His laser focus on large pizza chains has allowed him to control as much as 85% of the market for pizza cheese and somehow sell simultaneously to a set of customers - Pizza Hut, Domino's, Papa John's and Little Caesars - that try to cut each others' throat in every way that doesn't involve where they buy their milk products. He lets others worry about fresh mozzarella balls and pizza that taste like they were made in the old country. The little-known Leprino (he declined to be photographed for this article) rates as one of America's all-time monopolists. In all, Leprino Foods sells more than a billion pounds of cheese a year, to the tune of $3 billion in revenue. But after nearly 60 years running the business and more than a decade on Forbes' list of billionaires, Leprino, worth an estimated $3 billion, is finally willing to be interviewed about how his family's grocery in Denver's Little Italy became the world's top producer of pizza cheese-the slightly derisive term competitors use to describe its mozzarella. There isn't a single image of Leprino on his company's website. Leprino has somehow eluded photographers for decades: A Google search picks up photos of fellow Colorado billionaire Philip Anschutz and cosmetics heir Ronald Lauder. Indeed he does, to a nearly unprecedented degree, given the way he dominates his industry. After an hour, the plastic shot glasses appear for sampling the company's lactose and whey powders, which end up in protein bars, Yoplait yogurt, Pillsbury Toaster Strudel and baby formula consumed by millions of infants annually. Team Leprino next brings out dessert: salted-caramel-flavored mozzarella wrapped in hot dough, rolled in cinnamon sugar. Then come the cheese cubes marketed as snack pairings: pear flavor with nuts or Gorgonzola with pretzels. Another course features frozen food made with Leprino products, including ham-and-cheddar Hot Pockets, Stouffer's lasagna and Smart Ones baked ziti. Then come flavored cheeses made with a mozzarella base, as well as provolone, cheddar and Monterey Jack.Ĭooks bring out a take-and-bake pizza, a New York-style pie and a stuffed crust, fresh from nearly a dozen ovens. First, thin wisps of low-moisture mozzarella, then a diced alternative, followed by an "artisanal" version, cut short and wide.
AN AVALANCHE OF CHEESE pours into the test kitchen at the Denver headquarters of Leprino Foods, the mozzarella supplier to Pizza Hut, Domino's and Papa John's.
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