In 1963, a single Sizzler opened in Sugar House, Salt Lake City, a quiet move with loud consequences. That lone steakhouse didn’t just serve dinner, it served notice. Six decades later, that original flame is now a firestorm: Sizzling Platter, LLC, a 13,000-employee franchise force with over 800 quick-service and fast-casual locations across the U.S. and Mexico. This isn’t your uncle’s franchise group. It’s an operational machine quietly shaping the dining map behind brands you already crave.
And now? They just dropped the kind of financing that makes Wall Street pay attention and competitors start rereading their leases. Affiliates of Bain Capital Private Equity backed Sizzling Platter with a $500 million senior secured note offering, 9.5% coupon, due 2032. The kind of long-range fuel that signals confidence with a capital C. Transaction implied a $1 billion enterprise value, and let’s just say, when Bain’s in, the calculus changes. Add UBS, Jefferies, Deutsche, HSBC, BNP Paribas, KKR Capital Markets, Mizuho, RBC, Santander, Stifel, and Wells Fargo to the mix? That’s not just leverage, that’s a league.
But let’s talk real growth. Since 2019’s equity partnership with CapitalSpring, Sizzling Platter didn’t just scale, they multiplied. From ~750 units to 800+ in under two years, they didn’t ride trends, they manufactured them. Little Caesars, Wingstop, Jamba, Dunkin’, Jersey Mike’s, Cinnabon, Red Robin, and of course, the OG, Sizzler. If there’s a playbook for multibrand synergy, Nathan Garn (CEO) and Kristopher J. Cox (CFO) didn’t just write it, they digitized it, optimized it, and rolled it out across 35 states and deep into Mexico.
This is more than restaurant ops, it’s infrastructure. With Kalibrate’s location-intelligence layered into site selection and AWS-native tech pushing real-time analytics, Sizzling Platter built a centralized engine that makes legacy ops look like cassette tapes. Unified dashboards. API pipelines. PCI compliance baked in. Their tech stack doesn’t just support the business, it scales it with surgical precision.
What’s next? 1,000 units by 2027. Expansion in the Southeast and deeper urban clusters in Mexico. A unified mobile ordering system and AI-powered forecasting already queued. Add 200 hires across tech and development, and you’re looking at a full-court press on future-proofing every layer of the operation.
This is what happens when a company stops asking how to keep up and starts deciding where the market goes next. Respect to Nathan Garn, Kristopher J. Cox, and the entire Sizzling Platter team. You took a neighborhood steakhouse and turned it into a billion-dollar blueprint for modern franchise growth.
Still hungry? You’re not alone.
