‘That’s A Review’: Barstool Sports Founder Makes The Rounds Of Local Pizza Joints

If you’re in the pizza game, you know the name Dave Portnoy.

 The owner and founder of the digital media monolith Barstool Sports is perhaps best known for his “One Bite” pizza reviews. The rules (everyone knows them) are simple. Portnoy finds a pizza shop, calls in his order (typically a regular cheese) and promptly ranks it on a scale of 0 to 10. And despite the title of the review, he often munches down a slice or more of a large pie. 

 These days, having the Pontiff of Pizza walk in for a review is the best thing that could happen for a small shop. Just ask Sarah Koopman, co-owner of Pizza Shark. The business’ Pleasant Lake location was among a handful of local shops that were reviewed when Portnoy visited the Cape in late July. The Barstool chief also stopped at George’s Pizza, Harwich Port House of Pizza and Stone L’oven Pizza in Brewster.

 Koopman said on July 22 that someone called in a plain cheese pizza under a different name. 

 “As soon as he walked in, they knew exactly who he was,” she said of the people on staff at the Shark that day.

 Portnoy gave his order a “real world” score of 5.9, and a 7.3 on his special scale of Cape Cod establishments he’s visited. Just two days after the video of the review went online, the review had garnered 139,000 views.

 “Great vibes, though,” he said of the shop.

Koopman said she’s hardly disappointed by the score, noting Portnoy’s expressed preference for a different “Connecticut-New York” style of pizza.

“It’s a win for us whether we got a 1 or a 10,” she said.

While there was little the shop could do to plan for Portnoy’s visit, it created a stir among Pizza Shark’s staffers.

 “He went outside and did the recording and then came back in,” she said. “The staff were all super excited. They took pictures with him. He was in and out of here in, like, 10 minutes.”

 Summer is the busy season for pizza establishments Cape wide, so Koopman said it’s hard to tell just how much business has directly been brought in by Portnoy’s visit. But she said merch sales have been up since Portnoy sported a Pizza Shark shirt in a separate review.

 “We sold a bunch of merchandise from that bump,” she said.

 In the Stone L’oven review, co-owner Christine Kalogirou stopped Portnoy on the way in to express her excitement about his visit.

 “Oh, I hope they make you the best pie,” she said with a smile in the video review. “You can make it or break it. OMG.” 

 Fortunately, Portnoy left pleased with his pizza, giving it a “real world” score of 7.7 and an 11 on his Cape Cod Scale.

 “Hands down, the best pizza I’ve had on this trip,” he said, noting that Stone L’Oven’s stone-fired pizza is “much more (his) style.” The video received approximately 167,000 views as of last week.

 Reached by phone after the review, Kalogirou said she saw an immediate uptick in business the weekend following Portnoy’s visit. 

 “Hands down the best advertising,” she said of the review’s impact. “There’s no better advertisement than Dave giving us an outstanding review.”

 George’s Pizza earned a score of 6.5, while Harwich Port House of Pizza got a score of 6.8, with Portnoy commenting how it reminded him of pizza he grew up with in his native Swampscott. 

 “Tastes good, eats good, a little greasy,” he said.

 Owner Aleks Sotiri said while he wasn’t happy with the score, after decades in business, the review “doesn’t affect anything.”

 “It won’t affect me,” he said when reached by phone Monday.

 Portnoy also made time to try pizza in Dennis and Yarmouth on his trip. As far as Koopman is concerned, his presence in the region is a win for the ’za scene regionally.

 “My business partners and I frequent every other place in the offseason, so it’s just nice for all of these small places to get a little highlight from him,” she said. “It’s a fun little community aspect. I’m happy for everybody that he stopped by. I think it’s really cool.”

 And the Cape may not have seen the last of Portnoy. According to Kalogirou, he said he plans to come back to Stone L’Oven at some point.

 “I said ‘You’ll never have to wait for a table.’”