Original Article - Lupoli Companies

SUCCESS STORY
BUILT ON
Opened in 2012, Salvatore’s Restaurant is one of Sal Lupoli’s newer businesses in the town of Andover.
Lupoli has extended his knack for polishing
diamonds in the rough to the Andovers 18
and
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Businessman Sal Lupoli stands at an overlook on the second
floor of the Andover Medical Center & Express Care building,
which he built from the ground up on Lowell Street in Andover.
B
usinessman Sal Lupoli’s restaurant and real estate moves in the Andovers
might seem to stray from those he’s taken with the ventures that forged his
success in the Merrimack Valley over the past 25 years.
After all, he twice mortgaged all he had on ideas rife with risk.
First, in 1990, the Northeastern University graduate banked big on Sal’s
Pizza. He opened store one — of what would become a sea of franchised Sal’s — in
Salem, N.H., a working-class/middle-class city.
Then in 2003, he again risked all he, and now his young family, had to develop an enormous and largely dilapidated mill space in Lawrence, a poor city with all the problems
that accompany poverty.
But Lupoli’s Andover investments have followed a familiar pattern, moving from food
to real estate, and relying on those same instincts shaped by life lessons and marked by
good timing.
By Terry Date • Photos by Mary Schwalm
Spring 2015
19
peaks for you, you climb and climb and
climb and move on, you don’t stop.”
Solid reputation
Businessman Sal Lupoli smiles as he greets the crowd at the ribbon-cutting ceremony earlier this year for the Andover Medical Center & Express Care
building.
Three years ago, he bought 34 Park St.
in Andover’s downtown. He renovated
the property, opening another of his popular Salvatore’s restaurants in a vacant
space there. He also kept the existing tenant, the longtime local real estate broker
Lillian Montalto Signature Properties.
Then in late 2014, he put his second
imprint on the community with the new
Andover Medical Center & Express Care
building at 323 Lowell St. that he built
from the ground up — and is soon to
double in size.
The medical center, a joint venture
between Lawrence General Hospital and
Pentucket Medical Associates, was fully
occupied even before the doors opened
in December. The medical center and the
restaurant represent 200 jobs, including
120 new doctors, says Gerry-Lynn Darcy,
vice president of real estate for the Lupoli
Companies.
Now, the married Chelmsford father
of two children has plans to develop a
350,000-square-foot office and retail complex on Dascomb Road in Andover near
Interstate 93. The job growth from the
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Dascomb project alone could top 900,
Darcy says.
Raised for success
Lupoli, 48, dressed in a crisp, darkblue suit and sitting in a clean, bright
conference room with lots of glass in that
once-ailing Lawrence mill site, says his
investments in Andover are part of his
overall vision first assembled as a junior
in college with the help of academics.
The former college football nose guard,
a scholarship player who rose from humble ranks with roots in East Boston, actually traces some of his most enduring
lessons to his upbringing.
Long before his first Sal’s Pizza, his
grandparents, Salvatore and Mary Lupoli, ran a pizzeria together on Revere
Beach.
It was his father, Nicholas, who had
owned a restaurant before a heart attack
left him largely bedridden, who advised
a young Sal.
At 16, at home in Chelmsford, sitting at
the foot of his father’s bed, he listened to
the patriarch of his family philosophize
about the importance of being passionate
in endeavors, about the role scale plays in
business acumen, and about having an
impact on people.
“The greatest lesson he gave me was his
explanation and his requirement to make
a difference in people’s lives,” Lupoli says.
Lupoli credits his father with advising
him, as a college business management
student who graduated with honors in
1989, to seek the counsel of professors,
when forming his business plan.
From his mother, Jeannette, Lupoli saw
an example of hard work. A strong, petite
woman with a unique laugh, she raised
six boys while working 60 hours a week.
She instilled lots of confidence in
Lupoli.
He remembers telling his mother that
he was going to make it to the mountaintop and take care of the family.
She responded: “What makes you
think you are going to get to the top of
a mountain?”
At first, Lupoli didn’t understand what
she meant.
She went on, saying, “Sal, there are no
Lupoli’s business climb has resulted in
him leading more than 1,000 employees
and managing more than $40 million in
annual revenues.
Lupoli Company’s holdings include
those in hospitality, commercial real estate,
property management, construction management, healthcare and e-commerce.
There are 40 Sal’s Pizza locations,
and Salvatore’s restaurants in eight
communities, including Andover as well
as the Seaport and Theatre Districts in
Boston.
In Lawrence, the Riverwalk Properties
is a campus of 2.6 million square feet of
retail, commercial and residential space.
In 2003, the property had less than 35
businesses employing fewer than 700
people. Today, it has more than 200 companies supporting more than 4,000 jobs.
Darcy, Lupoli’s vice president of real
estate, says her boss puts the right people
to work in the right places, and he has
strong business instincts.
A North Andover native and Brooks
School graduate, Darcy herself grew up in
the construction business and has worked in
the industry for decades, including on the
redevelopment of the Hingham shipyard,
which included abandoned properties.
Successful developers like Lupoli have
a natural intuition as to which projects
will work, she says.
Lupoli has exercised that intuition by
seeing diamonds in the rough, seeing
potential in underused, even vacant and
blighted locations.
Longtime Andover Town Manager
Reginald “Buzz” Stapczynski says the
town has long been desirable to developers. But he says Lupoli found a creative
use for 34 Park St., and the project’s timing coincided with renewed interest in
downtown and restaurants, an interest
that Salvatore’s presence has enhanced.
Lupoli has succeeded in infusing
Andover with energy and experience,
Stapczynski says.
“The enthusiasm and vision he brings
to all his projects is infectious,” the town
manager says. “I think he was met with
open arms because of his reputation.”
That reputation is of being a trusted
professional who is well prepared to present to local boards and who brings the
right people to his projects.
He is also driven to succeed and to
move on to what’s next.
Sal Lupoli’s colleagues say his natural intuition and vision, combined with the lessons instilled by his
parents and grandparents, have played key roles in his success.
Businessman Sal Lupoli smiles as he greets the crowd at the ribbon cutting opening of the Andover
Medical Center & Express Care building.
Lupoli works long hours, rising at 3 or
4 a.m. daily, typically focusing on the real
estate side of his business during the first
part of the day and the restaurant hospitality part in the latter portion.
He values education and recently,
in 2012, earned his Master of Business
Administration degree from Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Sloan
School of Management.
Lupoli devotes time to reading —
“Soul of Leadership,” “Lincoln” and
“Daring Greatly” were among his latest
choices. He leads business organizations, including serving as board chairman for the Merrimack Valley Chamber
of Commerce, and supports charitable
endeavors, including the Leadership and
Literacy Foundation in Lawrence, making
a difference in the lives of children and
adults and the community.
He’s also a devoted family man who
coaches sports and with his wife, Kati,
is actively raising daughter Mary and
son Salvatore Jr.
All of those ingredients have gone into
bringing Lupoli to where he is today — his
good business instincts serving as the yeast
that has given rise to his successful portfolio and his upbringing providing him with
the perspective and desire to become an
agent for good in people’s lives.
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