San Angelo Family Serves Authentic Brick Oven Pizza

Mark Phillips takes freshness seriously. Rolling out hand-made dough, grinding his own seasoned sausage and preparing his own special sauce, the San Angelo entrepreneur and owner of Bada Bing Wood-Fired Pizza has found the ingredients it takes to lock in a dedicated customer base for his family-owned business.

Outfitted with a custom-built trailer topped with a brick oven, the family man sets up shop at area events and downtown on the weekends, serving up pizzas by the hundred, each freshly baked in about a minute and a half. The idea for the business started at home, he said.

“I started this in February of 2011,” Phillips said. “The way we got started doing this is we’ve got one of these [brick ovens] in our backyard and we entertain quite a bit. Every weekend everybody’s like, ‘Hey, are y’all doing pizzas this weekend?’”

Phillips said the high demand for his pizzas at home prompted him to consider starting a business, and he began researching brick oven trailers online. What he found, he says, were roughly 150 in the United States and a man out in Colorado that could possibly fulfill his order.

Following a drive to Boulder, Co. and a brief encounter with the man, Phillips’ operation hit a brick wall and he was still without an oven.

“The guy that I went originally to buy one of these trailers from, he didn’t know anything about the business, really. He was just bs’ing people and couldn’t ever really answer any of my questions, so he kind of got mad at me and said, ‘Go talk to this guy. Maybe he can help you,’” Phillips said. “This guy knew I was driving all the way from here to Boulder to go visit with him and go spend money with him and we get there and he gives me about 10 minutes of his time and says, ‘I’ve got to go meet friends and drink some beer, man. Go talk to this guy.’”

The man Phillips was referred was a 70-year-old Italian whose parents own a brick oven pizzeria under the Brooklyn Bridge. He taught Phillips the ins and outs of pizza making, and referred him to another man who casts the ovens, and Phillips made his order. Back in San Angelo, a friend of his custom built the trailer and the mobile pizza making station was ready to go.

“We’ve been going at it ever since,” Phillips said. “I think last year we worked 52 days with it. We do all the big events, you know, the rodeo, the blues fest…the boat races, which aren’t looking real good right now…and we go to Stanton three times a year and do trade days.”

Since he started Phillips has built up a pretty loyal customer base. At the rodeo this year a local doctor would come to place an order while his wife circled the parking lot, pick up pizzas for dinner, then leave the fairgrounds, he said.

“This is what we do,” he said. “We’ve got a commissary kitchen and all that just like a restaurant and we get inspected by the health department, we set up and do downtown when we’re not doing private parties. It’s been sweet. It’s been a good business to be in. It’s just fun. My daughter (Kylie) works for me most of the time doing this and my wife (Debra) San Anhelps me sometimes and we just enjoy doing it. We just come out here and go to a party and do this. You can’t do that where you’re working.”

Bada Bing caters private parties and events. For more information on Bada Bing Wood-Fired Pizza, visit their Facbook page.