SYRACUSE, N.Y. — Carrols Restaurant Group, Inc. (NASDAQ: TAST) today announced it signed agreements to purchase 64 Burger King restaurants from subsidiaries of Heartland Food LLC for about $18 million in cash, excluding inventory.
Downers Grove, Ill.–based Heartland Food is the second largest franchisee of the Burger King restaurant chain, according to the Heartland website.
Carrols Restaurant Group is the largest Burger King franchisee in the world with 583 restaurants as of Aug. 22, the company said in a news release.
Carrols, which is headquartered at 968 James St. in Syracuse, has operated Burger King restaurants since 1976.
The transaction is subject to certain closing conditions. Carrols expects the acquisition to close in late September or early October, the company said.
In conjunction with the transaction, Burger King Corporation has also agreed to make a cash payment to Heartland at closing based on Carrols’ commitment to remodel 46 of the restaurants, according to the news release.
Carrols is acquiring restaurants located in Tennessee, Illinois, and Indiana, the company said.
The restaurants include 27 Burger King locations in Nashville, Tenn.; 11 locations in Springfield, Ill.; 15 restaurants in Terre Haute, Ind.; 7 locations in Evansville, Ind.; and four additional restaurants in nearby markets, according to Carrols.
This transaction will expand the company’s footprint to a number of markets “contiguous” to its existing operations, Daniel Accordino, CEO of Carrols, said in the news release.
It is “consistent” with Carrols’ strategy to “enhance shareholder value” through expanding ownership within the Burger-King system, he added.
“Since our stock offering earlier this year, we have completed the acquisition of 29 Burger King restaurants, and the expected closing of this transaction will bring our total 2014 acquisitions to almost 100 restaurants. We also continue to evaluate additional opportunities,” said Accordino.
The current transaction is the latest in what’s been an active year for Carrols in purchasing restaurants.
Carrols on July 17 announced it had signed an agreement to purchase 21 Burger King restaurants from the Rochester–based Kessler Group, Inc.
The restaurants are located in or around Rochester and in the Southern Tier region of Western New York, Carrols said.
The company didn’t release details about the purchase price or elaborate on specific restaurant locations in its July 17 news release.
Earlier, Carrols on June 30 completed the purchase of four Burger King restaurants in the Pittsburgh market. The firm on April 30 had also previously announced its acquisition of four Burger King restaurants in Fort Wayne, Ind.
Carrols earlier this year completed a public offering of common stock to “position us for opportunities such as these,” Accordino said in the July 17 news release.
Shares of Carrols Restaurant Group were trading up 40 cents at $7.00 per share during the 1 p.m. hour on Friday, according to Yahoo Finance.
Contact Reinhardt at ereinhardt@cnybj.com