Panago Pizza franchise owners leaving legacy for their children
August 22, 2020
Though trained in different fields, David and Candace Roker have an interest in business and wanted to do something to utilize their skills, creativity and talent to embrace the evolving world of work.
They also wanted to leave an inheritance for their children.
The Roker’s own two of the three Panago Pizza franchises in Durham.
There are 22 in the province and the investment for a unit ranges from $250,000 to $360,000.
The Ajax store at 5 Rossland Rd E. #103 has been operational since March 2017 while the Oshawa franchise at 1471 Harmony Rd. N. is expected to open later this year.
“This is an opportunity for us to come together, do something and really have a legacy for our boys,” said Candace who was a social worker for nearly two decades.
Entrepreneurial in all the jobs he has held, her husband felt the time was right to expand his horizon.
“I felt like I had achieved a lot that I wanted in my career,” said the Dalhousie University Political Science 2000 graduate who has a Master of Business Administration (MBA) from the University of Massachusetts.
What made a pizza franchise an attractive investment opportunity for the Roker’s?
“Pizza is an age-old food, something that everyone loves and it always brings a smile to people’s face and lightens up any occasion,” he said. “We love the product, there’s a focus on quality and sustainability and there’s a large market and appetite for pizza. We married our goals and vision along with the opportunity and the values that Panago has.”
With almost 200 stores in six Canadian provinces, Panago was launched 34 years ago with the opening of three stores in British Columbia. The company offers about 35 different pizza recipes and customers can order by recipe or create their own.
Panago customers for just over 10 years and loving the product made it easy for the Roker’s to decide on the business venture they wanted to pursue.
“We looked at lots of different models and we decided first and foremost on franchising, she said. “We then looked at a bunch of different concepts before settling on Panago because it’s a business that we were already familiar with. In looking at other concepts, this was the one that closely aligned with our interests. We love pizza and the quality of this particular product and were interested in business and franchising, so everything just came together nicely.”
David and Candace Roker are the proud owners of the Panago Pizza franchise in Ajax
They have myriad reasons for buying into the franchise.
“We use fresh organic ingredients and make our dough in-house and there is a focus on catering to anybody and everybody,” pointed out Candace who was a sessional lecturer at Dalhousie University and an adjunct lecturer at the University of Toronto. “If you have gluten and dairy-free needs, there is something for you. Everyone can have a pizza regardless of the dietary needs they have. But the most important thing is that we were eating the product for many years before we started selling it and we found it to be really fantastic.”
She discovered Panago about 11 years after moving to Toronto from Nova Scotia.
“There was a store near our downtown condo,” said the daughter of Canadian senator Wanda Thomas Bernard who was the first Black Canadian to have an academic tenure position and become a full professor at Dalhousie University. “As a young mom with our first son, I ordered pizza a lot when I was on maternity leave and quite busy raising the kids. Pizza was a quick meal, but this was one that I could make as healthy as I wanted to. I would get like a multi-grain thin crust and trying to make it healthy is something I felt good about giving to my kids.”
Like many businesses around the world, the Roker’s franchise has been impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.
They have weathered the storm so far.
“The first challenge was the need to be agile and adapt to the ever-changing phases we have had to go through since the virus hit,” she said. “There was the pre-COVID panic about ‘Is everything going to be shut down’? and then learning we could stay open, but with restrictions. You have to work around decisions that the government is making and how the virus is spreading, so it is very difficult to plan under those circumstances. We are doing our best to stay positive and not get distracted by negative thinking. We try to stay focused and ensure that we meet our customers’ demands.”
The New York deli comprises salami, ham, pepperoni, sausage, bacon and blend cheese
The Roker’s spent nine years in Ajax before relocating to Whitby last year.
“I feel at home here,” she said. “It’s small enough that we feel a connection to the community. It kind of reminds me of the way that I grew up in Nova Scotia. But you are close enough to the city and you can pop in to downtown Toronto whenever you want. It is a really livable area and a great place to raise our kids. I can’t see myself living in any other part of the Greater Toronto Area right now.”
Having their home and business in close proximity to the Viola Desmond Public School in Ajax adds to the allure of living in the community.
The late entrepreneur is the first Canadian woman on the face of a banknote.
“I have known about her for a long time, having been from Nova Scotia,” Candace, who was a patient care manager at The Scarborough Hospital, said. “I am all excited to see a national awareness of who she is. When I was in school, we used to hear a lot about Rosa Parks, another very important figure, and no one sort of knew who Viola Desmond was. It’s good to see her getting the recognition she deserves. Every time I get one of those $10 bills from a customer and I put it in the till, I think of her. It’s really empowering as a Black businesswoman to see her face on a banknote and as I run through a lot of those $10 bills during the course of a day, it’s a reminder of the steps she took as a businesswoman that made it possible for me to take the steps that I have taken and the moves we get to make today that wouldn’t be possible without the people who sacrificed. So it’s wonderful to have a reminder of that every day.”
Giving back is an integral part of the Roker’s DNA.
In addition to hiring young people and newcomers, they donated pizzas for the Viola Desmond Public School 2019 graduation dinner and Candace recently established a bursary to commemorate the legacy of her maternal grandmother – Marguerite Thomas Parent -- who was widowed at age 39 with 10 children and two grandchildren.
It will be presented to a student pursuing Culinary Skills at Durham College.
“When I am in my kitchen in the restaurant, I feel my grandmother’s spirit running through me because she’s the one who didn’t have an opportunity to further her education and pursue some of those vocational goals she had,” Candace noted. “She grew up during the Great Depression when Nova Scotia was segregated and her husband died in a tragic car accident leaving her with 10 children between the ages of 18 months and 18 years old. She was left on her own to raise the children and she did a wonderful job. After her kids had grown up, she went back to school and did countless volunteer hours in her community.”
She also initiated a bursary, administered through the Association of Black Social Workers at Dalhousie University, in memory of her cousin, Ngena Bernard, who died five years ago.
Though busy preparing pizza dishes and seeking opportunities for growth and wealth creation, the hands-on owners’ embrace continuous learning.
She’s pursuing an MBA at the University of Massachusetts while her husband is enrolled in the University of London Master of Laws program.
“I believe you need to constantly find ways of moving yourself forward,” said David who started a private investment holding company in November 2016. “For many years, I worked with the world’s leading education company. Education has always been an important feature of my life and for the goals that we have going forward, I know there is still the knowledge I am going to need to help me achieve them. This will add value to our company.”
David Roker
Prior to becoming a franchise owner, he held several senior roles at Pearson Canada that offers world-class tools, content, products and services designed to help people adapt to the changing world and was a web designer and University of Toronto Instructional Technology Analyst.
Leaving the Bahamas in 1994, David completed Grade 13 at St. Andrew’s College in Aurora prior to enrolling at Dalhousie where he met his wife at a party in his freshman year.
