Faith, family & fresh hot pizza. See inside new Holy Pie! Pizzeria in Perry

A new faith-based, family-owned pizzeria is now open in Perry, the first business to set up shop in a two-plaza development bringing additional restaurants, a coffee shop, nail salon and more.

Holy Pie! Pizzeria at 1818 Houston Lake Road, Suite B1300, operates under PB&J Restaurant Group, which is owned by Jake and Penny Watson of Roberta. The new Perry pizzeria is their third location.

The name comes from the first initials of their family — including themselves, their son, Jake Watson Jr. and his wife, Jessica, and grandchildren, Brayden, 16, and Jackson, 15.

Jack Watson Jr. serves as operator over the pizzerias while his wife, Jessica, handles social media. Their sons, Brayden and Jackson, who are homeschooled, help out at the restaurants.

“For the most part, when I say we’re a family company, everything revolves around family, and it’s not just blood kin, it’s the family of our team members, as well as being family with the communities that we operate in,” Jake Watson Sr. said.

The Watsons are franchisees and partners of the brand Holy Pie! Pizzeria, which was created by two friends, Kendall Wilson and Olman Del Cid. The friends have three Holy Pie! Pizzeria locations in the Savannah area and one in Statesboro. Jake Watson Sr. and Wilson are cousins.

Holy Pie! Pizzeria in Perry opened Oct. 1. The Watson family’s other locations are in Roberta and Macon.

The 1,200-square-foot Perry pizzeria is geared for takeout with limited dine-in, has a drive-thru, offers its own delivery within about a 5-mile radius and utilizes third-party delivery for greater distances.

“We’re just excited to be in the Perry market,” Watson said. “We’ve got a lot of friends and family that live around here, work around here, so to be able to serve them, it’s just exciting. Looking forward to being part of the community.”

What makes for a good pizzeria?

For Watson, fresh ingredients are the starting point for any great food.

The dough is made in-store, all the fixings for pizzas and salads are cut fresh daily, and everything is made to order with one exception.

Pizzas for the by-the-slice lunch special are kept warm in a display at the front counter.

The $6.29 special of two slices of pizza and a drink is offered from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday through Friday for dine-in and carry out only. Add a slice for $1.50 more.

On a recent visit, the pizzas offered for the lunch special were the Meat and Greet, Pickle Me, Pepperoni, and Ultimate Supreme.

The Meat and Greet features Holy Pie! Pizzeria’s own signature sauce, ground beef, pepperoni, Italian sausage, ham, and crispy bacon topped with mozzarella cheese, according to the printed menu.

Pickle Me is described on the menu as a new pizza addition with scratch-made buttermilk ranch topped with mozzarella, sliced pickles and bacon.

The Ultimate Supreme includes Holy Pie! pizza sauce, onions, green peppers, mushrooms, Italian sausage, ham, and pepperoni, topped with mozzarella cheese, according to the online menu.

The online menu offers more pizza options than what’s listed on the electronic and printed menus in-store. But customers can access the full menu by scanning the QR code on the printed menu and order any pizza in-store.

Guests can also build their own pizza. Gluten-free crust is available, and guests can “turn any pizza doughless” with a pizza bowl.

In addition to its regular menu options, Holy Pie! Pizzeria offers a “pizza creation of the month.’’

For October, the pizza of the month is the Olympian Greek, which Watson described as their hand-tossed dough with Greek dressing, mozzarella cheese, fresh tomatoes, black olives, banana peppers, red onions, smoked chicken and topped with feta cheese.

Ever get tired of eating pizza?

When asked what his favorite pizza was, Watson said for the moment, it’s the Olympian Greek.

“As you can imagine being in the pizza industry, you eat pizza every day,” Watson said. “So your favorite comes and goes.

“One month, it will be the Greek pizza. The next month, it may be our buffalo chicken pizza. The month after that, it may be our Meat and Greet.”

When asked if he ever got tired of pizza, Watson replied, “That’s what makes pizza so unique, it never gets old.”

Holy Pie! Pizzeria also offers appetizers, wings, salads, sandwiches, calzones and stromboli, wraps, pastas and desserts.

The pizzeria’s most popular salad is the Meat and Lean, which the menu describes as a fresh cut salad mix topped with ham, bacon, smoked chicken, pepperoni, tomatoes, croutons and mozzarella cheese.

Wings are baked in a smoker. The pizzeria also has its own dough mixer and dough ball maker. Baked fries were recently added to the menu. Watson said he probably eats their chocolate chip cookies as much as he eats pizza.

A family affair

His grandsons, Brayden and Jackson, are not employed at the restaurant. But the teenagers come in and help out as needed, and it gives them an opportunity to learn a work ethic while also learning the recipes and the ropes of the family business.

On a recent visit to the pizzeria, the brothers were working together at the dough ball maker.

Watson was asked if he hopes his grandchildren will follow him into the family business.

“So if that’s where it goes... we want them to find happiness in life,” Watson said. “Hopefully, the skills and traits that they learn here will help them find that happiness.”

Holy Pie! Pizzeria is the latest in a string of locally-owned pizza places to open in Perry in recent years. Others include Home Slice Pizza, Ghost Runner Pizza, Amici, and Trattoria di Napoli, an upscale Italian bistro that features a Neapolitan pizza oven.

“The pizza industry as a whole, there’s a lot of competition that’s out there, and each brand kind of has their own little niche, whether it’s a quality dough, or you know, sometimes it’s all about the atmosphere that a pizzeria creates,” said Watson, recalling growing up with Pizza Hut, Shakey’s and Godfather’s Pizza.

“That’s why I think the market will allow the different brands to be able to coexist ... Some people may prefer a quick serve, very economical pizza, whereas some people may be, you know, wanting to go out for a dining experience to where they get the full experience of a hand tossed pizza in a brick oven.”

At Holy Pie! Pizzeria, Watson noted: “We prefer to be in the middle of the road to give a good quality product at a reasonable price and just encourage families to come together and sit around the dinner table.”

‘Let go and let God’

The pizzeria was expected to have opened in early 2025.

“With construction, there’s just so many factors that go into opening a new business in a new site because of all the inspections, all the permits that go into it,” Watson said. “We have a firm philosophy that … we can’t worry too much.

“A motto that we have is, ‘Let go and let God,’ “ he said.

Christian music plays over the speakers at the pizzeria, and a well-known Bible verse is printed on the menu:

“For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” - John 3:16.

Watson gave The Telegraph a walk-through of the pizzeria’s well-organized and space-maximizing operation, from dough making to prepping to creating a pizza for its trip through the oven to boxing the final product.

For Watson, everything about Holy Pie! Pizzeria comes down to serving God. When he gets to Heaven, Watson said during the walk-through that he wants to hear, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”

Hours are 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. daily. The number is 478-313-5150. Customers may call in to order takeout or delivery, or they may order through the pizzeria’s website.

This story was originally published October 7, 2025 at 5:00 AM.