Avellino's was first established in Calgary, Alberta, in 2004 by founder Roberto Aurigemma. Roberto, being Italian, grew up eating mortadella and genoa salami sandwiches on fresh baked baguettes for lunch everyday. His Mama making home made roasted red peppers and marinated eggplant was always a delicious sandwich topping that Roberto couldn't resist.
As Roberto got older and started to buy his own lunches he soon realized that his favourite mortadella and genoa salami sandwich with roasted red peppers and eggplant was very hard to find, in fact there was no where in Calgary that offered his favourite sandwich and a classic ham and cheese sandwich was just not the same. Soon after high school Roberto realized that he wanted to offer people the same quality sandwiches he grew up eating, and that’s when he decided to pursue and open a Panini business called Avellino’s. Avellino is a town in Italy where Roberto’s Papa was born and raised and thought it was a great name to call his Panini business he was soon to open. In 2006, Roberto opened his doors and in no time it was evident that people loved the quality sandwiches Avellino’s had to offer.
In 2009, Roberto and wife Diana Aurigemma thought it would be a fantastic idea to offer healthier choices to people. That’s when they decided to include a custom-made salad bar where people could choose from 3 different types of lettuce, choices of protein, over 30 fresh toppings, a variety of dressings to choose from and we would toss it for them. Diana always disliked when she would buy a salad and by the time she had put the dressing on and tried to mix the salad, half of her salad would be on the table and her salad was still not evenly tossed. Tossing customers salads was a must! When the custom salad bar line was launched, Roberto and Diana were amazed at how popular it became. Who knew salads would be such a huge hit?
