Church's Texas Chicken Franchise Costs, Fees & FDD

Year Business Began: 1952

Franchising Since: 1967

Headquarters: Atlanta, Georgia

Estimated Number of Units: 1,535

Franchise Description: The franchisor is Cajun Global LLC. Church’s restaurants are quick-service restaurants offering a limited menu of lunch and dinner products featuring flavorful chicken, both original and spicy, with classic sides and hand-made from scratch honey butter biscuits. Restaurants may be opened in free-standing buildings, store-front locations including mall locations, college and university locations, convenience stores, travel plazas, and other locations, in either urban, suburban or rural areas. Restaurants may feature walk-in, drive-in, sit-down, order ahead pay ahead, carside to go, delivery or catering formats, or some combination of these types of formats, with the franchisor’s approval.
Training Overview: Franchisees must complete, to the franchisor’s satisfaction, the new franchisee orientation program (NFOP) before opening their first restaurant. NFOP consists of two days of workshops and seminars conducted at a facility the franchisor designates (currently at the franchisor’s corporate offices in Atlanta, Georgia). Before opening their first restaurant, franchisees’ operating principal and up to four designated management employees (the franchisor decides the exact number, which must be at least two for the first restaurant, and at least two for each additional restaurant) must attend and complete, to its satisfaction, the initial Pathway to Excellence Advanced Operations and Leadership Training Program. Currently, this training consists of 13-17 hours of classroom training and 116-154 hours of on-the-job training. The franchisor also may periodically make available to franchisees and their employees additional training programs that the franchisor, in its discretion, chooses to conduct. Attendance at these additional training programs may be mandatory.

Territory Granted: Franchisees will be granted a geographic area (the protected area) within which the franchisor will not open, nor license anyone other than the franchisee to open a Church’s restaurant during the term of the Franchise Agreement. The protected area will typically (but not necessarily) consist of an area equal to the lesser of: (1) a two mile radius from the restaurant; or (2) an area surrounding the restaurant, encompassing a population (residential and/or daytime commercial) of 50,000 people. The protected area excludes: (A) existing restaurants that are under construction or open for business and/or restaurants for which a Franchise Agreement has been executed; and (B) alternative venue locations, including transportation facilities (including airports, train stations, bus stations, travel plazas, etc.), stadiums, arenas, convention centers, military facilities, schools, colleges, universities, hospitals, recreational theme parks, business or industrial foodservice venues, food courts, enclosed shopping malls and retail centers, venues in which foodservice is or may be provided by a master concessionaire or contract foodservice provider, Indian reservations, casinos or any similar captive market location. With the exception of the protected area, franchisees will not receive an exclusive territory under the Franchise Agreement and the franchisor may establish other franchised or company-owned restaurants outside of the protected area that may compete with the location.

Obligations and Restrictions: Franchisees must designate and retain an individual to serve as the “operating principal.” Unless waived in writing by the franchisor, the operating principal must meet six criteria detailed in the Franchise Disclosure Document. Franchisees must designate a group of individuals and/or entities to serve as a “continuity group.” The continuity group will at all times own at least 51% of the voting securities in the franchise (or if the franchise is a partnership, the continuity group will at all times have at least a 51% interest in the operating profits and losses and at least a 51% ownership interest in the franchise). Franchisees may offer for sale at the restaurant only the products and menu items that meet the franchisor’s standards and have been approved in writing by the franchisor for sale. Franchisees must refrain from selling any products and menu items that have not approved or for which the franchisor has withdrawn approval.

Term of Agreement and Renewal: The length of the initial franchise term is 20 years from the date of commencement of operation of the restaurant. One renewal term of 10 years is available, subject to contractual requirements.

Financial Assistance: Neither the franchisor nor any agent or affiliate offers direct or indirect financing to franchisees, guarantees any note, lease or obligation of franchisees, or has any practice or intent to sell, assign or discount to a third party all or any part of any financing arrangement of franchisees. The franchise fee for U.S. military veterans and first responders (as established in accordance with the franchisor’s policies as it may adopt periodically) is $10,000 for their first restaurant established by the veteran, first responder or the veteran’s or first responder’s company for which the veteran or first responder owns a majority of the equity interest.

Estimated Initial Investment

Name of Fee	Low	High
Development Fee	$10,000	$10,000
Initial Franchise Fee	$20,000	$20,000
Grand Opening Marketing Funds	$15,500	$25,000
Real Estate (purchase or lease)	Variable
Site Work	$30,075	$450,000
Building and Improvements	$194,641	$692,672
Equipment and Signs	$290,000	$380,000
Fees, Misc., A&E Services, Deposits	$50,000	$150,000
Initial Training	$0	$23,000
Opening Supplies	$6,350	$12,700
Insurance	$7,500	$10,000
Utility Deposits	$10,000	$15,000
Business Licenses	$300	$600
Additional Funds – 3 months	$10,000	$20,000
ESTIMATED TOTAL*	$644,366	$1,808,972

*The estimated initial investment range covers from an end cap restaurant up to a free-standing restaurant with limited parking, dine-in and 1 or 2 lane drive-thru facilities. See FDD for more details. Range does not include a real estate estimate.

Other Fees

Type of Fee	Amount
Development Schedule Extension Fee	$5,000 for each development schedule extension of 4 months – if extending opening date and open within the extended time period, the extension fee will be credited to the franchise fee; if extending site approval date, no credit.
Royalty	5% of gross sales.
Tax Reimbursement	If any taxes, fees or assessments are imposed on the franchisor by reason of it acting as franchisor or licensing proprietary marks to the franchisee, then the franchisee must reimburse the franchisor such amount.
Advertising Fund Contribution	5% of gross sales (up to 1% of gross sales if a regional co-op has been formed, plus contribution to co-op) and at least $25,000/year.
Digital and Technology Fees	Then-current amount. Currently, approximately $205 per period ($2,665 annually) plus 5% of first party digital sales.
Transfer	$10,000
Unauthorized Transfer	$25,000
Renewal	50% of the then-current, standard, initial franchise fee.
Securities Offering Review Fee	$10,000 or such greater amount as is necessary to reimburse the franchisor for reviewing the proposed offering.
New Supplier Inspection and Product Testing	Cost of inspecting the facilities of a previously unapproved supplier proposed by the franchisee and of testing ingredients, products, supplies or goods the franchisee proposes to purchase from that supplier (could range from $0 to $5,000).
Audit (by the franchisor)	Cost of audit plus cost of travel if determined to go on site.
Customer Satisfaction and Franchise Compliance Programs	Franchisees must pay $95 per 4-week period to the franchisor and it will pass the fees for these technologies on to the vendors supplying the technology. The franchisor does not keep any portion of those fees. If franchisees are using the HME Drive-Thru Timer in lieu of the Acrelec Drive-Thru Timer, the fee will be $75 per 4-week period.
Late Payment Fee - Overdue Payments and Understated Sales	1.5% of the amounts due per month, plus $100.
Default Royalty	1% of gross sales.
Costs and Attorneys’ Fees	Will vary by circumstances.
Cure	Will vary by circumstances.
Follow-up Inspection	Will vary by circumstances.
Minimum Royalty During Temp Closure	The average weekly royalty owed to the franchisor during the 52 weeks before the closure of the restaurant multiplied by the number of weeks or partial weeks that the restaurant is not in operation.
Indemnity	Will vary by circumstances.
Liquidated Damages	Average weekly royalty fees and advertising contributions for the 52 weeks preceding termination, multiplied by 208 (or if less than four years remaining in the term, multiplied by the number of weeks remaining in the franchise term).
Supply Chain Department Surcharge	Pass-through of the franchisor’s cost.
Manager Training	Cost of training program.

The above information has been compiled from the FDD of Church's Texas Chicken. Year of FDD: 2025.
Franchise Direct's Disclaimer