 | |
| Company type | Private subsidiary |
|---|---|
| Industry | Restaurant |
| Founded | 1972 |
| Headquarters | Nashville, Tennessee |
Area served | United States |
| Products | Country style food |
| Parent | Captain D's |
| Website | grandys |
Grandy's Country Cookin' (shortened to Grandy's) is a homestyle cooking and comfort food restaurant chain based in Nashville, Tennessee.
Walter E. Johnson and Rex E. Sanders had met working together as teenagers at a restaurant in Oak Cliff, Dallas. In the early 1960s, they opened a fried chicken stand on Grand Avenue, which expanded. In 1969, Host International purchased the 14 outlets to use for their expansion of Jim Dandy Fried Chicken. After launching and selling a successful chain of restaurants, the two young men created Grandy's, hoping to combine the efficiency of fast food with the ambiance of a full-service restaurant. Johnson and Sanders waited until a non-compete clause before renaming the chain to Grandy’s in 1977. [1]
Under the ownership of Saga Foods, Inc. a multi-concept restaurant firm who acquired Grandy's in 1983, [2] Grandy's experienced its greatest growth surge, primarily in the 1980s, having at its zenith almost 200 stores. A buyout of Saga by Marriott Corporation led to a sell off of the Grandy's chain, along with other concepts owned by Saga, to American Restaurant Group. [3] In the late 1990s, Grandy's, now over 20 years old, began to close older locations and remote markets that were underperforming. They retreated to the core markets of Texas and Oklahoma with a strong presence in southern Indiana and northern Kentucky.
In 2000, American Restaurant Group sold Grandy's and three other subsidiaries to Spectrum Restaurant Group. [4] [5]
In July 2004, Steve Butts and Brian Bowen left Grandy's, leaving the restaurant chain without an executive to lead the chain. Monty Whitehurst took over, without experience running a restaurant chain. Within 12 months, the chain lost 18 stores and same store sales dropped 32%. Also under Whitehurst, many of Grandy's locations were exposed on local television stations for failing health inspections. This caused sales to drop and closing a number of units[ citation needed ].
Spectrum filed for bankruptcy in 2006 and put Grandy's up for sale. [6] Souper Salad acquired Grandy's in 2007. [7] Souper Salad filed for bankruptcy in 2011. [8]
On December 19, 2011, Grandy's was acquired by Captain D's for an undisclosed amount.[ citation needed ]
In 2013 several of the restaurants were shut down due to failed health inspections. In September 2016, USRP closed eight stores by not renewing leases that Grandy's, Inc. signed in 1996.
In 2018, the original chicken restaurant in Denton, Texas that the founders opened and rebranded as the second Grandy's closed. This left the city of Denton without a Grandy's.
As of May 2019, Grandy's had 38 restaurants, almost half being in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex. In December 2020, the original location in Lewisville, Texas closed, leaving a total of 27 restaurants. By October 2021, that number had fallen to 24, franchised across six states. [9] As of April 2024, the company operates 23 locations in Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas. A location opened in Murfreesboro, Tennessee in 2020 but closed 6 months later. [10]
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