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Pizza Pleasers Who says family and work can't co-exist?

By P. Kelly Smith

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Goodfella's is the name and family is the game.Since 1993, brothers Scot and Marc Cosentino and brother-in-law E.Jay Myers (37, 38 and 36, respectively) have been serving upgourmet pizzas to New Yorkers with Goodfella's Brick OvenPizza. With no background in food service, $75,000 among the threeof them and a love for food and family, Scot, Marc and Myers setout to create a business that would put them on the map. Theyopened their first restaurant on Staten Island in January 1993 withcompetition from five other pizzerias within 10 blocks. With no airconditioning, a refrigerator from their house and a teeny mixer,they cleaned their windows and typed up a menu.

"In the beginning, we went to food distributors and said,'Give us the best of everything,'" Scot remembers."And that's how we put together the taste-not by anyrecipe, not by any standards. We just started throwing thingstogether."

The three men made a pact that, no matter what happened, theyweren't going to let anyone else determine their course."We knew we wanted to be in control of our own destiny,"Myers says.