Marketing and food. These are the two great passions that brought Eugenio Pezone, a LUISS student in his third year of Economics and Management, victory in the Holy Idea Business Game and gave him the opportunity to do a six-month internship in the Communications Department of the Sebeto Restaurant Group.
All of this goes back to last spring, when the holder of brands like Rossopomodoro and Anema e Cozze launched a competition for the Business and Management students at our university to promote the newest member of the group: Ham Holy Burger. Faced with this opportunity, Eugenio decided to test what he had learned in courses and in books: "It was about creating something innovative that was still in line with the group’s entire philosophy, what the company calls Traditional Evolution. In other words, keeping up with new trends in the food service industry while remaining faithful to the values on which the brand was built."
Eugene’s project was inspired by one fundamental question: "How do you innovate something in a brand whose core strength is innovation?" He created a personal focus group, inviting friends out to dinner at one of the restaurants to get suggestions and opinions. "The opinions were quite varied. Everyone was pretty happy with the experience overall, but they also had a critical eye: they compared the restaurant with its competitors and gave me recommendations. I finally had something I could work with."
His first attempt did not go very well. "LUISS gave me a lot of support on this, thanks to the availability of our professors, who let us know if we were on the right path. In my case, I realized that I was doing nearly everything wrong, that I was proposing changes that were too radical, too ambitious, and I was way off track. In other words, a lot of wasted effort."
He completely changed his perspective for his second attempt which was much more intimate and personal: "I thought about what I would want from a restaurant, I created the project around my expectations and needs. I worked and then I worked some more, in one night I was able to finish the project. I hit 'send' and the die was cast." After a few weeks, Eugenio was invited with other participants to the new restaurant Ham Holy Burger in Rome to find out the name of the winner with Franco Manna, the president of the group. "I chatted with him, and then it was time to announce the winner. I was a little nervous. We were standing when the envelope was opened. As they opened it, I caught a glimpse of my project, and I smiled. 'The winner is... Eugenio Pezone!'”
For him, the real victory wasn’t about creating the best project, but about having a chance to work at a company where he can get fully trained in something he is passionate about: "To spend six months in marketing and communication in the restaurant industry. This is what I want to do with my life."
