Papa John's tops list of 100 best small companies in US

Nation's Restaurant News, June 6, 1994

NEW YORK--Papa John's International, based in Louisville, Ky., ranked first among a group of 100 diverse corporations hailed by Business Week magazine as "the best small companies in America."

In all, six restaurant companies were on the list: The others were Cheesecake Factory, Calabasas, Calif.; Eateries Inc., Oklahoma City; Taco Cabana, San Antonio; Landry's Seafood Restaurants, Houston; and Pollo Tropical, Miami.

All of the selected companies fulfilled a number of operational and financial criteria to make the 1994 ranking.

BusinessWeek selected the best 100 small companies from a starting pool of 9,000 publicly held companies. To qualify companies had to have annual sales more than $10 million but less than $150 million, a market value greater than $1 million and stock price higher than $2 per share.

companies made it on the list according to three-year results in sales growth, earnings growth, return on invested capital and market capitalization.

The Louisville, Ky.-based Papa John's, at No. 1, over a three-year span had a rate-of-sales growth of 108 percent, to $89.2 million; earnings were up 117.2 percent, to $4.9 million; and its market cap was $238 million. Landry's Seafood was the second-highest-ranked restaurant company at No. 26. Landry's sales grew 28.8 percent over the past three years, to $34.2 million; earnings were up 112.2 percent, to $3.8 million; and its market cap is $136 million.

Pollo Tropical, Miami, was the third-highest-ranked restaurant company at 35, with a three-year rate of sales growth at 81 percent, to $23.1 million; a three-year earnings rate of growth of 120 percent, to $1.9 million; and a market cap of $108 million.

The standings of the remaining three restaurant companies on the best-small-companies list were Taco Cabana, at 61; The Cheescake Factory, at 69; and Eateries Inc., at 85.