One private-equity firm controls more than a dozen of the biggest restaurant chains
- The restaurant chains Subway, Arby's, and Buffalo Wild Wings have a common owner.
- Roark Capital Group has been buying up restaurant chains for nearly 25 years.
There's a good chance that just one private-equity firm owns one of your favorite restaurant chains.
Over the past quarter century, Roark Capital Group has bought up nearly 20 restaurant brands in the US. Its latest acquisition came last year when it acquired Subway, which operates more stores than any other restaurant chain in the US.
But Roark's holdings include other restaurants that you've probably visited before:
Other notable Roark restaurant holdings include the coffee chain Dunkin', Arby's, Jimmy John's, Buffalo Wild Wings, and the suburban-mall favorites Cinnabon and Auntie Anne's.
The private-equity firm also has investments in The Cheesecake Factory, which is publicly traded, and the Midwestern burger chain Culver's. And it owns the bakery chain Nothing Bundt Cakes and some franchises of Seattle's Best, that coffee chain you used to find at Borders bookstores.
Founded in 2001, the Atlanta-based Roark has $38 billion in assets under management, according to its website.
The firm "was named after Howard Roark, the protagonist in Ayn Rand's book The Fountainhead," the firm's website says. Rand's books have a following among libertarians and other advocates of deregulation and individual enterprise.
But the website adds: "As a firm of diverse viewpoints, it does not signify adherence to any particular political philosophy."
While Roark owns a lot of restaurant brands, it's hardly the only private-equity player in the industry.
Hooters was acquired by TriArtisan Capital Advisors and Nord Bay Capital in 2019, for instance. TriArtisan also owns TGI Fridays and P.F. Chang's, according to its website.
Restaurants aren't the only consumer brands that have become more consolidated under a handful of owners. A small group of multinational corporations, including Nestlé and Mars, own hundreds of food and personal-care brands.