Zaxby's franchise: what it costs
Opening a Zaxby's restaurant costs $1,445,000 to $3,810,500, based on its 2025 Franchise Disclosure Document (FDD), the paperwork a brand must give you ahead of any purchase.
Zaxby's franchise costs, one item at a time
- Full cost of opening
- $1,445,000 to $3,810,500 Item 7, 2025 FDD
- Franchise fee you pay one time at the start
- $35,000 Item 5, 2025 FDD
- Royalty, your ongoing payments to the brand
- From gross sales: 6% Item 6, 2025 FDD
- Marketing fund, which covers shared advertising
- From gross sales: 1.5% Item 6, 2025 FDD
- Figures on sales or earnings
- $2,782,488 a year on average across 776 locations it counts, before costs Item 19, 2025 FDD
- Location count at the close of 2024
- Franchise owners ran 826; the company ran 143 Item 20, 2025 FDD
Each figure here comes from the 2025 Zaxby's Franchise Disclosure Document, a filing by Zaxby's SPE Franchisor LLC at the Minnesota Department of Commerce, dated April 25, 2025. Each small label points to the numbered part of the FDD where that figure sits.
Sales and earnings numbers in the Zaxby's FDD
Figures from Zaxby's appear in Item 19, the FDD section where a brand may give sales or earnings for its locations. The main figure is sales averaging $2,782,488 a year, drawn from 776 franchised restaurants open throughout 2024. It is money the store takes in, not profit, because rent, wages and every other cost get paid from it.
Before you rely on any figure in it, our guide shows the way to read an Item 19.
Other chicken franchises next to Zaxby's
Opening a Zaxby's costs more than most of the chicken franchises on this site; the middle one starts at $1.19M.
| Brand | Total cost to opentotal, lowest to highest | Upfront feeone-time fee | Royaltyongoing, usually a % of sales | Sales or earnings showndoes the brand show sales figures | Year filed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chick-fil-A | $318K to $3.46M | $10,000 | 15% + 50% of profit | Yes | 2026 |
| Chicken Salad Chick | $777K to $999K | $50,000 | 5% | Yes | 2026 |
| Dave's Hot Chicken | $824K to $4.12M | $40,000 | 6% | No | 2026 |
| Slim Chickens | $1.19M to $4.94M | $30,000 | 5% | Yes | 2026 |
| Popeyes | $1.22M to $3.92M | $50,000 | 5% | Yes | 2026 |
| Zaxby's | $1.45M to $3.81M | $35,000 | 6% | Yes | 2025 |
| KFC | $2.11M to $4.16M | $45,000 | 5% | Yes | 2026 |
Before you buy, a brand has to hand over its Franchise Disclosure Document (FDD); the brand's latest one is where every figure comes from. After opening, you keep paying a royalty to the brand: a share of sales or a set amount. And "Sales or earnings shown" indicates if the brand reveals what its locations take in. A K stands for thousand, an M for million. The filing year is the year that FDD was listed with the Minnesota Department of Commerce.
All chicken franchises, side by side
The number of Zaxby's locations
At the end of 2024, Zaxby's had 969 locations in the United States, with franchise owners running 85% of them (Item 20). In that same part of the FDD, you get phone numbers for owners still running stores and ones who left. Your best way to learn how these costs play out in real life is to call a few of them.
Get the Zaxby's FDD read by a franchise attorney
Before you sign, one franchise attorney can go through the Zaxby's FDD and franchise agreement with you.