JJ’s Woodfire Pizza in Webb City has always taken pride in giving back to the community, and the tradition continues during Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

 Throughout October, the locally owned pizza place will be raising funds for the Breast Cancer Research Foundation.  This includes giving $1 from every large specialty pizza sold the entire month of October to the cause. 

 Owner JJ Spurlin is partnering with Zeta Tau Alpha sorority for one of the Breast Cancer Awareness events, which will be a pizza buffet, with tickets soon to be sold to the community. 

Additionally, the restaurant is selling Breast Cancer Awareness T-shirts, with the proceeds going toward the foundation.

 Spurlin is also a criminal justice professor at Missouri Southern, and the restaurant’s success has roots at the University. 

In fact, JJ’s Woodfire Pizza began as an experiment with 10 students from Spurlin’s asset protection class, and he originally only planned to have the restaurant for a year. 

 “Now we’re two years in and it’s been so lucrative that it’s hard for me to walk away, especially when those kids are doing it and we’re doing so much for the community,” he said. 

What he means by lucrative is the amount the restaurant has been able to raise for good causes.  All of the profits go back into the community.

 He makes it a point to employ Southern students and said  all of the schools on campus are represented at his restaurant.