A new pizza café could soon be joining a burgeoning thoroughfare in Grosse Pointe Woods.
Owners of Crispelli’s Bakery & Pizza are cooking up plans to open a restaurant at 19850 Mack Ave., according to site plans recently reviewed by city officials.
Council members discussed a Sunday sales permit and class-C liquor license that would allow Crispelli’s to sell beer, wine and alcohol during a public hearing Monday.
The new pizza shop could sit next door to a Bucharest Grill that’s in the planning stages to open in the adjacent storefront.
Crispelli’s is a locally owned chain that launched in 2012, selling affordably gourmet pizza, sandwiches and authentic Italian dishes. Owned by a quartet of founders — Joe & Kenny Morelli, Mark Artinlan and Glen Wilson — it’s “part bakery, part pizzeria, part Italian Mercado.”
The Grosse Pointe Woods locations would mark the sixth link in the chain. There are already Crispelli’s up and running in Berkley, West Bloomfield, Troy, Clarkston and Royal Oak, according to the restaurant’s website.
The pizzeria will hold 45 seats and offer 35 jobs for full- and part-time employees, Crispelli’s attorneys tell the city. In December, city officials approved an interior fit out to make the site suitable for a new tenant.
Crispelli’s owners have signed a 10-year leasing agreement with two five-year options to occupy the 2,700 square-foot storefront, which used to be a market.
According to site plans, the build out will come with a $1.1-million overhaul.
There was no word on how soon the location might open. Owners could not be reached for comment by late Thursday.
