For one U.S. traditional Long John Silver’s restaurant, the strongest defensible public-data model produces about $10,600 to $111,100 in annual pre-tax owner earnings when normal manager compensation remains an operating expense. A base scenario is about $52,900. When a qualified owner also performs the general manager’s work, estimated owner-operator benefit rises to about $85,500 to $186,000, but the added amount compensates the owner’s labor and is not passive business profit.
This range is an independent analytical scenario, not an Item 19 financial performance representation by Long John Silver’s, LLC. It combines identified facts from the 2026 Franchise Disclosure Document with U.S. Census Bureau, National Restaurant Association, and Bureau of Labor Statistics benchmarks. Actual results can differ materially by location, restaurant format, sales, seafood and chicken costs, labor, occupancy, financing, digital-order mix, owner involvement, and operating execution.
Legal franchisor: Long John Silver’s, LLC. FDD issuance date: June 24, 2026. Item 19 status: no financial performance representation. Modeled population: one traditional U.S. limited-service restaurant; non-traditional venues are excluded because their sizes, menus, occupancy structures, and captive-location economics vary too widely. Benchmarks: 2022 U.S. Economic Census revenue, 2024 limited-service income-before-tax margin, and May 2025 Food Service Manager wages. Date checked: July 21, 2026.
Why limited: the current FDD supplies unit formats, operating obligations, recurring fees, and outlet counts, but it supplies neither Long John Silver’s sales nor a franchised-unit profit measure. The earnings range therefore relies materially on broad U.S. limited-service restaurant benchmarks and explicit analytical spreads.
Annual residual under the conservative, base, and upside model, before personal taxes and financing principal.
$1.323 million modeled revenue multiplied by a 4.0% limited-service income-before-tax proxy.
2022 Census limited-service restaurant sales divided by 271,243 employer establishments; this is an average, not a median.
5% royalty plus 5% advertising, before the digital transaction fee and fixed technology-related charges.
Down from 281 at the start of 2025; outlet movement does not itself establish unit earnings.
What does the 2026 Long John Silver’s FDD actually disclose about earnings?
It discloses no sales, operating profit, EBITDA, net income, cash flow, owner compensation, or owner-earnings figure. This is an official finding from the 2026 FDD, Item 19, pages 51–52. Item 19 states that Long John Silver’s, LLC does not make representations about future franchisee performance or the past performance of company-owned or franchised outlets.
That means no same-brand average unit volume is available to anchor a direct profit calculation. The FDD’s absence of a financial performance representation is not evidence that a restaurant earns zero, nor is it evidence of profitability. It means a buyer must treat every published owner-income number outside the FDD as an estimate unless it is supported by written records for a specific existing outlet.
The model starts with an industry revenue benchmark, but revenue belongs to the restaurant, not automatically to the owner. Food, labor, occupancy, insurance, utilities, repairs, franchise fees, technology, and other operating expenses must be paid before any residual owner benefit exists.
The Federal Trade Commission’s guide to buying a franchise explains why Item 19 is the place to look for authorized earnings claims. The FTC also advises buyers to request written substantiation for financial performance information and to compare it with franchisee experience.
How was the annual earnings range calculated?
The estimate multiplies three transparent revenue cases by three transparent pre-tax margin cases. It is a scenario calculation for a traditional U.S. restaurant, not a forecast for a specific site.
What revenue evidence anchors the model?
The base revenue anchor is $1,323,036 per establishment. This is a derived 2022 industry average: the U.S. Census Bureau reported $358.864 billion in sales for 271,243 employer establishments classified as NAICS 722513, Limited-Service Restaurants. Dividing sales by establishments produces the average. The 2022 Economic Census limited-service restaurant table provides the inputs, and the Census profile for NAICS 722513 defines the category.
The Census result covers the entire U.S. limited-service category, not Long John Silver’s, seafood-focused restaurants, franchises only, or mature restaurants only. It is also a 2022 nominal-dollar benchmark. Because the FDD provides no system sales distribution, the conservative and upside revenue cases are explicit editorial assumptions set at 80% and 120% of the average. They are not quartiles or probabilities.
What margin evidence converts revenue into owner earnings?
The base margin is 4.0% of sales. The National Restaurant Association reported that income before taxes represented a median 4.0% of sales among limited-service respondents for 2024. Its 2025 Restaurant Operations Data Abstract was based on financial and operating data from more than 900 restaurants nationwide, although the public summary does not disclose the limited-service subsample size. The National Restaurant Association’s limited-service margin summary cautions that the figures are management benchmarks, not standards or goals.
Because only one central margin is publicly available, the model applies the required sensitivity of minus and plus 3 percentage points: 1.0%, 4.0%, and 7.0%. The Association’s benchmark is treated as an all-in income-before-tax proxy, so Long John Silver’s recurring fees are not subtracted a second time. Whether a particular restaurant can absorb the disclosed fee package and still achieve a 4.0% margin is unresolved.
- Conservative: 80% of the Census revenue average and a 1.0% pre-tax margin.
- Base: 100% of the Census revenue average and a 4.0% pre-tax margin.
- Upside: 120% of the Census revenue average and a 7.0% pre-tax margin.
- Exclusions: personal income taxes, financing principal, and a separate capital-expenditure reserve are not modeled. The public margin summary does not standardize the treatment of interest, depreciation, owner compensation, or capital expenditures across respondents, which reduces comparability.
| Scenario | Revenue | Margin proxy | Manager-run pre-tax earnings |
|---|---|---|---|
| Conservative | $1,058,428 | 1.0% | $10,584 |
| Base | $1,323,036 | 4.0% | $52,921 |
| Upside | $1,587,643 | 7.0% | $111,135 |
One traditional restaurant; annual dollars rounded to the nearest $100.
Interpretation: the margin assumption drives a larger earnings swing than the modeled revenue spread. At base revenue, each 1 percentage-point change in margin changes annual pre-tax earnings by about $13,230.
Source and formula: 2022 U.S. Economic Census NAICS 722513 revenue average; 2024 National Restaurant Association limited-service income-before-tax benchmark; earnings = scenario revenue × scenario margin. Values are independent estimates.
How does owner involvement change the result?
Active operation can add roughly $74,880 of labor value, but it does not create the same amount of passive profit. The 2026 FDD, Item 15, pages 43–44, says the franchisee need not personally handle direct operation, but the ownership entity must designate a Principal Operating Owner with at least 5% equity who devotes full time and effort to supervision and operation and lives in the restaurant’s geographic area. The restaurant must also maintain a trained manager and staff.
The owner-operator scenario assumes the Principal Operating Owner is qualified, completes required training, and also fills the general manager role rather than employing a separate manager. The added labor value uses the May 2025 national mean annual wage of $74,880 for Food Service Managers from the Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics release. It excludes employer payroll taxes, benefits, bonuses, and local wage variation.
The distance between markers is the $74,880 market value of manager labor performed by the owner.
Interpretation: an owner who replaces a paid manager may receive more total economic benefit, but the increment is compensation for full-time work. A manager-run structure preserves the owner’s time but leaves the manager wage inside operating expenses.
Source and formula: manager-run scenario earnings plus $74,880, the May 2025 BLS national mean annual wage for Food Service Managers. The wage is a market proxy, not a Long John Silver’s payroll disclosure.
The base owner-operator benefit is about $127,800, consisting of approximately $52,900 in modeled residual business income plus $74,880 of manager labor value. Calling the full amount “profit” would overstate passive economics.
How much do Long John Silver’s fees matter to annual earnings?
Traditional restaurants owe at least 10% of Gross Receipts in percentage-based royalty and advertising charges before digital transaction fees. The 2026 FDD, Item 6, pages 10–13, states a 5% royalty and 5% advertising contribution for traditional restaurants. It also lists technology and support charges of up to $2,000 annually, Voice of the Customer charges of $288–$400 annually, and a digital transaction fee equal to 3.5% of Gross Receipts from covered digital transactions.
At the $1,323,036 base revenue anchor, the 5% royalty and 5% advertising contribution equal about $132,304 combined. Adding the maximum stated annual technology charge and $400 Voice of the Customer charge brings the known burden to about $134,704 before the digital transaction fee. A 20% covered digital-sales mix would add about $9,261; that 20% mix is an illustration, not an FDD fact.
The scenario does not deduct these fees again because the 4.0% National Restaurant Association benchmark is used as an all-in income-before-tax margin. This avoids double counting. The unresolved issue is whether a Long John Silver’s restaurant with its actual product mix, labor model, occupancy, and franchise fee burden can reproduce the broad limited-service benchmark.
| Recurring item | 2026 FDD amount | Modeled treatment |
|---|---|---|
| Traditional royalty | 5% of Gross Receipts | Assumed within the all-in margin proxy; not subtracted twice. |
| Traditional advertising | 5% of Gross Receipts | Assumed within the all-in margin proxy; not subtracted twice. |
| Technology and support | Up to $2,000 annually | Included conceptually in normal operating expenses. |
| Voice of the Customer | $288–$400 annually | Included conceptually in normal operating expenses. |
| Digital transaction fee | 3.5% of covered digital sales | Actual burden depends on digital mix; no system mix is disclosed. |
What does Item 20 add to the earnings decision?
Item 20 shows a contracting franchised outlet population, not a profit distribution.The 2026 FDD, Item 20, pages 52–58, reports 261 franchised outlets and 218 company-owned outlets at the end of 2025. Franchised outlets declined from 367 at the start of 2023 to 261 at the end of 2025.
| Item 20 measure | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Franchised outlets at start of year | 367 | 322 | 281 |
| Franchised outlets opened | 22 | 1 | 5 |
| Non-renewals | 15 | 7 | 6 |
| Ceased operations—other reasons | 33 | 15 | 19 |
| Franchised outlets at end of year | 322 | 281 | 261 |
Closures, non-renewals, transfers, reacquisitions, and system contraction can reflect many causes and do not prove that remaining restaurants are profitable or unprofitable. They do increase the importance of interviewing current and former franchisees about store-level sales, food and labor percentages, repairs, remodels, lease economics, manager turnover, and reasons for exits. The FTC’s guidance on evaluating franchise earnings information specifically recommends requesting written substantiation and consulting knowledgeable advisers.
What is included—and excluded—from the owner-earnings estimate?
The figures are pre-tax operating-income proxies, not after-tax take-home pay. They apply per traditional restaurant and do not represent a per-owner portfolio result.
- Manager-run pre-tax owner earnings: modeled residual after normal operating expenses and recurring franchise fees, with manager labor retained as an expense, before personal income taxes and financing principal.
- Estimated owner-operator benefit: manager-run residual plus the market value of manager labor performed by the owner. It combines business income and compensation for work.
- Debt service: not modeled. Item 10 says Long John Silver’s does not currently finance initial expenses. Interest and principal depend on financed amount, rate, term, collateral, and lender.
- Depreciation, interest, and capital expenditures: not separately modeled because the public industry margin summary does not provide a standardized bridge. Equipment replacement and remodel spending can reduce cash available to owners.
- Personal taxes: not estimated. Federal, state, and local tax outcomes depend on entity structure, jurisdiction, deductions, and owner circumstances.
- Startup investment: not treated as an annual operating expense. Item 7’s traditional investment ranges are capital requirements, not amounts to subtract from one year of sales.
The FDD’s traditional initial investment ranges from $1,092,500 to $4,160,000 excluding real estate, depending on in-line/end-cap or freestanding format. Financing even part of that amount could consume a substantial portion of the modeled $52,900 base residual. Operating earnings should therefore be evaluated before and after a buyer’s actual lender terms, but principal payments should not be confused with operating expense.
What should a buyer verify before relying on this range?
Verify actual store records and comparable franchisee experience. The model is useful for framing questions, but the 2026 FDD does not supply the same-brand sales and expense evidence needed to validate its center point.
- Ask Long John Silver’s for any written Item 19 substantiation and confirm that no later amendment changes the June 24, 2026 disclosure.
- For an existing restaurant, obtain at least three years of point-of-sale reports, tax returns, profit-and-loss statements, payroll records, delivery-platform statements, and repair and maintenance history.
- Separate traditional freestanding, in-line/end-cap, and non-traditional economics. Do not use this traditional-unit range for airports, campuses, travel plazas, convenience stores, food courts, or other captive venues.
- Ask franchisees for Gross Receipts, food and packaging cost, fully burdened labor, occupancy, utilities, insurance, technology, digital transaction fees, local repairs, and remodel reserves as percentages of sales.
- Confirm whether the Principal Operating Owner also works as general manager, how many weekly hours that requires, and whether another trained manager is still employed.
- Review every 2023–2025 closure, non-renewal, transfer, and reacquisition relevant to the target market, including why the outlet left the system.
- Model the buyer’s actual debt separately, including interest, principal, fees, covenants, and any real-estate financing.
Decision-useful earnings view
The strongest defensible public-data range is approximately $11,000 to $111,000 per year in manager-run pre-tax owner earnings, with a $52,900 base scenario, for one traditional U.S. restaurant. This is scenario-based, not official Long John Silver’s performance. An owner who also replaces a paid general manager may receive approximately $85,000 to $186,000 in owner-operator benefit, but about $74,880 of that difference is labor value. The most important driver is the restaurant’s realized operating margin; the largest unresolved uncertainty is the absence of same-brand Item 19 sales and expense data. Before deciding, a buyer should verify current Item 19 status, written substantiation, actual outlet records, and franchisee interviews that separate format, maturity, owner role, and financing.