For centuries, people have gathered over bread, wine, and conversation. At Postino Winecafe — opened in 2001 inside a vacant 1940s brick post office in Phoenix’s Arcadia neighboorhood — that tradition takes shape through bruschetta piled with unexpected toppings and paninis built for conversation-starting bites. Positno is one of the several Phoenix favorites from Upward Projects, the companyh behind Windsor, Churn, Federal Pizza, and Joyride TacoHouse, all built around the same idea: create spaces where people feel at home.
The Challenge
“Since the very beginning, our concepts have been rooted in the neighborhoods they’re in”, says Marisa Bigler, senior graphic designer at Upward Projects. Every restaurant is designed to honor it’s building’s history, its era, and the community around it — right down to a wall collage in Postino Montrose that pays a loving tribute to its LGBTQ roots.
That level of detail extends everywhere: the story a server shares about the building, the music on the speakers, the weight of a business card, the upholstery that holds up in Arizona sun or Texas humidity, a menu font sized to read in low light. For Upward Projects, hospitality is built one small decision at a time — and as the brand grew, protecting that consistency across every location became harder to do alone.
Why it Mattered
With seven Arizona locations (an eighth coming in Tucson), two in Houston, and three in Denver, Postino was expanding fast — and outgrowing what its previous print provider could support. “We will be at 20-plus locations in the next few years, so we needed a provider that offers a more advanced ordering platform, as well as fulfillment and shipping,” Bigler explains. Without the right systems in place, that kidn of growth risks the very consistency that makes each Postino feel like Postino.
How We Helped
Upward Projects brought on Prisma a year ago as a solutions partner to help plan for that growth. Through Prisma’s dokshop portal, Upward Projects now manages print-on-demand menus, signage, and store collateral, alongside inventory and fulfillment for items like custom menu hardware and screen-printed stickers. Curated sections for sign holders and event decor let individual locations order pre-selected, on-demand materials without extra oversight.
The Outcome
“Dokshop has been a game changer for the stores and our home office”
–Marisa Bigler, SENIOR GRAPHIC DEISNGER
Store teams can log in, order from variable templates, and route proofs to Marketing before print — putting ownership in the hands of the people closest to each location, instead of routing every request through a single department. “It encourages department heads to be able to plan and budget their print collateral,” Bigler adds
“It’s easy for our team to log in and quickly see all the materials available, select quantities, and determine budget.”
–Marisa Bigler, SENIOR GRAPHIC DEISNGER
With a platform built to scale alongside them, Upward Projects can keep opening new locations without losing the details that make each one feel distinct — and worth coming back to.
