When the production department of his Mansfield-based employer relocated in March, 2011, Brad Konves was frustrated and unemployed. “I was tired of being a statistic,” he says. Armed with what Konves calls “marketing genius,” Bill Konves called his cousin with the idea that would soon become the Two Cousins Pizza Company.
The Mansfield location opened its doors in July, 2012, barely a year after the March, 2011 launch of the original restaurant in Lexington, giving Two Cousins claim to the type of success usually enjoyed by businesses with more years in the oven. With community support as its main ingredient Two Cousins’ recipe for success is anything but usual.
“Our philosophy is that we treat everybody like family,” Brad Konves said. “It’s our family serving yours.”
Although Bill Konves lives south of the city, both cousins consider Mansfield home and, according to Bill, it’s not about whether or not the business breaks even; it’s about bringing revenue back to the city they love. “Mansfield’s my hometown,” he stated. “I’ve done pretty well, so why not try to give back?”
“We want to be the mom and pop shop that everybody comes to,” Brad Konves added, “We want to serve the best product that we can to the most people we can but we also want to always keep in mind that the community serves us and we need to serve them.”
Their current initiative gives 25 percent of the sale from any customer who mentions the Bellville Parent Teacher Organization back to the organization.
Mansfield’s response to both product and philosophy has been an enthusiastic “thumbs up.” Two Cousins boasts over 7,000 “likes” on Facebook alone, a significantly higher number than most other local businesses, but the active online presence is more than an ego-boost; it’s a ridge in the key to the Two Cousins’ success.
“Without social media we would not have pizza shops,” Bill Konves explained. “It would have been too hard to open a mom & pop in Mansfield without it.” He said one of the biggest challenges facing small businesses is how to communicate with their audiences. If used effectively, social media is an opportunity to build relationships in the community, but as with all relationships, it’s also a lot of work. “You always have to be thinking about it and coming up with new ideas,” he continued, “It levels the playing field against the pizza chains.”
Between the two of them, the cousins combine twenty years of retail corporate marketing experience, business ownership, supervision, production, and industry control, but neither cousin had any official restaurant experience.
A pizza lover all his life, Bill Konves became what Brad Konves calls a “pizza connoisseur” simply by trying all kinds of different pizza. “I used to travel a lot and I was eating different pizza everywhere I went,” Bill Konves said. “I wanted it to be a hobby, but the marketing aspect of it interested me as well.”
Aside from a stint as a short order cook during high school, Brad Konves’s restaurant experience was limited to familial association. Having two chefs and prior restaurant owners in the family helped him find his footing in the early days of the business, but it was never a safety net. “I wish it would have helped me a little more,” he joked. “I stumbled, but that’s how you learn. It’s only a mistake if you don’t learn from it.”
That willingness to learn the industry can make or break the business. After he purchased a concrete company, Bill Konves spent the next few months online reading everything he could about his new venture. “I don’t have passion for concrete,” he explained. “I’ve got passion about building something that’s better than someone else’s. If you have a passion to win, you’re never going to give up.”
For the cousins, giving up was never an option. Consequently, Two Cousins will continue to grow as the Konves search for a third location, but it won’t stray too far from its roots. “I don’t know whether we thought from the beginning that eventually we’d like to grow it big, but we still want to be that mom & pop shop that serves the community,” said Brad Konves.
“Our philosophy is that we treat everybody like family,” Brad Konves said. “It’s our family serving yours.”
