Bankrupt fried chicken chain franchisee closes more locations

Diners parked successful drive-thru lines astatine Raising Cane's Chicken Fingers oregon Chick-fil-A restaurants are helping to thrust the popularity of the fried chickenhearted fast-food industry.

Fried chickenhearted eating chains were the astir fashionable subsector of the fast-food manufacture successful 2025, arsenic postulation to chickenhearted concepts roseate 3% for the twelvemonth ending September 2025, portion each concepts dropped 1% compared to the erstwhile year, according to marketplace probe firm Circana.

Despite the sector's popularity, large fried chickenhearted concatenation franchisees operating Popeyes restaurants are filing for bankruptcy extortion and closing locations.

Popeyes franchisee Liberty Restaurants Holdings, which operates Popeyes restaurants successful Upstate New York, closed a determination successful Cicero, N.Y. connected April 30, 2026," Syracuse.com reported, and 1 successful Oswego, N.Y., connected March 15, 2026, the store's erstwhile manager Mike Ward confirmed to WSYR.

Popeyes franchisee closes shops

And present large Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen franchisee Sailormen Inc., which operated astir 130 fried chickenhearted locations erstwhile it filed for bankruptcy successful January 2026, has won a judge's support to merchantability 97 of its restaurants to 5 buyers for a full of $16.55 million, according to tribunal papers.

The franchisee, however, mightiness beryllium forced to cull the leases of astir 33 locations it could not merchantability and permanently adjacent them.

Sailormen sells locations

Sailormen won Judge Robert A. Mark's support successful the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Florida successful Miami connected June 23 to merchantability 50 Florida Popeyes locations to Pulse Restaurant Group LLC for $2.69 million, 23 Orlando-area restaurants to RFI Ventures LLC for $2.5 million, 16 Miami-area stores to Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen Inc. for $9.6 million, 5 Savannah, Ga., locations to SBH Foods PLK LLC for $650,000, and 3 West Palm Beach, Fla.-area restaurants to 61 Biscuits LLC for $1.11 million, according to tribunal orders.

The debtor besides won tribunal support connected June 24 to cull 18 edifice leases, consisting of 15 locations successful Florida and 3 successful Georgia. The income and lease rejections screen 115 restaurants, leaving astir 15 remaining restaurants that the franchisee could not merchantability to beryllium closed and their leases rejected.

Debtor rejects edifice leases

Sailormen Inc., which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection connected Jan. 15, 2026, submitted a question successful January successful the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Florida to cull 17 leases retroactively to Jan. 15 aft closing 8 locations connected Jan. 19, 5 locations connected Jan. 20, and 4 locations connected Jan. 22, according to tribunal papers.