Cult Aussie charcoal chicken chain El Jannah is sold to New York billionaires for an
An Australian charcoal chicken chain started in Sydney by an immigrant Lebanese family has been snapped up by a New York investment company for almost $1billion.
Married couple Andre and Carole Estephan opened El Jannah as a single store beside a train station in Granville, in the city’s west, in 1998.
Over the past 27 years, the family-run business has catapulted from humble beginnings to a fast-food juggernaut, with the brand now operating 48 stores across the country.
Now, the highly-coveted restaurant empire has gone under the hammer for close to $1billion after a fiercely-contested auction.
New York-based private equity firm General Atlantic, which is headquartered in the United States, acquired the business after outbidding offers from Goldman Sachs Asset Management and Melbourne buyout firm BGH Capital.
It is understood the Estephans will retain a significant stake in the business and remain involved. CEO Brett Houldin will also maintain his position.
Mr Houldin would not share the specifics about the transaction, but said El Jannah is excited about the new partnership.
‘We’re delighted to have found a partner that is strategically aligned with the Estephan family, management and our franchisees,’ Mr Houldin told the Financial Review.
El Jannah’s husband-and-wife duo Andre and Carole Estephan are pictured inside a store
El Jannah is now a fast-food juggernaut with 48 locations in NSW, Victoria and the ACT after its humble beginnings as a single store beside a train station (a branch is pictured)
‘We’re looking forward to this next chapter in El Jannah’s story.’
The family-run business currently has 30 stores in NSW, 17 in Victoria, and 1 in the ACT, with two more stores set to open next month in Hawthorn, in Melbourne‘s inner east, and Woden, in Canberra’s south.
Each week, a whopping 100,000 chickens go through its franchise network, with the company aiming to expand to 70 restaurants by July 1, 2026.
Mr Houldin said in October last year his ambition was for El Jannah to have 300 sites ‘maybe closer to 500 if we can’ within the next decade.
The brand hopes to become a household favourite to vie with fellow chicken-oriented fast-food giants KFC and Red Rooster.
The auction came after it was revealed in January that the husband and wife were testing the waters for a potential sale, with international investment banks such as Morgan Stanley looking to advise the owners and broker a deal.
El Jannah’s roots go back to the first chicken shop called Awafi which was opened by Andre and Samira and their respective partners in 1997 in the Sydney suburb of Granville.
Andre and Samira’s family moved to Australia to flee Lebanon’s civil war in the 1970s.
The couple’s first El Jannah store in Granville (pictured) opened in 1998
El Jannah has set its sights on becoming a household name across the nation
The new billionaires sold their sprawling Dural home for $15million last year
After spending years working as a taxi driver, Andre decided to reignite his childhood passion for cooking and paired up with his sibling to venture into hospitality.
Samira and her husband Simon Azzi chipped in the majority of the capital with Andre and his wife Carole putting in the rest.
Awafi offered traditional Lebanese-style chicken cooked over an open pit of charcoals, with the delicious smell reportedly drawing in customers from the nearby train station and word soon spread through the surrounding suburbs.
‘People think Australians are the only ones to barbecue, but it’s normal for every home to cook with charcoals in Lebanon,’ Simon and Samira’s daughter Sindy said.
In 1998, Andre and Carole had decided to split from Simon and Samira and go out on their own by founding El Jannah, which means ‘heaven’ in Arabic.
Andre took on the administration and front-of-house side of the business while Carole worked as chef in the back kitchen.
Being a family business, agreements about Awafi’s methods and finances were informal and led to a rivalry between the new El Jannah and the Azzis, who continued on with Awafi, as the two restaurants competed for customers.
El Jannah’s chargrilled fare – served with Lebanese mixed pickles, pita bread, fries and a generous serving of its famed garlic sauce – saw it rise to the top of Sydney’s warring chicken chains.
Awafi along with Hawa, also from Western Sydney, Portuguese immigrant-founded Frangos and the aforementioned eastern suburbs-based Chargrilled Charlies have all seen success but El Jannah’s meteoric rise has outshone them.
The Lebanese chain wants to rival fast-food giants KFC and Red Rooster as the chicken provider of choice in Australian homes
‘Back in 1998, El Jannah was one of the first of its kind to offer this type of food,’ Mr Estephan told Real Commercial last year.
‘We saw an opportunity to sell a high-quality product that wasn’t already widely available and Granville was an ideal location because of the existing Lebanese community.
‘We loved seeing customers who enjoyed our food and would return with their friends and family. With our charcoal chicken as the hero and sales growing, by the end of the first year of trade we knew it would be a successful business.’
The company branched out on its second location in nearby Punchbowl in 2009, followed by other locations in its ‘heartland’ of Western Sydney.
It then moved into Melbourne with venues in Preston, Campbellfield and Craigieburn performing well.
It now has regional NSW locations in Tahmoor and Albion Park, along with a store in Gungahlin in the ACT.
The fast-food powerhouse also has its eyes set on spreading into South Australia and Queensland.
‘I’d love the brand to be all over the country and potentially go international,’ Mr Houldin said.
Recent success stories in Australia’s red-hot fast food industry include burrito chain Guzman y Gomez, which recently floated on the ASX, and Sunshine Coast founded Betty’s Burgers, which has exploded to 60 locations in under 10 years.
General Atlantic is best known in Australia for its investment in aged and disability care platform Mable, which is its only asset headquartered Down Under.
In 2023, the American equity firm also backed Authentic Brands Group – which bought Boardriders and luxury fashion brand Zimmermann – with a $500million investment.