Food & Beverage · registry year 2024 · HQ CT
Subway Franchise
A Doctor's Associates brand operating in the food & beverage sector, franchising since 1974. According to the 2024 FDD filing for Subway, this is an editorial comparison record; it does not reproduce the brand's current FDD.
- $117K – $263K
- Initial investment · Mid-range entry cost
- 8.0%
- Royalty rate · Above-average royalty
- 36,969
- Total locations · Large network
- $422K
- Avg unit revenue · Below-average unit revenue
FDD outlay schedule
Registry subway Subway
Subway needs $117K–$263K to open and charges a 8.0% royalty - an entry cost below the typical food & beverage franchise.
- LO $117K
- HI $263K
- FEE $15K
- ROY 8.0%
- UNT 36,969
- I19 Disclosed
- INV# #142/223
- UNT# #3/223
Same-sector Item 7 peers
Nearest Item 7 peer: Papa John's ($130K)
Same-sector Item 7 neighbourhood for Subway (registry year 2024). Listed lows only - not a profit, cost-of-living, or suitability claim. Verify the current FDD before relying on these figures. How we place brands →
Franchise Opportunity Health Score
How healthy and transparent Subway's franchise system looks, from 2 of 2 tracked dimensions.
- Network momentum -3.8% net unit growth (YoY) 0/100 · F
- Financial disclosure Item 19 disclosed 100/100 · A
Benchmarked against the 223-brand tracked corpus (p10-p90 range per dimension); a higher score means a growing unit count and a disclosed Item 19. See how we place brands.
Where Subway's investment ranks nationally
Subway's listed Item 7 low of $117K against every one of the 218 tracked franchise brands with a disclosed initial investment. Listed figures only, verify in the current FDD before relying on them.
Subway vs all tracked franchise brands by listed investment
Initial investment low (FDD Item 7), PlainFranchise brand corpus
$116,600 Lower than most lower than 65% of 218 franchise brands
Franchise brands, banded by listed Item 7 low
Each bar is a $0.001K-wide band; taller bars hold more franchise brands. The dashed line + filled bar mark this entry. Hover or tap any bar for its full count and share, and where it sits relative to this entry.
Source PlainFranchise editorial comparison registry · 2024-12-31
Investment Overview
- Franchise Fee
- $15K
- Ad Fund Rate
- 4.5%
Revenue Data (Item 19)
- Average Revenue
- $422K
- gross revenue per location
* Revenue figures are gross revenue (sales), not profit. This registry does not report operating costs or profit.
Network Size & Growth
Net Growth Rate
Year-over-year unit change
2200 locations closed in the last reporting year
Quick Facts
- Sector
- Food & Beverage
- Subsector
- quick service restaurant
- Founded
- 1965
- Franchising Since
- 1974
- Headquarters
- CT
- FDD Year
- 2024
- Item 19
- Disclosed
Important Notice · Subway
This Subway page is a registry comparison record, not a verified FDD extract. It does not establish suitability, operating costs, profitability, or expected results for Subway.
National footprint registry read for Subway
Signature read: 36,969 locations · Item 7 low $117K
Subway, a Doctor's Associates franchise, has been franchising since 1974 - 9 years after the concept was founded in 1965 , currently with 36,969 total locations (36,969 franchised, 0 company-owned; 100% of the recorded total is franchised) in the food & beverage sector, headquartered in CT. The registry records a total initial investment between $117K and $263K, recorded as a low-to-high range in the registry. A franchise-fee field of $15K is recorded separately, while the registry summary does not reproduce the full Item 7 schedule.
Royalty payments here are set at 8.0% of gross sales; the registry also records a 4.5% advertising-fund field, for a 12.5% arithmetic total. Subway has an Item 19 financial-performance field in this registry, a voluntary disclosure under the FTC Franchise Rule. The reported average gross revenue per location is $422K; applying the listed royalty rate to that reported average yields $34K as a simple arithmetic illustration, not a cost or profit estimate. This reported revenue field is not a profitability measure; operating costs are outside this registry.
Network momentum is currently negative: Subway contracted by 3.8% year-over-year with 2200 closures on the record. The percentage does not identify why the count changed or what it means for a specific location.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much does a Subway franchise cost?
How many Subway locations are there?
What are the ongoing fees for a Subway franchise?
Related reading for Subway: Understanding FDDs , Subway lists Item 19 revenue here, how Item 19 fits the 23-item FDD.
Snapshot uses the registry's listed Item 7 initial-investment low and Item 20 location-count fields. It is a descriptive comparison, not a ranking or investment recommendation.
How Subway's Item 7 and Item 19 fields are labeled (expand)
Nationwide brands with similar investment or network size
Two data-derived peer sets for Subway , both outside HQ state CT : nearest Item 7 lows and nearest total-location counts, not the same-sector roster below.
Similar listed investment
Nearest Item 7 lows ($117K here).
Similar network size
Nearest total location counts (36,969 here).
What to do with this
Subway at a glance, drawn from the same figures above.
- Subway scores 50/100 (F) on our composite opportunity read, combining net unit growth and Item 19 financial-disclosure transparency.
- Its $117K – $263K entry cost runs below the typical food & beverage franchise.
- Ranks #142 of 223 listed franchises by initial investment. See rankings
- Papa John's sits at a comparable investment level ($130K) in the same sector. Compare
Editorial comparison registry, not a source-linked FDD record. Verify the current FDD before relying on any figure.
Read our methodology - what this registry can and cannot establish.
Source: PlainFranchise editorial registry Record-level FDD source link and retrieval date pending
| Publisher | PlainFranchise |
| Sources | Public state franchise disclosure registries and FDD filings |