Sailormen put 136 Popeyes restaurants into Chapter 11 after a failed sale

Sailormen Inc., a Miami-based Popeyes franchisee owned by Nevada-based Interfoods of America, operated 136 restaurants across Florida and Georgia. The operator filed for Chapter 11 protection on 15 January 2026 in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Florida, reporting nearly $130 million of debt at filing.

The company had tried to reduce the pressure by selling 16 Georgia restaurants to Tar Heels Spice in 2023. The transaction fell through, leaving Sailormen responsible for the restaurants' leases as debt, inflation, the lingering effects of the pandemic and a limited qualified labor force continued to squeeze the business.

The bankruptcy filing did not immediately mean the 136 restaurants closed. Sailormen sought to keep operating while the court considered its financing, but a failed portfolio sale had turned a debt problem into a larger fixed-cost burden. The case shows why a rescue plan that depends on closing a sale needs a fallback for the leases when the buyer walks away.

The sale was meant to ease debt, but when the buyer walked away, the leases stayed, adding fixed costs to nearly $130M debt across 136 stores.

Sailormen used a proposed sale of 16 restaurants as a debt-relief plan before the transaction was secure.

When the buyer withdrew, the operator kept the leases and the operating burden instead of reducing them.

Debt, inflation, pandemic after-effects and labor shortages compounded the failed portfolio transaction.

The franchise model left a large estate of locations whose fixed obligations could outlast the plan to sell them.

A disposal plan is not a rescue until the buyer closes. Model the leases and operating costs that return if the sale fails, or the fallback can deepen the hole it was meant to close.