We Filipinos simply love pizza! Look at how many pizza brands there are in the market — and, when a new pizza brand is introduced, we cannot resist the urge to try, just to see if it is good and if it can compare to the more established brands.

One of the standouts in the local pizza game is Angel's Pizza. A proudly Filipino brand, it has been giving big pizza conglomerates a run for their money since it first made its presence felt around 2009. It filled the gap between very expensive gourmet pizzas and affordable but low-quality pizzas.

"There were many local and international players already at the time but the flavors were all very common and large international players' pricing was quite expensive, while the very affordable pizza players were very good on low pricing but their pizza was lacking in quality. We wanted to fill this niche. We Filipinos love everything about pizza: cheese, bread, and all sorts of toppings. Pizza is a group-gathering meal which, in our culture, we love to share with friends and family. We knew then that the love for pizza in our country is very strong and will continue to grow," says Justin Liu, chairman of Angel's Pizza.

Menu development took about a year as getting the proper formulation for the pizza dough was very important to the Angel's Pizza team, who did not stop until they got the perfect formula for a really good pizza crust. So good that their pizzas remained good even when refrigerated and then microwaved. Their first flavors were the usual Pepperoni and All-Meat. They had a special pizza with everything on it, their best-seller at the time, which was the Angel's Overload (now called Toppings So Bongga), which they sold at a regular price and not a premium price.

Not resting on their laurels, the team continued to develop new pizza flavors and new products. They drew inspiration from trends in the food industry as well as new innovations and ideas from abroad, aside from constantly throwing ideas at each other and adopting brilliant ones.

"We try to play around with new promotional products every year and see which ones the market really likes, and we can choose to add these to the permanent menu. We constantly evaluate which menu items have to be refined and optimized and are always on the lookout for new flavor trends in the food industry," Liu adds.

One of the brilliant new ideas that the team recently came up with was the Creamy Spinach series, which includes the original Creamy Spinach Dip Pizza and the newest hit, the Creamy Spinach Sushi Bake (crab stick, Japanese mayo, Sriracha sauce, seaweeds and parsley on a creamy spinach pizza), which was inspired by the sushi bake trend that emerged from the pandemic. With this series, Angel's Pizza has started an all-new hit flavor in the market, to which many other pizza shops have followed suit.

More recently, Angel's Pizza added several new items to its menu. These include chicken fingers (thick and juicy chicken tenders dredged in house-made breading then fried to golden perfection); chicken fingers with rice (served with rice and chicken sauce on side); Palabok Special (traditional palabok topped with shrimps, crunchy chicharon, spring onions, boiled egg and calamansi); and Spicy Fried Chicken (crispy and juicy fried chicken with a kick).

There are four new desserts — saba con yelo (milky and creamy dessert treat with caramelized bananas and mini sago pearls); Triple Chocolate Cake (layered with velvety chocolate mousse, topped with chocolate mirror glaze); Banana Langka Pie (traditional turon with the caramelized banana and sweetened langka in a crunchy pocket pie); and Ube Macapuno Pie (pocket style pie filled with ube and macapuno).

From a pizza brand that started with one store, grew to 14 and now expanded to 111 stores and counting, Angel's Pizza is rapidly developing its menu to keep up with its expansion plans.