Boardroom talks to the chef who went from homelessness to entrepreneurship and redefined frozen food with delicious pizza pies.
Katie Lee makes it look easy. The St. Louis born and based entrepreneur, frozen food upstart, and acclaimed restaurateur, balances her 350-person empire with an intoxicating blend of joy and tenacity. In many ways, it all stems from gratitude; a celebration of being alive. The single mother and high school drop out first began cooking while her mother was teaching abroad in Italy. She was 14, had no idea what she wanted to do, and fell in love with cooking. She opened a restaurant in her hometown, the first Katie’s Pizzeria when she was 25. Though her dream was in front of her, she struggled mightily with addiction and was forced out of the place she had spent her life dreaming of. She ended up on the streets and checked into a halfway house shortly after. “I lived there for six months and have been sober ever since,” she explains to Boardroom with an infectious smile.
Lee’s got plenty of reasons to smile. Lee and her team recently received an order of 400,000 pizzas in a deal with Target, a number they had 90 days to reach. Not particularly easy when you hand-stretch and wood-fire every pie and use ingredients like extra virgin olive oil and burrata cheese. Lee, though, likes a challenge. “We’re proving a lot of people wrong in disrupting that category, which is more exciting than the revenue.”
The glue at the center of this food empire — which also includes three restaurants with another on the way — is Katie’s leadership abilities. “With a team that big, team building and retaining a familial atmosphere is critical. One of the reasons to be in this industry is to feel that sense of belonging, to feel supported,” she explains. After spending much of her life feeling disconnected from a traditional lifestyle, Lee has finally found a group who moves to the same rhythm. “Whether it’s moving staff back and forth from the restaurants to the production facility or taking team trips as we just did with a group of us to Italy, those are ways that we stay connected to each other no matter what role you have.” Though Katie Lee, Katie’s Pizza & Pasta, and Katie’s Frozen Pizza are each remarkable accomplishments, it seems like the chef and business owner is only getting started.
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BOARDROOM: When did you fall in love with cooking?
KATIE LEE: I was kind of a problem child and dropped out of high school at a very young age. My mother is a fine artist and my father was a junker. Interesting parents. I felt different, dropped out, and immediately began working in restaurants at about the age of 14. I was bussing, washing dishes, prepping — all of that — at many, many restaurants in St. Louis. My mother got a job teaching painting in Florence, Italy through Washington University’s study abroad program. At about the age of 18 I got the opportunity to go and live with her. She lived there off and on for about 10 years. I got an incredible opportunity to learn about these beautiful specialty ingredients and regional recipes — how food is more part of their culture than probably any other country. I fell in love with it. I had this great background working in restaurants, and asked, ‘Without any sort of degree, what am I gonna do?’ Around the age of 21, I wrote the first business plan for Katie’s Pizza. It took me a while to convince anyone to help me do it, but at 25 I opened the first pizzeria.
Wow.
It was a tiny little hole in the wall pizzeria. There were a lot of great characters there and I was the first to bring ingredients like squash blossoms, burrata cheese, and all of the amazing cured meats to St. Louis. We were the first artisan pizzeria. That was in 2008. I was struggling with addiction during that time and I was kicked out of my restaurant a few times. I eventually ended up on the streets, homeless. I checked into a halfway house after many attempts at getting sober. I lived there for six months and have been sober ever since. I began to build the empire that you see today from there. We’re working on our fourth restaurant right now.
When did the transition into frozen pizzas begin?
When COVID hit. When they announced they were shutting down dining rooms, I had built everything on my own with my team. I didn’t have anything to fall back on and realized we had to quickly find a way to save these restaurants and, more importantly, save the team. We came up with the frozen pizza and prototyped it in as long as it takes to freeze a pizza, so about 24 hours. We threw up a really basic Shopify site and created this business where we were delivering pizzas to the St. Louis Metro area about 72 hours later. We sold 50,000 pizzas in the first six weeks. All of my servers and bartenders became delivery drivers. They made $10 a box and drove them within 50 miles. Our dining rooms became assembly lines. We were the only restaurant that was hiring during COVID. We were able to keep working and keep everybody safe. We kept the business going and realized we had this really incredible thing. We doubled down on that and started to figure out how to get into groceries. We got into a local grocer and from there just built organically through specialty retailers across the country until this year when we got our big Target deal.
How do you continue to honor the responsible scaling of the pizzas while being successful in the eyes of a corporation as big as Target?
I consider myself an artist. My food and how we express it to the world is very important to me. The hand-stretching is something I won’t compromise on. The ingredients are something I will never compromise on. The way that we treat our team and the way we treat our community is really important to me. Those things are dealbreakers. What I find cool about that is it brings this extra challenge to scaling. The minute I got into this, everyone said I needed a co-packer or I needed to switch my ingredients and process. I took that as a really cool challenge, to find a way to scale something that is artisan with real chefs and amazing ingredients — keeping the label clean. Target is the first benchmark where we’re proving it is possible. Every pizza that you see at Target is handstretched and woodfired; it uses extra virgin olive oil and burrata cheese. We’re proving a lot of people wrong in disrupting that category, which is more exciting than the revenue.
What’s harder: running multiple restaurants or scaling a frozen food operation?
I don’t know. I always say I’m a glutton for punishment because I’m in the two hardest industries in the world: groceries and restaurants. I would say I’m really good at restaurants. Right now, I really enjoy them. I have a system down and I have a great team. Scaling into retail is more challenging but I welcome it. It’s gonna be cool to do things that people haven’t done before. The most exciting thing is the disruption of it all, which we’re even doing with our marketing. We’re doing that all in-house, with artists from around the country. We’re filming a documentary on our own and I’m writing a memoir. We’re trying to do as much as we can on our own to show that you don’t need big firms or focus groups.
Why have you embraced St. Louis as the hub of your food community?
I was born and raised here. It’s a super gritty city. I love the people and I love that we have the space to do things differently. There’s maybe not as much influence, but that’s kind of cool too because you can create a new way of doing things. Cost of living is good and there’s a pool of really great people who maybe see the world a little differently than those on the Coasts.
How big is your team?
About 350 people.
Do you ever take a step back and give yourself a pat on the back?
I absolutely should be dead. First, it’s exciting to be alive [laughs] and having recovered for so long. We also have all of these amazing people who believe in what we’re doing. I’m starting to attract some really incredible talent from across the country. I have Cary McDowell, who was on the opening team for Daniel Boulud’s flagship, Daniel. I’ve got Derek Woodley, the former CDC [chef de cuisine] of Flower + Water. I’ve got Jordan O’Clarke, former head Pastaio at Evan Funke’s Felix, as my pasta guy. Chris Kelling, the head of operations for my restaurants, worked at Meadowood when the restaurant there achieved three Michelin stars and a James Beard award for best service. We’re attracting really cool, amazing chefs that are moving to St. Louis, I think because they believe in the same philosophy we do: Don’t let the corporate world screw this up.
Are they coming into the restaurants or the frozen food area of the business?
It’s a combination. The chefs are helping me develop new products and ways of cooking, but they fall back and forth between both. When we had to scale up for Target, we had 90 days to make 400,000 pizzas. We got the deal, we didn’t really have the space or understanding to do it, so I brought all of those chefs over to make the pizzas and rework the factory. What’s fascinating about this first PO is that it was made by some really, really talented James Beard chefs. I was on the line, we were all on the line. I thought, ‘I can’t make these people do this crazy thing if I don’t help out.’
What does your day-to-day look like? I imagine it can be chaotic.
It’s chaotic and structured. I’m pretty militant about how I treat my mind and body. At this level, you’re kind of athletic. I do all of those crazy things and then I meditate. I have a seven year old daughter. I’m a single mom, so I navigate that as well. I have 100 calls a day, my battery’s out by 2 PM [laughs]. I have a lot of in-person meetings at the restaurants. I work with chefs developing menus at my restaurants, I go to the factory and spend time with them as well. Right now, because of what we’re looking at ahead, it’s a lot of strategizing. We’ve got Target, I’m wrapping up the memoir, we’re working on some other huge accounts, so I have to fly places to do pitches. Then there are basic things like manager meetings, where I’ll go to a restaurant and meet with the GM.
There are two more restaurants coming, right?
Yeah. One will be open in a few months and the other will be open in spring/summer. I’ve also got a new one-off Florentine concept that I’m working on as well.
Are you planning on keeping everything in St. Louis?
No, we’re gonna expand. We’re gonna stay where we can get direct flights out of St. Louis, so KC, Nashville, and Denver. We’ll start in the Midwest and go from there. Restaurant groups are interested, but we want to remain in control of it and do it a different way.
It seems to always go well until outside money comes in.
Yeah, and we’re getting offers for it, but it’s just a no. We really believe in building this thing in this way.
How has being sober helped you on this journey?
My father, who was also sober, used to say, ‘The benefit that we have is we have seven days a week.’ We always have seven days where we’re clear and ready to go, while the rest of the world has maybe five or six. A lot of gratitude, too; just being so grateful for my team. I write that down every day. There are all these opportunities that I have the freedom to create. I feel good, I’m healthy, and I’m hopefully a good mom.
Were you seeking out the chefs that made their way to your operation?
Never seeking out. I love my restaurant community and I don’t ever poach. My chef that I started with, Jake Sanderson, neither of us went to culinary school and we learned to cook together 12 years ago. I would send him on stages all over the world — he probably did 15 or 20 stages over the past 10 years. He got connected with that world and I got connected with that world through social media. It was never like, ‘Will you come work for us?’ We would generally get a message like, ‘Are there any opportunities?’
When someone cooks up one of your pizzas or eats at one of your restaurants, what do you want them to feel?
I want them to look at the food and wonder why it’s so different and feels so much better. Looking at something and wondering the how and the why is always big for me.
The American food system is obviously so backwards. Is part of your goal to show that there’s a different way to do mass consumption food?
Absolutely. That’s one of the big things. Can we scale it with extra virgin olive oil and an extra grain semolina? I’m a mom, I’m very healthy. I pay attention to all of that stuff. That’s probably the biggest thing for me: that the food we’re creating on a mass scale honors the old world Italian way.
It’s not like pizza is the healthiest thing, but it’s nice knowing you can make a frozen pizza with real ingredients.
I call it clean comfort food. It still tastes really good and is comforting, but it’s a clean label.
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