Food & Beverage
Taco Bell Franchise
A Mexican-inspired quick-service chain and one of YUM! Brands' three core U.S. concepts (alongside KFC and Pizza Hut). The first Taco Bell opened in 1962, and predecessor Taco Bell Corp. franchised from 1964 until a 2016 securitization financing transaction made Taco Bell Franchisor, LLC the U.S. franchisor of record. Franchised Traditional Unit count grew every year shown, though growth slowed sharply in 2025 (+142 in 2023, +157 in 2024, -6 in 2025) while company-owned units jumped from 498 to 663 that same year.
Every franchisor has to file a document called an FDD before they can legally sell you a franchise. Buried in it are the two things a sales rep won't volunteer: what you'll actually spend to open, and whether existing locations are opening or closing. That's what's below, pulled straight from Taco Bell's own filing.
What it costs to open
From the filing's investment breakdown -- not a "starting at" number a sales rep quoted you.
Franchise fee
$45,000
Total to open
$1,859,750–$4,312,200
Ongoing royalty
5.5% of gross sales
What you'd actually spend, over time
The upfront cost is only part of it. Plug in what you expect a location to bring in, and see the real total once royalties over a few years are added on top.
Defaulted to a rough food & beverage industry average, not a figure from Taco Bell's own FDD -- change it to your own estimate.
Total cost of ownership over 5 years
$2,134,750 – $4,587,200
Startup investment
$1,859,750–$4,312,200
Royalty per year (5.5%)
$55,000
Total royalty, 5yr
$275,000
When would you break even?
Revenue alone doesn't tell you this -- it depends on what's left after rent, labor, and everything else. Taco Bell's FDD doesn't disclose a reliable profit figure (most franchisors don't), so this starts from a typical food & beverage profit margin (~8%) and applies it to the revenue you entered above -- adjust the percentage to your own realistic estimate.
Defaulted to a general food & beverage industry benchmark, not a figure from Taco Bell's own filing -- this is a starting point to adjust, not a promise about what franchisees actually make.
At that profit, you'd break even in about
23.2–53.9 years
Weigh that payback period against what you already know: Taco Bell is currently losing locations. A long payback period on a shrinking brand is a very different bet than the same payback period on a growing one.
Is Taco Bell actually growing?
Franchisors have to report, every year, how many locations opened, closed, or changed hands. Most franchise sites never show you this. Here it is:
Locations opened vs. closed, by year
ShrinkingFrom Item 20 of Taco Bell's FDD, the section franchisors use to disclose real openings and closings.
| Year | Franchised units, start | Franchised units, end | Net change |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2023 | 7,056 | 7,198 | +142 |
| 2024 | 7,198 | 7,341 | +157 |
| 2025 | 7,341 | 7,335 | -6 |
Most recent year (2025): lost 6 franchised units, ending the year at 7,335 total.
What you're actually signing up for
The cost and growth numbers above are only part of the picture. These three FDD items are the ones a prospective franchisee tends to weigh most heavily once they're past the sticker price.
Training & ongoing support (Item 11)
For a franchisee's first Unit (and any Unit in New York City's five boroughs), Taco Bell can require a Development Services Agreement with affiliate YRSG for construction services ($25,000) plus ADA inspection costs and optional real estate services ($10,000); an All Access Fee ($750/year) and per-digital-transaction fees ($0.19) fund the MYTACOBELL ordering/technology platform.
Territory protection (Item 12)
The Franchise Agreement grants no territorial protection or exclusivity of any kind -- Taco Bell can register and open other Units as close as it chooses, and franchisees have no right to prevent it, regardless of proximity to an existing Unit.
Renewal & termination terms (Item 17)
Initial term is 25 years for a new Traditional Unit (10 years for In-Line/End-Cap, 20 years if converting an existing non-Taco-Bell building). There is no renewal right under the standard Franchise Agreement -- continuing past the initial term requires qualifying for a Successor FA (20-year term for Traditional Units) under Taco Bell's then-current requirements, including a successor fee and possible materially different terms.
How Taco Bell compares to other Food & Beverage franchises
Across the 28 food & beverage franchises we've hand-verified so far, the typical range to open runs $837,269–$2,125,953, with royalties averaging around 5.7% of gross sales (based on the 25 of them that charge a flat %-of-revenue royalty).
$617,800–$2,170,000 · 6% royalty
Slim Chickens$1,188,900–$4,944,000 · 5% royalty
Ziggi's Coffee$315,830–$2,093,361 · 6% royalty
Crumbl$848,566–$1,472,533 · 8% royalty
Little Caesars$376,500–$1,769,200 · 6% royalty
Jamba$480,850–$941,300 · 6% royalty
Tropical Smoothie Cafe$300,000–$720,500 · 6% royalty
Playa Bowls$188,675–$636,458 · 6% royalty
Kona Ice$114,730–$228,601 · non-%-of-revenue royalty
Firehouse Subs$166,671–$950,351 · 6% royalty
Wingstop$310,400–$1,048,500 · 6% royalty
Jersey Mike's Subs$436,176–$1,162,228 · 6.5% royalty
Dunkin'$532,400–$1,832,500 · 5.9% royalty
Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen$1,222,045–$3,923,245 · 5% royalty
Del Taco$1,461,200–$3,313,500 · 5% royalty
Blaze Pizza$757,000–$1,297,100 · 5% royalty
Church's Texas Chicken$1,202,400–$1,886,300 · 5% royalty
MOD Pizza$924,732–$1,220,633 · 5% royalty
Twin Peaks$2,959,000–$5,734,000 · 5% royalty
McDonald's$1,470,500–$2,642,000 · 5% royalty
Subway$263,000–$630,000 · 8% royalty
Domino's Pizza$231,450–$743,500 · 5.5% royalty
KFC$2,107,575–$4,155,000 · 5% royalty
Burger King$2,039,200–$4,730,600 · 4.5% royalty
Chick-fil-A$317,521–$3,463,155 · non-%-of-revenue royalty
Penn Station$507,500–$858,750 · non-%-of-revenue royalty
Nekter Juice Bar$243,155–$647,160 · 6% royalty
Keep going
- Taco Bell and Burger King are both food & beverage franchises; Taco Bell's total investment starts about $179,450 lower than Burger King's. Burger King Franchise
- Taco Bell and KFC are both food & beverage franchises; Taco Bell's total investment starts about $247,825 lower than KFC's. KFC Franchise
Where this came from: Taco Bell only files a Net Worth/Experience Exemption notice, not a full FDD, with California DFPI, so this entry is sourced from Minnesota's CARDS registry instead: Clean FDD issued March 26, 2026 (MN File No. 7887, filed 3/27/2026, effective in Minnesota 4/9/2026), Traditional Unit FDD. Item 5: $45,000 initial franchise fee for a new Traditional Unit ($25,000 for a new In-Line/End-Cap). Item 6: 5.5% royalty ("Period Franchise Fee") plus a 4.25% Marketing Fee, both on the Unit's Gross Sales. Item 7: $1,859,750-$4,312,200 TOTAL for a Traditional Unit. Item 20 Table 1 franchised Unit rows above; company-owned units grew from 464 to 483 (2023), 483 to 498 (2024), then jumped to 663 in 2025 -- a real recapture/refranchising shift, not a parser artifact. hqLocation is Taco Bell's actual headquarters (1 Glen Bell Way, Irvine, CA) pulled from the FDD's own Item 1 text -- an earlier automated pass on this filing mis-parsed the FTC's Washington, D.C. boilerplate address as the HQ; corrected here. You can pull the same filing yourself from the California DFPI's public franchise search. Filed 2026-04-09. None of this is investment advice -- get the franchisor's current FDD and talk to a real attorney or accountant before you sign anything.
If you see a different unit count elsewhere: franchisors only have to refile their FDD annually, so the numbers here can run 6–18 months behind a franchisor's own real-time marketing claims -- which often aren't independently verified, and sometimes count signed-but-not-yet-open locations. A gap isn't necessarily an error on either side; it's two different snapshots in time from two different sources.