Pittsburgh. Pa - 21 May, 2004 -

After Whole Foods Market proved successful selling organic groceries to an eager customer base in East Liberty, a health-conscious restaurant franchise has also found early success in Pittsburgh. Amazon Cafe, a small Philadelphia-based franchise that anchors its menu with fruit smoothies, opened its first franchise location outside its home market last year with a location on Grant Street. Mick Petrucci, founder of the chain and president of Amazon Systems LLC, said the early success of the restaurant whetted the company's appetite to bring more locations here. "Our Pittsburgh store has been the number one store as far as volume to date," said Mr. Petrucci. "So Pittsburgh is accepting us with open arms." Currently, Amazon is working with a local franchisee that consists of partners Matt McCrerey and Chris Dimmack. The partners have established a development agreement that gives them territory rights for all of Allegheny County and the expectation of opening another four to six locations with the options to do more. Mr. Petrucci is still working to sell franchise territories for the rest of the metropolitan market. For a franchise cost of about $175,000 per store, he expects the average Amazon Cafe to reach between $400,000 and $600,000 in gross annual sales. Overall, the company currently operates 15 locations, with the rest in Philadelphia. It has development agreements to open 50 more franchise locations in Western Pennsylvania and along the East Coast. Doug German, head of the retail group for Howard Hanna Commercial, based Downtown, is helping Amazon find locations of 1,500 to 2,200 square feet. He said the franchisee, whose territory is Allegheny County, is looking for another 12 to 15 locations. "Because of the uniqueness of the store, I'm not sure what the market is going to be able to bear," Mr. German. But Mr. Petrucci seems expansive when he discusses Amazon's plans, suggesting there is potential for 20 locations in the region and including as many as four or five Downtown.

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