‘Pizza Trail’ promotes Lima-area eateries

LIMA —There’s a lot of choices for pizza in the Lima area, and the folks at Visit Greater Lima have found a way to generate traffic to the pizza places through what they’re calling “Mission Impizzable — The Greater Lima Pizza Trail.”

There are 32 businesses on the Pizza Trail. You can pick up a booklet at the Visit Greater Lima office, 144 S. Main St., Lima, to win prizes for participating.

“We encourage people to visit as many pizzerias as they can,” said Cara Venturella, director of tourism and communications for Visit Greater Lima. “We actually have prize packs that are available up to the grand amount, which is 25.”

The restaurant owners think it’s a great idea, especially since the COVID-19 pandemic took a bite out of their businesses.

“I like the concept. I think it’s pretty neat,” said Rob Rigali owner of Rigali’s Pizza Village. “With what’s been going on the past year, year and a half, there’s a lot of businesses out there that really need traffic flow to come back. And this may push them out there. You know, it’s just something that needs to be done.”

It’s an opportunity to bring new customers in the door.

“Our hope is to possibly gain new customers that are going to try and hit everybody on the pizza trail and just get somebody to try a Westgate pizza who maybe never had one before,” said Andy Johnston, owner of Westgate Entertainment Center.

The prize levels start with trying five pizzerias, Venturella said.

“You visit five pizzerias, there’s a prize pack for that,” she said, “Ten pizzerias, there’s a prize pack for that, and 15. Then the grand prize that you can qualify for is 25 pizzerias.

“And with the grand prize, you actually get a pizza trail T-shirt. Anyone who has completed the 25 pizzerias will get entered into a grand prize drawing toward the end of each year, and if you actually make it to all 32 pizzerias, you actually get five additional entries into that grand prize drawing as well.”

There’s not any deadlines to complete the pizza trail.

“You can take your time because there’s so many pizzerias on the list that you can visit. We don’t want someone to feel that they have to do all of them in a month. If they want to spread it out a little bit, if they’re from out of town, and they visit every once in a while, we want them to be able to participate as well,” Venturella said.

Cashing in on the pizza trail is easy.

“People that would like to take on the challenge are basically required to visit the pizzeria and keep the receipts,” Venturella said.

When you’re done, you can bring those receipts to the Visit Greater Lima office and pick up your prize pack.

Kosta’s Top Chalet is one of the stops on the Greater Lima Pizza Trail.

https://www.limaohio.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/54/2021/01/web1_Pizza-Trail.jpgKosta’s Top Chalet is one of the stops on the Greater Lima Pizza Trail. Submitted photo

Reach Sam Shriver at 567-242-0409.