Defying the odds, an award-winning independent chef has successfully broken into the intensely competitive frozen pizza market in the United States. Katie Lee, St. Louis Chef of the Year for six years running, has listed her handmade pizza line at Target retail stores throughout the nation.
Lee has won accolades for building and growing Katie’s as an independent food and restaurant brand with unwavering perseverance. But the road to success was not smooth. Before triumphing in the frozen pizza business she was a high school dropout and a homeless drug and alcohol addict. Now clean and sober, she is a single mother, restaurateur and wellness enthusiast.
“When I was homeless, everything I owned would have fit into one of Target’s shopping bags. Now I’ve made it into their shelves with Katie’s pizzas,” said Lee, the company’s founder and chief executive officer. “As a busy working mom, it’s hard to find convenient, real food – so we made it ourselves. This is real food for the soul – hand crafted with the best ingredients.”
But the success story may never have happened had it not been for the Covid-19 pandemic. The fear of closing restaurants, laying off staff and losing her business inspired the creation of a line of frozen pizzas based on Lee’s popular restaurant pizza offerings. Driven by difficult challenges and a push for excellence, Katie’s stayed in the black, its entire staff remained employed and the frozen business quickly grew into regional and national distribution followed by permanent shelf space in select local and regional grocery chains. And now Target.
Katie’s brand has reportedly outperformed the frozen pizza category in the USA with more than 100% year-over-year growth since 2021. The four varieties now available at Target stores, all boasting hand-stretched wood-fired dough crust, include the following:
• Burrata Margherita Frozen Pizza featuring house-made sauce, select sourced Burrata, high-quality extra virgin olive oil, Mozzarella and Parmesan cheese, basil and sea salt.
• Pepperoni Stracciatella Pizza offers a cup and char pepperoni drizzled with wildflower honey on a bed of creamy Stracciatella and Fontina cheeses, finished with high-quality extra virgin olive oil.
• Meatball Frozen Pizza is loaded with Italian sausage, grated Parmesan cheese, toasted pine nuts and breadcrumbs complemented by select Fontina cheese and house-made sauce.
• Black Garlic Burrata Cheese Pizza is a Katie’s original, starring chef-made black garlic impasto. The sweet umami flavor of black garlic is complemented by Burrata, salty Pecorino Romano and dried chives.
