The owner is Greek, the restaurant is Italian. And it serves the best Chicago-style stuffed pizza in the Chicago area.

That’s saying something, given that there’s a pizza joint on the four corners of every major intersection. This restaurant is not a franchise. Not a carry-out-only place. And while it serves other Italian food - I don’t know that for sure, since I’ve eaten only the pizza.

To beat the rush weekend evenings, we order in. That is, my wife or I call about 40 minutes ahead and place our order. We arrive with our three kids, two of which head to a playroom with video games and other toys.

We put our name in with the host, who most often is the grumpy, squatty gray-haired owner-grandma. She barely looks up when you walk up to the podium that she peers over to take your name. We remind her that we’ve already ordered. I don’t think she smiles. She plays no favorites.

The service is slow, the waiters and waitresses are never around when you want another drink. You wait for your check. You wait for the box to take home the leftover pizza. It’s the place to go if you want to test your patience.

In short the restaurant violates pretty much every marketing principle of the last quarter century.

Yet, I suspect that the owners fit the profile of the rich folks in the best-selling book, The Millionaire Next Door. The restaurant mints gold, the pizza is gold.

So I wonder what there is to take away from their success, and the only thing I can think of is this: Great pizza trumps great service. That is, if your product is really, really good, then your service can be average.

That doesn’t sound right to me, but I’m stumped.

Thoughts?