Time for a reset — Gualtieris work toward spring opening of Pizza Barn

The Gualtieri family has taken back control of the Pizza Barn and plans to reopen the longtime restaurant this spring.

Pam Gualtieri told the News Letter Journal that the restaurant is temporarily closed while the family works through the practical steps of resuming operations, including restoring longtime vendors, coordinating inspections and addressing licensing requirements after several months under different ownership.

“It’s almost like restarting from the beginning for us because they changed everything,” Gualtieri said.

The restaurant was operated by out-of-state owners for about seven months. Gualtieri said she believes running a business like The Pizza Barn from afar proved difficult. She described the period under different ownership as a time of adjustment, noting that running a restaurant can involve a steep learning curve. Gualtieri said the business appeared to experience “the ups and downs” as the owners worked to understand the community and how the restaurant fit into it.

She said some ideas discussed during that time showed promise but were still in development.

“I think there was the want,” Gualtieri said. “I just don’t know if they had what they needed.”

She said the previous owners changed the menu, ingredients, pricing and food suppliers. Under the Gualtieris, much of the food was made in-house or relied on specialty vendors that support the family’s New York- and Chicago-style pizza and make deliveries once or twice a month. Those relationships now must be reestablished.

The family is also cleaning and reorganizing the kitchen and evaluating whether to keep the current layout or return it to its former configuration.

Gualtieri said the past several months were difficult for her family, given the deep personal history connected to the restaurant.

“That’s 50 years of my husband’s life and 15 to 20 years of my life of building an iconic place in Newcastle,” she said. “We want to make sure that we have that community place again that everybody loved.”

Gualtieri emphasized that the closure is temporary and intended to ensure a smooth reopening.

“The Pizza Barn isn’t going anywhere,” she said. “We just need to get our ducks in a row so we can open and not have any issues when we open in the spring.”

She said she appreciates the encouragement from the community, such as the positive responses to social media posts announcing the family’s return and the turnout when perishable food was given away after the transition. Several former employees have also reached out about returning when the restaurant reopens.

Looking ahead, Gualtieri said she hopes to restore the restaurant’s family-friendly atmosphere, including hosting birthday parties and welcoming children back into the space.

“I’m super excited to be able to … see the smiles on people’s faces again, to have little kids make pizzas again,” she said. “I miss that. I miss that a ton.”

No reopening date has been set, but Gualtieri said the family hopes to reopen sometime this spring and asked for patience as preparations continue.

“To make sure that we do it right, it’s going to take us a little time and we just want everybody to be patient with us while we make sure we get it, we do it right and get things back to the way they were,” she said.