05
What the range hides
Why Item 7 low and high totals can differ because of site condition, format, bundled labels, discounts, timing, and which cities the estimate actually opened in.
An Item 7 range is a pair of endpoints. The midpoint is a quoted “typical” project only if the filing says so, and the low end is the price a qualified buyer should expect only under the assumptions that produced it. The endpoints combine assumptions about format, site, market, payment timing, and operating period that can move together.
How wide the issued totals actually are
Dividing the high total by the low total shows the spread without pretending the midpoint is a bid:
| Brand | Item 7 low | Item 7 high | High ÷ low | Format |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| German Doner Kebab | $690,500 | $1,123,000 | 1.63 | 1,200–1,400 sq ft, five-outlet minimum |
| Shah’s Halal Food | $197,000 | $405,000 | 2.06 | 1,200–2,000 sq ft full-sized restaurant |
| The Great Greek | $582,014 | $1,088,560 | 1.87 | 1,800–2,000 sq ft in-line or end-cap |
| Mad for Chicken | $321,125 | $691,700 | 2.15 | 2,000–4,000 sq ft full restaurant |
| 375° Chicken ‘n Fries | $324,100 | $521,500 | 1.61 | 800–1,500 sq ft outlet |
| Döner Haus | $359,500 | $586,000 | 1.63 | 850–1,200 sq ft imbiss |
Shah’s and Mad for Chicken more than double from low to high. GDK, 375°, and Döner Haus cluster around 1.6 times. Those ratios are descriptions of the disclosed bands, not rankings of risk. A narrow band can still omit a cost that a wide band included under another label.
Shah’s $197,000–$405,000 is also the band a cheapness sort would put first, and the format statement is why that sort misleads. The table is a 1,200–2,000 square-foot full-sized restaurant. Forty-four of 58 outlets were licensed; no franchises were operating. Construction is $80,000–$160,000. Döner Haus’s $359,500–$586,000 is an 850–1,200 square-foot imbiss in New York and Los Angeles. The lower printed high is a different building, priced across a licensed national footprint. The higher printed high is the cost of the two cities on that locator.
Mad for Chicken’s FDD issued 12 March 2025 also discloses an Express Model at $243,500–$470,700 on 750–2,000 square feet, and a Multi-Unit Development Agreement at $263,500–$711,700 that is not a store format at all: it covers entering a three-outlet development agreement and opening the first outlet. Neither band is in the table above, because the line-item worksheet here is the full restaurant. Mixing an Express Model low with the full-restaurant high would manufacture a spread the franchisor did not print, and putting the development range in a column of single-restaurant ratios would be worse than that. Reading a multi-unit Item 7 is where that third table belongs.
Different spaces produce different scopes
Construction is the obvious source of spread. A compliant second-generation restaurant may preserve infrastructure that a shell needs from scratch. Landlord work and a tenant-improvement allowance can change who writes the check and when. Local labor, permit, utility, and accessibility requirements can move the project outside a generic estimate. A wide construction range may therefore describe several site conditions, not contractor uncertainty around one defined scope.
The construction-bucket sums inside the itemised filings show where the total’s width often lives:
| Brand | Construction-bucket low | Construction-bucket high | Share of that brand’s high total |
|---|---|---|---|
| German Doner Kebab | $355,000 | $680,000 | 61% |
| Shah’s Halal Food | $80,000 | $160,000 | 40% |
| The Great Greek | $260,000 | $660,000 | 61% |
| Mad for Chicken | $85,000 | $255,000 | 37% |
| 375° Chicken ‘n Fries | $108,000 | $212,000 | 41% |
| Döner Haus | $131,000 | $266,000 | 45% |
GDK’s construction high is $325,000 above its construction low. The brand’s total high is $432,500 above its total low. Construction accounts for most of that movement, and even then the $0 leasehold-improvements low is a site assumption sitting next to $150,000–$175,000 of mechanical, electrical, and plumbing that does not go to zero with it. Great Greek’s leasehold-improvements line alone is $250,000–$650,000; that $400,000 swing is within $5,000 of Shah’s entire printed high total of $405,000.
Footprint compounds the difference. The 800–1,500-square-foot outlet in 375°’s filing and the 2,000–4,000-square-foot full restaurant in Mad for Chicken’s do not need the same seating, finishes, HVAC, refrigeration, or working inventory. Comparison starts with the format statement printed above the line items. The cost per square foot arithmetic is a way to see that mismatch, not a way to erase it.
Labels bundle unlike costs
The public filings show the problem directly. Minnesota’s filed Shah’s Halal Item 7 uses a fixture package alongside a separate build-out line. A filed Great Greek disclosure puts equipment, furniture, supplies, and fixtures together. Here, German Doner Kebab separately discloses restaurant equipment, fit-out materials and installation, smallwares, furniture and fixtures, and mechanical, electrical, and plumbing.
Those tables may all be internally valid. They are not row-for-row substitutes. Adding every relevant row within one filing is safer than comparing a single “equipment” label across filings. When a package cannot be unpacked from public data, the package stays intact.
Working-capital period is another hidden axis. GDK, Shah’s, Mad for Chicken, 375° and Döner Haus estimate additional funds for three months. Great Greek estimates $35,000–$75,000 for zero to six months. A reader who treats Great Greek’s higher reserve as “more conservative” without noticing the longer window is comparing unlike periods. The working capital chapter keeps the period attached to the dollars.
Discounts and zeroes need context
A low total can include a fee discount available only to a defined class of buyer. Great Greek’s Item 7 low uses a $35,550 franchise fee; a first-time buyer pays $39,500. The $3,950 difference is small next to a $1,088,560 high total, but it is a qualitative error: the low column is not the price of admission for the reader who is not already inside that affiliated-brand class.
A $0 low value can mean the cost is not expected in a qualifying site, could be covered by another party, or is estimated as no additional payment under the stated assumption. GDK’s leasehold-improvements low of $0 and property-agent row of $0–$0 are disclosed zeros. Great Greek’s real-estate service charge of $0–$3,500 is a range that starts at zero. It is a disclosed zero, not a blank. Conversely, a brand with a published total but no line-item source here remains total-only; no rows are reverse-engineered from the difference.
Arithmetic deserves the same restraint. If a filing’s line items do not add to its printed total, report the printed total and the sum. Shah’s high column adds to $410,000 against a printed $405,000. The generated page reports that difference. Quietly changing one of the values would make the table cleaner and the source record less accurate.
Time changes the comparison
Filing years matter because labor, equipment, freight, insurance, and rent assumptions age. Great Greek’s table is a 2023 disclosure; GDK, Shah’s and 375° are 2024; Mad for Chicken’s is the filing issued 12 March 2025; Döner Haus is 2026. A 2023 leasehold high sitting next to a 2026 imbiss total looks like a ranking. It is two different years.
Payment timing matters because a project can exhaust cash before every reimbursement or loan draw arrives even when the final total fits the estimate. A tenant-improvement allowance collected after opening does not fund the contractor during month two of the build. The tenant-improvement allowance chapter treats that as a cash-flow problem, which is what the range conceals when it nets the allowance into a low construction figure.
The FTC’s consumer guide to buying a franchise recommends comparing the filing with what franchisees in the system and competing systems actually paid. Use the range as a starting hypothesis and test it against recent openings, site quotes, and a dated cash-flow model.
Halal Guys, Dog Haus, Crave Hot Dogs and BBQ, Pepper Lunch, and Capriotti’s appear in the totals directory with Item 7 ranges and without line-item worksheets here. Their highs and lows can be compared as issued totals, with filing year attached, and cannot be compared row-for-row with GDK’s MEP line or Great Greek’s restaurant package. A wide total without rows shows the spread and hides the causes.
bluTaco discloses no initial fee and has no Item 7 here. Wienerschnitzel has no Item 7 here. Those are absences of a table, not low-end openings. Ranking them against Shah’s $197,000 low would mix unlike things, the same way ranking a three-month reserve against a six-month reserve would.
Read the high end as exposure under the franchisor’s assumptions. Read the low end as a conditional endpoint. Then write down which conditions the real project satisfies: filing year, format, and which wide rows produced most of the spread.