Applebee’s Franchise Costs, Fees & FDD

Year Business Began: 1980

Franchising Since: 1983

Headquarters: Pasadena, California

Estimated Number of Units: 1,565

Franchise Description: Applebee's Franchisor LLC is the franchisor. The parent company is Dine Brands Global, Inc. (formerly known as DineEquity, Inc.). Franchisees operate sit-down, table service restaurants, including the service of food and alcoholic beverages, under the trade name of “Applebee’s Neighborhood Grill & Bar.”
Training Overview: The franchisor provides a basic restaurant management and operations program for directors of operations, other persons with development or supervisory responsibility over more than one restaurant, general managers, kitchen managers, assistant managers and other restaurant managers at a franchisee’s restaurant. The current training program for management includes in-store, performance-based, task-oriented training. The training covers the following functions: server, host, bartender, Applebee’s To Go, fry cook, mid cook, grill cook, prep cook, expo, general utility, dining room management, kitchen management and administration. The restaurant training will take 10 weeks (a work week consisting of five days), depending on the position and performance of the individuals involved. If they are a new franchisee without existing restaurants, for their first restaurant opening, for approximately eight days before and six days after they open their first restaurant, the franchisor will provide franchisees with the services of up to eight training personnel to train their restaurant employees in the operation of the kitchen, bar and dining room areas. The franchisor can offer refresher courses regarding the restaurant operation, which, at its request, the director of operations, supervisory employees, general managers, kitchen managers and assistant managers must successfully complete to the franchisor’s satisfaction.

Territory Granted: Under each Franchise Agreement, the franchisor allows franchisees to operate a restaurant at the single specific location described in the Franchise Agreement. The franchisor must approve the location of the restaurant in advance. Franchisees will not receive an exclusive territory. Franchisees may face competition from other franchisees, from outlets that the franchisor owns, or from other channels of distribution or competitive brands that the franchisor controls.

Obligations and Restrictions: The franchisor does not require franchisees to personally supervise their franchised restaurants. Franchisees must employ a leader of operations (or an individual with equivalent or greater responsibility and authority) to devote his/her full-time efforts to the restaurants in the territory. The leader of operations may be one of the individual principal shareholders if the franchisor agrees he/she has sufficient restaurant experience to perform the job. Under each Franchise Agreement, franchisees must employ a general manager who will devote his/her full-time efforts to supervising the day-to-day operation of each restaurant and a kitchen manager who will devote his/her full-time efforts to supervising the day-to-day operation of the restaurant kitchen. The general manager, kitchen manager and assistant managers for each restaurant must successfully complete the operations training course before the opening of the restaurant for which they are responsible (and after the restaurant opens, as the franchisee hires each new manager) and must successfully complete any refresher courses the franchisor requires. Franchisees may offer for sale in their restaurants only those products and services specified in the Franchise Agreement and the manuals which satisfy the franchisor’s standards and specifications and which the franchisee purchases from approved suppliers and distributors. Franchisees may not use the restaurant location for any purpose other than the operation of a restaurant complying with the franchisor’s requirements, and franchisees may only advertise locally through media the franchisor approves.

Term of Agreement and Renewal: The length of the initial franchise term is from one to 20 years. There are currently no provisions given for renewal.

Financial Assistance: The franchisor does not offer direct or indirect financing. The franchisor does not guarantee a franchisee’s note, lease or obligation.

Estimated Initial Investment

Name of Fee	Low	High
Initial Organizational and Training Expenses (incorporation, legal and accounting fees, training, site location and miscellaneous expenses)	$75,000	$82,688
Purchase of Land	Varies
Building Costs (purchase, construction, remodeling, etc.)	$1,254,046	$2,355,863
Site Work	$118,108	$230,269
Professional Services	$97,820	$143,261
Permits/Fees (See below for Liquor License)	$26,000	$28,900
Furniture, Fixtures, Equipment and Signage	$835,298	$1,348,864
Point of Sale (POS) System	$12,000	$17,000
POS System License Fees	$850	$4,000
Kitchen Display System	$1,500	$2,400
Smallwares (dishes, silverware, other utensils, etc.)	$39,779	$43,966
Initial Inventory	$25,500	$28,000
Pre-Opening Expenses (insurance, legal, accounting, personnel and training expenses)	$15,000	$20,000
Applicant’s Fee	$0	$15,000
Franchise Fee Deposit	$0	$10,000
Initial Franchise Fee (if franchise fee deposit paid, less $10,000, for a total of $25,000)	$35,000	$35,000
Initial Advertising Expense	$5,000	$10,000
Liquor License(s)	$500	$1,000,000
Apple Supply Chain Co-op Stock Purchase	$0	$5
On-Line Ordering (per month)	$65	$200
Europay, Mastercard, and Visa (EMV) Point to Point Encryption (P2P) Services	$1,350	$4,200
Wi-Fi Services (per month)	$100	$300
Wi-Fi Equipment	$1,200	$2,000
Digital Products Service Fee (per month)	$21	$100
Server Tablet Maintenance Fee (per year)	$500	$500
Implementation Fees	$800	$3,500
Menu Management Platform Fee (per month per restaurant)	$90	$180
Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Fee (per month)	$0	$150
Gateway Processing Fee	$63 per month
Guest Waitlist Management (per month)	$23	$75
BOH Reporting – food cost, labor and business analytics reporting service	$200 set up per location; $75-$400 per month (depending on modules selected)
Gamification ShiftOne (per month)	$30	$60
To Go Accuracy Printer	$550	$650
Campaign/Menu Training	$30 per year
Extra Manuals (per set)	$0	$250
Operating Expenses During First Three Months	$405,000	$450,000
POS MDM Fee (per month)	$50	$60
ESTIMATED TOTAL	$2,941,348	$5,822,933

Other Fees

Type of Fee	Amount
Royalty	Currently, 4% of gross sales.
Advertising (National Advertising Fund)	Currently, 4.25% of total gross sales. This percentage can be increased or decreased at any time.
Local Advertising	There is currently no required local advertising fee.
Applebee’s POS Software License Fee	Applebee’s point of sale license is currently $2,500 per site.  This includes the AppleONE Point-of-Sale (A1POS) and AppleONE Cards (A1 Cards) software components.
Applebee's POS Software Maintenance Fee	An annual maintenance fee of between $850 to $4,000 per restaurant is currently charged for the POS.
Server Tablet Maintenance Fee	An annual maintenance fee of up to $500 per restaurant if server tablets are deployed (regardless of the number or tablets in the restaurant).
Implementation Fees and NRO Technology Implementation Fee	$800 to $3,500
Menu Management Platform Fee	$90 to $180 per month per restaurant.
Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Fee	$125 to $150 per month per restaurant.
Compliance Audit Fee	Interest on unpaid fees (royalty and advertising fees) plus audit costs.
Creative Services Graphic Design Jobs	$75 per hour.
De-identification After Termination	Reimbursement of franchisor’s costs.
DineEquity Brands Franchisee Technology Services Support (Help Desk)	Annual subscription costs range from $1,700-$2,300 per restaurant, based on actual products supported. For nonsubscribers, the pay per incident fee currently ranges from $425 to $500. Additional services, such as network consulting, technology rollouts and menu and software configuration, are available for additional project fees.
Payment Protection Fee	$150 to $300 per month.
Digital Products Service Fee	$21 - $100 per month.
Guest Relations Chargeback	Reimbursement of the franchisor’s costs.
Independent Audit Fee	Reimbursement of the franchisor’s costs.
Indemnification	Reimbursement of insurance cost and any fees.
Insurance	Cost of insurance and any late fee.
Late Fee	Up to 18% interest or highest rate allowed by law.
National Gift Card Program Charges	Currently, 10.22% of the redeemed portion of gift cards sold in the national gift card program, but the amount may increase or decrease on an annual basis.
Personal Property Removal Fee	Reimbursement of franchisor’s costs.
Renewal of Franchise Agreement	For each five-year renewal period, 10% of the initial franchise fee at the time of renewal (currently $3,500).
Site Development	$150-$450
Supplier/Distributor Approval	Costs of sample testing plus other actual costs, such as facility inspection.
Transfer Fee	$2,500 per restaurant.
Unsuccessful Party Legal Fees	Amount of fees.
Food Safety Evaluation Reaudit Fee	$0 to $1,200

The above information has been compiled from the FDD of Applebee’s. Year of FDD: 2025.
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