Bookie’s Pizza claims first retail spot at downtown’s Anton Pacific complex

A popular pizza business has signed as the first commercial business in a new apartment building in downtown Santa Cruz. 

Bookie’s Pizza, founded by chef Todd Parker in 2022, will move from its location inside craft brewery Sante Adairius’ Santa Cruz Portal to a 3,475-foot space on the ground floor of Anton Pacific, a mixed-use development on Pacific Avenue. 

Bookie’s is the first of three retail spaces to be filled at Anton Pacific, which opened to residential tenants in July 2024. It’s aiming for a spring or early summer opening next year, according to a media release on Wednesday. 

“We’re incredibly excited to fully realize the Bookie’s vision in a space of our own and create the experience we’ve always imagined for our guests,” said Parker in the release. “Downtown Santa Cruz has long been the heart of this community, and we’re honored to be a part of its continued revitalization. We look forward to creating a space that adds to the energy, character, and future of this incredible community.”

Parker worked in Michelin-ranked restaurants in Europe and the United States, including five years at chef David Kinch’s three-Michelin-starred Manresa in Los Gatos, before coming to Santa Cruz as the opening chef at Bad Animal in 2018. In 2020, he started Bookie’s as a pop-up at Sante Adairius’ Midtown location on Water Street, and moved in as a permanent kitchen partner in 2022. 

His “inauthentic” Detroit-style pizzas feature a thick, focaccia-like crust with a crackling cheese crown, and are topped with rotating seasonal toppings like maitake and tree oyster mushrooms, preserved lemon and porcini white sauce, a barbecue pizza with chicken from Pescadero’s Fogline Farms, and squash blossoms, sungold tomatoes and summer squash. His vegan beetaroni pizza, with beets transformed into peppery meat-free pepperoni, was acknowledged as an outstanding dish at the Santa Cruz Vegan Chef Challenge in April. 

The restaurant will be Bookie’s “fully realized,” Parker told Lookout, with a full liquor license, private dining room, and 1,400-square-foot outdoor patio. “We may expand the menu a little bit, but we’ll stick with what we do, and that’s pizzas, salads and wings,” although he may add a few pastas to the menu. 

Guests will order at the counter, as they do at the current Bookie’s, but can reorder drinks and food with a server. “We want to be quick and efficient, but have the customer and the guest feel like they’re at a table service restaurant,” said Parker. 

The project is currently in the design phase. Bookie’s will remain open at its current location until the new spot opens at Anton.

“We’re thrilled to welcome Bookie’s Pizza as the first retail tenant at Anton Pacific,” said Anton DevCo President Trisha Malone in the release. “Bookie’s is exactly the kind of locally loved, community-focused business we envisioned when designing the retail experience for this development. As a true Santa Cruz institution, Bookie’s will serve as a cornerstone tenant that helps establish the vibrant neighborhood gathering place we are creating at Anton Pacific. We couldn’t be more excited to kick off our retail leasing program with such a beloved local brand.”

As several multi-story projects have been completed in the downtown area, they have been slow to secure businesses on the ground levels. Finding retail tenants for the thousands of square feet of new commercial space has posed a challenge for developers, possibly because of ongoing construction projects throughout downtown. It’s also been a difficult few years for retail nationally.  

In March, Gran Gelato Caffé, owned by Santa Cruz restaurateurs Sandro and Luciana Costanza, was the first business to open in a commercial space in a new downtown development when it opened in the Cedar Street Family Apartments on Cedar Street. 

FOR THE RECORD: This story was updated with comments from Todd Parker.