For basketball legend Shaquille O’Neal, chicken is personal.
Many chains wanted him to do endorsements and it never felt right.
“It felt unauthentic, and he’s one of the most authentic human beings you’ll ever meet,” said Josh Halpern, CEO of Big Chicken, a fast casual founded by O’Neal in 2018, during a recent investor presentation.
He wanted Big Chicken to be part of his legacy and be rooted in his favorite childhood recipes without it being over the top. Fans have responded in kind. Through November, the fast casual has welcomed more than 5 billion media impressions because of customers’ “fascination with Shaquille.”
Over six years, his beloved concept has grown to 46 restaurants (49 by December 31)—24 traditional, 19 nontraditional, one in an airport, one international, and one on a Naval base. A little more than 20 locations opened in 2024 alone. According to a five-year forecast, Big Chicken expects to open 26 stores in 2025, followed by 42 in 2027, 55 in 2028, and 69 in 2029, eventually putting the chain at 272 restaurants.
There are 210 stores in the pipeline, which should open over the next eight years. Big Chicken partners with Oak View Group to open six to 12 nontraditional outlets per year.
The company has a store in the U.K. and next year plans to enter Canada (with at least three nontraditional spots in sports arenas and a franchise partner who’s committed to at least two units), Honduras (signed a 30-unit deal in Central America), and most likely the United Arab Emirates. The international growth is spurred by O’Neal’s reputation as a global sports icon. In fact, Halpern mentioned an India-based media publication that frequently covers Big Chicken’s growth. The coverage has been so significant that the chain is getting requests to open a restaurant in the country. The company believes its peak international market penetration is 10 percent of a region’s KFC footprint.
Big Chicken is close to finishing a $10 million capital raise, led by New York-based firm Branded Hospitality Ventures. The funding will be used on personnel, marketing/tech stack, and international IP execution.
“As a 6-year-old company, issues will come up,” Halpern said. “But as long as we have the right village of people all communicating together and working together to smooth out the bumps so that we can grow fast, we can be in a great position to win, and that’s really why we’re raising this capital.”
O’Neal’s popularity has allowed Big Chicken to quickly gain a national footprint instead of having to build a regional base and growing outwardly like a typical restaurant. In a recent example, the fast casual opened in Hattiesburg, Mississippi—its first location in the state—and earned $50,000 in revenue across three days. Halpern attributed that swift rise to unaided awareness from O’Neal’s reputation.
“The Shaquille PR machine drives so much trial right after that, it’s really on operations to make sure we’re driving the repeat [visits],” Halpern said. “Once you get past the awareness, the next thing is your supply chain. We’re running north of 98 percent, 98.3 percent [efficiency], which was a damn good number before COVID or any of this stuff happened over the last few years.”
The CEO admits that marketing density can be difficult in some markets. National marketing director Josh Sims—who previously served at Bojangles and has experience reaching Gen Z and millennial guests—works with franchisees to help with traffic-driving tactics and ensure marketing dollars have a wider impact. The operators are usually backed up by O’Neal, who has a major social media presence.
“Shaquille’s posting, if not weekly, every other week on his Instagram account, TikTok,” Halpern said. “He posts a bunch as well. We get enough. We get the marketing that we need.”
Big Chicken has learned hard lessons when it comes to franchisees. Some of the earliest operators are beginning to move on, which Halpern prefers. Over the years, the chain discovered a lot about itself in terms of the type of franchisees it wants, how to launch restaurants in the best possible way, and how to focus on unit-level economics. Thirty-five franchisee groups have been selected from 4,700 applications.
The company certainly isn’t having a difficult time finding people to work at stores. The number one location had around 700 applications within the first week.
The key, however, is finding employees with the right values. The same goes for the corporate level. In November, Big Chicken added vice president of operations Bobby Shaw, who spent time with Chipotle when it was still considered an emerging brand and worked with Wahlburgers, Teriyaki Madness, and Salt & Straw. There is also Sam Stanovich, SVP of franchise leadership, Tony Giardina, director of supply chain, and Marci Rude, VP of development.
“We’re trying to build an A-plus team,” Halpern said. “We’re not trying to have hundreds of people. We’re not trying to have cash burn issues. In fact, we’re burning extremely responsibly and believe that we’ll start breaking even in early 2026. The goal now is how do we build the right infrastructure to go a little bit wider to support the growth that we’re expecting next year.”
Big Chicken has also achieved an international footprint quicker than the average emerging concept. Halpern said the “where” isn’t as important as “who” the partner is and whether they’re the right fit. The CEO added that O’Neal is bigger in China and the Philippines than in the U.S.
Halpern noted that O’Neal is “massive in 50-plus countries.” He believes there’s an opportunity to go global as long as the supply chain is right and the marketing machine is working well. Halpern said it would be a mistake to hold the brand back and compares its “lightning in a bottle” rise like Dave’s Hot Chicken and Blaze Pizza.
