slices and more than 100 kegs of craft beer since opening in May 2023, Patrick Santos and Joey Viray reset their careers with a partnership that’s literally forged by fire and fermentation.
“I’ve always liked pizza ever since I was a kid. It’s so easy to eat and it just tastes so good,” he says. His lingering memories of visiting New York City as a child and seeing pizza joints and eating “cheap pizza for $1 or $2” helped inform his decision to launch Nolita in 2012. “I thought it would be cool if we had that back in Manila.”
After captivating Manila with their pizzas and beers, and adapting to the business climate (like Nolita moving to various locations), everything shifted dramatically when the pandemic hit. That is, both were forced to close despite noble attempts to weather the storm.
But like anything in life, everything can turn around. And they’ve proven it with their collaboration concept Nolita Joe’s. After serving roughly 20,000 pizza slices and more than 100 kegs of craft beer since opening in May 2023, Santos and Viray reset their careers with a winning partnership that’s literally and metaphorically forged by fire and fermentation.
The turnaround couldn’t have been better.
How did this collaboration come about?
Patrick Santos (PS): When the pandemic hit, we had to close and ended up doing deliveries. For a time, we were operating out of Borough in High Street and luckily we were talking with Joey’s brother Marco and he was saying ‘We have a space in Poblacion baka you guys want to partner up’ so that’s how we got together.
If you had not found this space, would you still have opened a physical store?
PS: Yes. I always feel like with our products, it’s really best when you have it straight out of the oven. So even though we were doing deliveries and it’s doing pretty well—of course, during the pandemic delivery picked up—iba pa rin if you have a physical space where people can go and see the pizza go in the oven, they get it and it’s super hot and fresh. But we’re lucky with this space because it’s a super nice location and it’s a perfect partnership with Joe’s Brew.
Joey Viray (JV): It’s also like a taproom, a showroom where I can showcase the new experimental beers.
So Nolita Joe’s is like your comeback from the closures. How was that experience for you?
PS: It was super hard because we were there for a year. You invested in that space, you hired people, and then suddenly the pandemic happened. We tried to keep it alive by doing deliveries but then at the height of ECQ, we weren’t allowed to operate at all. We were only able to start delivery when the restrictions eased a bit. And we were delivering out of Borough. It became like a cloud kitchen. Pero it’s still not the same as with a physical space. It was very, very hard in terms of trying to survive.
“You really need to learn how to adapt. How will you keep the business going? How will you tweak your product offerings? How will you find ways to still get your product out there and make enough to sustain your staff and yourself?” says Patrick Santos.
What were your learnings or realizations during that tumultuous period?
PS: You really need to learn how to adapt, for example, given the restrictions. How will you keep the business going? How will you tweak your product offerings? How will you find ways to still get your product out there and make enough to sustain your staff and yourself? It was more that—learning how to be a bit more flexible, how to be more adaptable to the situation. In terms of the product itself, we added new products. Before, we served slices and the whole 21-inch pizzas but we added different sizes like a 12-inch and a 16-inch because of the delivery component.
Is the menu just the same as before or did you develop a new one specifically for Nolita Joe’s? And how did you intend to design the customer experience here?
JV: Actually that’s our goal this year—to do food pairings, not just with our pizzas but also working with different chefs.
PS: In terms of the menu, it’s pretty much the same but we recently added four new flavors that we didn’t have in the previous Nolita—a white anchovy flavor and a red anchovy flavor, plus the pizza a la vodka and the pepperoni a la vodka.
JV: For the beers, I have all six beers but I would add something special, like now I have the blond ale, and then I have special IPAs and sour beers.
How would you describe Nolita Joe’s to someone who’s never been?
PS: Given the location, we wanted it to sound a bit more casual by saying it’s a pizza and beer bar instead of saying it’s a pizza restaurant. It’s more inviting and not as intimidating for people. And about the experience, most of the time what happens is people walk in, they go straight to the pizza counter, check the slices, and then they pick. And then usually the staff suggests a beer to go with it. The staff more or less can recommend what type of beers would go with what pizza.
What are the most important facets of a pizza and beer bar to ensure a good customer experience?
PS: I guess the first thing is that the pizza and beer have to be really good (laughs). And second is that the vibe has to be inviting and welcoming. This is actually patterned like those dive bars in New York.
Are collaborations important in today’s landscape?
PS: Yes because when you collaborate with somebody and whatever your strengths are, whatever their strengths are, if you guys can work well together, that is much more than what you guys would be able to do on your own.
Can you share some advice for startups looking to expand into the pizza or beer business?
PS: You have to get into something you really enjoy. If you’re going to serve beer, you have to like beer. At least being a fan of it yourself, you would know what good quality means or you would know what appeals to you so you can more or less serve that to other people. The other thing is, you also have to be able to adapt to the market. Once you see what the market wants, you need to be able to adjust. You can’t be too stagnant.
