NORFOLK, Va. — A local pizza chain is back in the good graces of its loyal customers.
If you like pizza, or you’re from Hampton Roads, you’ve likely heard of Chanello's Pizza which serves all kinds of pizza at locations all over the region. But in 2023, the regional chain had to stop making its ‘Special Sauce’ that comes with every pie, and it didn’t go over well.
Every pizza order comes with a little container of a special white sauce that many people don't just love, but depend on.
“It’s one of the things that everyone comes in here for,” said Bailey Midkiff, Chanello's Norfolk store manager and granddaughter of the man who started the company decades ago.
Last year, the sauce disappeared from pizza boxes. Chanello’s Director of Operations Debra Walker-VanLear said they started having issues with distribution during the pandemic, and finding a new producer that could get the sauce right, and for the right price, wasn’t easy to find – so, they stopped making the tangy, white sauce.
“When the sauce went away, it was a major deal,” said Walker-VanLear. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”
During that time, Midkiff said he received 15 to 20 calls a day at his location on West 21st Street alone.
“From customers just asking, ‘When are you getting the sauce back?’” Midkiff recalled.
It’s a secret recipe the company spent months trying to bring back to frustrated customers, and at the end of 2023, things came together.
At the beginning of 2024, with a new distributor, the lost sauce was finally returned to its rightful home – next to a hot pizza, in the corner of that signature red and yellow Chanello box for customers to enjoy.