This story is based on an interview that appeared on the January 2, 2026, episode of the Food and Loathing podcast.
For a few years, Guerrilla Pizza felt like a rumor that refused to die in Las Vegas. The Detroit-style pies that developed a devoted following during the pandemic years were gone from the city, but the memory lingered — crispy cheese-laced edges, pillowy interiors, and a menu that treated vegan diners with the same seriousness as everyone else.
Now, Guerrilla Pizza is officially back.
Founder Robby Cunningham has returned to Las Vegas and opened the brand’s first standalone brick-and-mortar location in downtown, marking a new chapter for a concept that began as a side hustle and grew into one of the city’s most talked-about pizza operations.
Born In A Bar, Popularized Online
Guerrilla Pizza started in 2019, when Cunningham was bartending at Artifice and experimenting with pizza at home. With no food program at the bar, he began bringing in pizzas for regulars — and quickly realized he was onto something bigger.
“Guerrilla Pizza essentially started as a fever dream,” Cunningham said. “I was messing around with pizzas at home, bringing them into work, and people kept telling me I should sell them.”
Instead of opening a restaurant, Cunningham leaned into social media. He gave away pizzas to anyone willing to post about them on Instagram, personally delivering orders within a small radius of downtown Las Vegas. The strategy worked. Word spread quickly, and by 2020, Guerrilla Pizza had become a familiar name among Vegas pizza obsessives.
The Hard Hat Years
That momentum led to a major opportunity: taking over the kitchen at Hard Hat Lounge when pandemic-era regulations required bars to serve food in order to reopen. Cunningham launched Guerrilla Pizza there in October 2020, earning widespread praise for bringing authentic Detroit-style pizza to a city where the style was still relatively rare.
At its peak, Guerrilla Pizza at Hard Hat became a destination — drawing diners from well beyond the neighborhood for square pies with deeply caramelized cheese edges and a menu that treated vegan options as equals, not afterthoughts.
To Michigan and Back
In 2023, Cunningham stepped away. Hard Hat closed temporarily for renovations, and Cunningham returned to Michigan for a summer near Torch Lake before deciding not to jump immediately back into the pizza business. Guerrilla Pizza went quiet in Las Vegas, even as demand for its return continued.
That return finally arrived in 2025, with Cunningham partnering again with former Hard Hat owner Steve Mardirossian to open Guerrilla Pizza’s first permanent home — a downtown location just off Las Vegas Boulevard in the Soho Lofts building.
Mardirossian, who had seen firsthand how Guerrilla Pizza transformed Hard Hat into a destination, wasn’t worried about opening slightly off the beaten path.
“If people went there, they were going there for the pizza,” he said. “That’s what gave me confidence.”
Expanded Menu
The new Guerrilla Pizza location allows Cunningham to do things he couldn’t fully execute inside a bar kitchen. The menu expands beyond pizza to include salads, wings, and house-made sauces, while keeping the focus squarely on Detroit-style pies baked in seasoned pans.
Cunningham is adamant about what defines the style. Cheese must run to the edge of the pan, creating a crisp, frico-like crust, while the interior remains soft and airy.
“You should be biting into a pillow that’s just a little crispy on the bottom,” he said.
Equally important to Cunningham is accessibility. From the beginning, Guerrilla Pizza built a reputation for standout vegan offerings — not as a niche option, but as part of the core menu philosophy.
“My whole philosophy has always been for everybody to be able to come in and have the same experience,” Cunningham said. “It’s not about making vegan food as a separate thing — it’s just about caring a little more.”
With a permanent home, a broader menu, and a downtown location poised for growth, Guerrilla Pizza’s return feels less like a revival and more like a reset.
After years as a pop-up, a pandemic success story, and a cult favorite operating out of a bar, Guerrilla Pizza is back where it belongs — fully formed, fully realized, and once again feeding Las Vegas.
