How Freddy's is putting its private equity partnership to work

Breaker box doors. That’s how the conversation with Chris Dull starts as we sit down for an interview during the Restaurant Finance & Development Conference. Supply chain disruptions are everywhere, but it’s an inability to get doors for circuit breaker boxes that’s holding up new restaurant openings for Freddy’s Frozen Custard & Steakburgers, where Dull is CEO.

“We’re investing our own capital right now … we’re buying equipment right now” in anticipation of more shortages, he said, so heading into 2022 franchisees can then purchase equipment from corporate when they’re ready to open, avoiding delays.

“We’ll probably take a loss,” continued Dull, “but it behooves all of us to get these restaurants open.”

Freddy’s is a franchise founded on an “overarching desire to do good,” said Dull, which is one of the reasons he took the chief executive post in May following the company’s sale to St. Louis-based Thompson Street Capital Partners.

Read more: Franchise Times