Piling On The Franchises
Lenny’s Sub Shop continues to expand across country with multi-restaurant franchise opportunities.
Susan Fishman

The standard Lenny’s prototype is approximately 1,800 square feet. Most of the newer units are in-line, preferably with an end-cap position.

Generous sandwiches and attention to service have helped Lenny’s Sub Shop become one of the fastest growing sub sandwich chains in the country. Recently, Lenny’s opened restaurants in Savannah, Georgia, and Mobile, Alabama, taking the franchisor to the 100-restaurant mark. In less than 2 years, the company has doubled its size and expects to grow by 100 more stores next year.

Len and Sheila Moore opened the original Lenny’s Sub Shop, a genuine Philadelphia-style sub shop, in a Memphis suburb in 1998. Lenny’s Franchisor CEO George Alvord and private investors acquired majority ownership of the company from Len Moore in 2004. Since then, Lenny’s has granted more than 600 franchises in 14 states from California to Virginia.

“When we first bought the company, we told our investors that over the first 5 years of business, we thought we would have about 500 restaurants sold,” says Linda Costas, executive vice president of real estate and construction for Memphis, Tennessee-based Lenny’s. “In the first year and a half, we already had about 600 sold. The community has really embraced Lenny’s as an opportunity to grow all across the country, and we’re growing much faster than we had anticipated.”

Lenny’s Sub Shop interiors offer TVs, music and oversized booths.

With roughly 650 restaurants in the pipeline to be built over the next 5 to 7 years, Lenny’s Sub Shop currently has 108 locations, 105 of which are franchised stores.

“We’ve felt pretty fortunate to have a broad expansion given the current size of our system,” says Andrew Bryant, director of real estate. “We are as far west as Las Vegas, as far east as Charlotte and Nashville, as far north as Detroit and as far south as Fort Lauderdale. So we’ve pretty much blanketed the country.”

Lenny’s most recent openings include Savannah, Georgia; Jackson, Michigan; Oxford and Homewood, Alabama; Clearwater, Florida; Memphis, Tennessee; and Houston, Texas.

“In most markets, we’re starting out with the initial one to three restaurants and then expanding pretty rapidly in each of those markets,” adds Bryant.

Lenny’s strongest density of population is businesses and daytime populations.

Len (pictured above) and Sheila Moore opened the original Lenny’s Sub Shop in suburban Memphis, Tennessee, in 1998.

“We love to be around business parks, universities and hospitals, but any kind of shopping center that has lots of activity during the day, especially on the weekends, is good for us,” says Bryant.

The standard Lenny’s prototype is roughly 1,800 square feet. Approximately 10 percent of Lenny’s units are in freestanding locations; however, most of the new units are in-line.

“We try to get on the endcaps of a power center or any kind of a regional center where there are outparcel buildings,” Bryant notes. “Like most retailers, we like very strong visibility and good access. We’re now putting a lot of restaurants in unanchored centers that are out in front on the road with great visibility, plenty of parking and, sometimes, traffic light access.”

Offering salads and made-to-order sandwiches, Lenny’s Sub Shop features a cool, clean, easy-to-read menu board. Customers walk up to a deli case filled with meats and cheeses that are sliced fresh in front of them and watch their sandwiches being prepared and dressed the way they want them. The restaurant format has been upgraded a bit, with three décor packages, to be consistent with some of the newer shopping centers and strip centers. TVs, music and oversized booths make for a comfortable place to sit and talk. And there are no garbage cans in the restaurant.

“That’s specifically because we want our franchisees and their employees out in the middle of the dining room talking to people and bussing the tables,” notes Costas. “So customers can enjoy their food and not have to worry about cleaning up after themselves.”

The typical Lenny’s franchisee has a lot of experience in the restaurant industry or is highly capitalized and brings on an operating partner who has many years of restaurant experience.

“We feel our franchisee selection definitely differentiates us from our competitors,” Bryant says. “We are bringing high-credit, highly motivated people to the table who have really proven to be successful operators.”

Ultimately, Lenny’s Sub Shop expects to be in every major U.S. market.

The other thing that differentiates Lenny’s, says Bryant, is its ability to drive traffic.

“We are in areas of the country where we have established ourselves and become a destination location,” he explains. “People love our restaurant and will go out of their way to come to us. We also bring an attractive, clean restaurant to a shopping center complex without a whole lot of waste or grease.”

Lenny’s ultimate goal is to be in all major markets, developing the brand across the country as fast as it can — but with significant forethought, notes Costas.

“We really want to make sure we’re not just putting restaurants on every street corner,” she says. “We want to make sure it’s controlled and smart growth.”


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