Vince Guzzo is an entrepreneur at heart.
The Dragons’ Den television judge has a diverse portfolio that includes multi-theatre cinemas, restaurants, a construction company, and his personal fashion brand, Mr. Sunshine.
Now he is venturing out into a new initiative launching an innovative e-commerce platform in Montreal called Lovefoodtogo.com which brings gourmet snacks and complete meals, including from his restaurant Giulietta Pizzeria, right to the doorsteps of consumers.
Love Food to Go Focuses on Delivering Gourmet Snacks Directly to Your Door
Currently, the platform represents about 40 food manufacturers with the potential to grow in the future.
“Now, more than ever, we are eating in, but sometimes, we want comforting and delicious meals without having to do the dishes. Lovefoodtogo.com offers direct to your doorstep delivery of gourmet, high-end meals that customers can now enjoy in the comfort of their home — including Giulietta’s Italian pizzas,” said Guzzo.
“We thought it is great to get our food into a retail space like a Costco or a Loblaw but one of the big problems is that grocery stores don’t carry the same things in big cities versus small cities. Costco isn’t everywhere. So why wouldn’t we offer the frozen food part of the retail space that’s right now being sold to the Costcos and Loblaws of the world. Why wouldn’t we put it online and allow people to buy some of those products. That’s how the idea started.”
But Guzzo said the idea was taken a step further.
“Now it’s going to actually be a platform where I can test the retail viability of some of the products that we want to launch.”
Consuming locally is more important than ever during the pandemic as more and more consumers look to support their local products.
Love Food to Go’s core value is that it wants to promote local manufacturers in Quebec and Canada by making their high quality and unique products available at the consumer’s doorstep.
By Choosing Love Food to Go You’re Supporting Local Employment & Canadian Family businesses
By choosing Love Food to Go, people support local employment and help Canadian family businesses.
“We’re now going to release a whole bunch of retail products that will be either under the Giuletta brand, either under the partnership brands that we have but also under the Mr. Sunshine while supplying my movie theatres and retail and grocery stores and so forth,” said Guzzo.
“The first orders we got for pizza was in New Brunswick. Then we had some out West in Calgary. It’s another way for us getting direct access to less than obvious areas that don’t necessarily have the big city availability of those products while also making it very convenient.
“Ultimately it’s a product that’s across Canada. It’s a frozen food concept. So it’s got to be delivered to you within 24 hours. We’re trying to make it as easy as possible.”
While the concept works very well under the current trends caused by the pandemic, the real inspiration, said Guzzo, was figuring out a way to get their products to areas of the country that don’t have the brands that have come together under the Love Food to Go’s umbrella.
“While we want to respect the brick and mortar customers we have, okay how do we get to somewhere else? How do we get further reach without necessarily having to go in that area and convince one by one the stores that carry our product.
“This was something that was in the works for six, seven months before the pandemic. It’s just that the pandemic created an urgency of ok let’s get it done. We can actually accelerate this. Eventually the plan is to develop it into an almost frozen food subscription model.”
