Subway’s New Owner Faces Hard Choice on Chain’s US Footprint (1)

After winning the competition for Subway, Roark Capital Group gets a company that has made recent strides in turning its business around. But it’s inheriting a stubborn problem: the sandwich chain’s massive US footprint.

Subway’s restaurant count currently stands at nearly 37,000 worldwide, with around 20,000 in the US. That’s even after the company aggressively pared back in recent years amid fierce competition and locations in close proximity to each other that cannibalized sales and squeezed franchisees. Management shuttered more than 6,500 US locations between 2015 and 2022, according to food-service research firm Technomic. But per-store sales still ...