“Shaq bought 155 Five Guys for less than $100 million”: How the Lakers legend invested in a fast-food chain with hundreds of millions of dollars

Shaq knew what to do when it came to securing a financially successful retirement, with buying Five Guys chains being one of his moves. 

Shaq was told at college that big guys don’t sell during a business-centric lecture after he came up with merchandise revolving around him. The eventual NBA Hall-of-Famer took this constructive criticism and actually tried to work his way around it. His solution? Big guys may not sell but funny guys most certainly will. 

Despite earning hundreds of millions of dollars during his 19th year playing career, Shaquille O’Neal knew that generational wealth came from smart investments. These investments revolved around sectors of the business world that weren’t related to basketball in the slightest.

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Everything from pizza joints to burger chains, ‘The Big Aristotle’ made sure he wasn’t the smartest guy in the room and was instead surrounded by people smarter than him to make better decisions than he would. 

One such decision was him owning well over 100 chains of the popular fast-food franchise, Five Guys in North America. 

Shaq invested tens of millions of dollars in Five Guys chains. 

Shaq seems to be quite interested in investing in consumable products/services as over the years, he’s purchased 155 total chains of ‘Five Guys’ all across North America. This comes to about 10% of all Five Guys restaurants in existence. 

According to franchisehelp.com, the investment required for opening up a chain of your own is anywhere between $306,200 and $716,250. The median for this range is $511,225. If we were to use this figure for every single one of the 155 chains O’Neal opened, his investment would come to $79.2 million.

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While this is quite the large number, it pales in comparison to the expected profits a franchisee owner will make annually. It is expected that the owner would make up to $1.2 million off one chain in a year. Multiply that by 155 and Shaq is most definitely making his money with no hiccups along the way.