Dairy Queen Franchise

Dairy Queen, a Berkshire Hathaway franchise, has been franchising since 1944 - 4 years after the concept was founded in 1940 , currently with 6,800 total locations (6,600 franchised, 200 company-owned, a 97% franchise-to-corporate ratio that signals the operator's reliance on independent owners) in the food & beverage sector, headquartered in MN. Per the 2024 FDD, budget a total initial investment of $1.1M to $1.8M, roughly a 67% gap between the low and high end once site size, local market, and buildout scope are factored in. Included in that number: the franchise fee of $45K, equipment, leasehold improvements, and initial working capital to carry the business through ramp-up.

Royalty payments here are set at 4.0% of gross sales, plus a 5.0% national ad-fund contribution on top -- 9.0% combined out of every sales dollar. Critically, Dairy Queen does disclose financial performance data in Item 19, a voluntary disclosure that only about a third of U.S. franchisors make. The reported average gross revenue per location is $1.1M, meaning the typical unit pays roughly $44K per year in royalty alone. Revenue is not profit, actual franchisee take-home depends on rent, labor, cost of goods, and local demand.

Dairy Queen's network is expanding: unit count grew at a 0.3% net rate over the past year (100 openings, 80 closures). Consistent expansion usually means the unit model pencils out for new owners, but a late-cycle growth spike can also come from an aggressive sales push rather than genuinely strong store-level economics.