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🔴 PRIVATE EQUITY OWNED
Jersey Mike's
fast-casual · Manasquan, NJ
PE Firm
Blackstone Group
Year Acquired
2024
“Eight billion dollars for a sub shop. The bread better be gold-plated.”
The PE Playbook
- •Blackstone acquired majority ownership for a reported $8 billion in January 2025 — the largest PE restaurant deal since Dunkin'
- •Founder Peter Cancro retains just 10% equity after building the chain from a single shop he bought at age 17 in 1975
- •Plans to double store count from ~3,000 to 7,500 in five years — that's a new Jersey Mike's every 10 hours
- •Deal includes an 'earn-out' clause: full price only paid after hitting 4,000 stores — so Blackstone won't pay up until they've squeezed more growth
Since the Acquisition
- ▸Within months of Blackstone's $8 billion acquisition, customers began reporting noticeably smaller sandwich portions on TikTok and Reddit — one viral video with 278,000+ views showed a comically thin layer of meat
- ▸Employees on Reddit confirmed that individual franchise owners may be instructing staff to slice less meat to protect margins
- ▸Company insists 'nothing has changed,' but the timing of widespread complaints aligning with the PE takeover has fueled consumer skepticism