Client Success: Enzos Cucina

VitrineMedia LED solution saves Enzo’s Cucina‘ nosediving like the oil price’ as COVID takes hold

Call it serendipity, call it coincidence, call it fate or destiny, or even great minds in sync.

Whatever you chose to call it, it is what Enzo Marturano calls it that really matters! And he is in no doubt that the inspirational moment and subsequent meeting in the days immediately preceding the COVID-19 shutdown in mid-March was a godsend that saved his business “nosediving like the oil price”.

Indeed, he is quick to credit the outcome of the godsend, two VitrineMedia A1 static backlit LED screens that allowed his business to not only survive the COVID-19 ban on indoor dining but thrive in a new guise as a takeaway business.

Enzo, the founder, owner and chef extraordinaire at Enzo’s Cucina’s flagship Italian restaurant in the north-west Sydney suburb of Chipping Norton, remembers seeing the VitrineMedia large format static backlit LED displays in a nearby coffee shop and being taken by their beacon-like qualities.

“The screens had the store stand out like a lighthouse on a dark and stormy night and I immediately made a mental note to follow it up,” he recalls.

Days later, regular patron and Chief Executive Officer at VitrineMedia Australia, Mike Toweel, strolled in for a family meal and while singing Enzo’s culinary genius when settling the bill, he challenged the restaurant owner to brighten up his shopfront with a display of VitrineMedia screens.

“It was uncanny, a fateful moment – and it wasn’t long before we were enjoying a quiet grappa to celebrate the conclusion of the deal install the screens in my front windows,” Enzo continues.

“My initial idea was to use the screens to announce regular special occasions such as Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day and the like but before we got to that point, the pandemic hit hard. As a 140-seater restaurant, we were staring into the abyss, pretty much up ship creek, as that well-known insurance ad chooses to call it.

“With takeaways our only option, we decided to turn a negative into a positive by using the screens to promote the new normal.”

The A1s were put to work to spread the word that Enzo’s Cucina was open for business, albeit in a different manner. The impact was immediate.

“Since advertising this message, along with our takeaway menu and the various specials we offer, we got brilliant take-up, with the combination of great artwork and messaging, the saturation and contrast of the latex printing carried out by VitrineMedia and the power of the cold white light of the backlit LED screens certainly having the desired effect.

“The feelgood properties of cold white light are never more pronounced than in the hospitality sector, where our culinary imagery is conveyed in true colour and has a magnetism that attracts people to the display where they stop, look and think ‘hmm, that looks like a great meal, best I get some of it!’”

Enzo has now taken the decision to invest in a further six VitrineMedia A1 screens as he appreciates that while the business has come through the worst of COVID-19, it is ultimately how it rebuilds as life returns to the normality of old that will ultimately determine the winners.

These additional screens will be used to promote those special events, along with menus and special offer and Enzo is already chatting with his ten franchisees – Enzo’s Cucina restaurants are dotted across Sydney and the city’s outskirts – to encourage them to follow suit.

“Why wouldn’t I?” muses Enzo. 

“After all, just two inexpensive and compelling VitrineMedia A1s helped prevent my lifelong work from a downward spiral akin to the global oil price. They were literally our one bright light during these challenging times…and our very own COVID-19 vaccine!”