By Tribune Staff
One of Nashville’s top Black-owned business is expanding again, this time to Murfreesboro. Slim & Husky’s Pizza Beeria’s newest location will be 2222 Medical Center Parkway in the former location for Freebirds World Burrito, which closed in March. It will cost, approximately $1.5 million to establish the new store, according to the city-issued building permit.
“We just want to make sure that we’re in position to become that true national brand and household name that we want to be. That starts with continuing to build the foundation,” Clint Gray, one of the business founders, told the Nashville Business Journal. Gray and childhood friends and Tennessee State University grads Derrick Moore and Emanuel Reed started the business four years ago. It has become not only a statewide example of culinary success, but gotten national attention with a profile on the CBS Evening News. Their motto and mission is to “empower communities while using pizza as their vehicle to engage.”
But the secret to their success is the pizzas. They are oblong-shaped flatbreads, made even tastier by an array of toppings. Plus their names are inspired by various hip-hop artists and popular songs. One prime example is the P.R.E.A.M. (Pizza Rules Everything Around Me).
It’s a take on the Wu-Tang Clan’s “Cash Rules Everything Around Me”). It begins with a spicy white sauce before layers of fresh spinach, mushrooms, red onions, Italian sausage, pepperoni and their house cheese blend are added. In addition to pizza, the restaurant’s menu includes cinnamon rolls, salads, craft beer and wine. Slim & Husky’s recently partnered with Goldbelly to have pizzas and cinnamon rolls shipped nationwide.
Gray, Moore and Reed’s first establishment was at 911 Buchanan St. in Nashville in 2017. The second at 5270 Hickory Hollow Parkway in Antioch began in 2018. They’ve opened additional locations in Memphis, Atlanta, Georgia and Sacramento, California. Another is planned for Nashville International Airport.