Quick Service Restaurant Feasibility Study in Idaho

Quick service near the top of Idaho's list

Limited-service restaurants rank 2 of 39 among Idaho's own SBA classes, even though Idaho ranks only 35 of 54 among states for quick service. Idaho lenders approved 155 such loans worth $73.3 million in FY2017 to FY2026. A 0.72x location quotient means quick service takes a smaller slice of Idaho's lending than of the country's, and the median loan of $318,900 sits at 1.03x the national class median. Nothing in the cell clears our screen.

Franchises and regional banks

Franchise units are 54.2% of Idaho's quick-service loans, so a typical borrower is opening or buying a branded unit. The middle half spans $120,250 to $572,900. SBA 7(a) carries 138 approvals and SBA 504 carries 17. Glacier Bank holds 23 loans for $8.2 million and Idaho Central CU 18 for $7.0 million; Zions Bancorporation, National Association has 11 for $8.8 million, The Huntington National Bank 8 for $2.0 million and Columbia Bank 8 for $1.1 million. Among development companies, Capital Matrix, Inc. has 8 loans worth $5.2 million. Ada County leads with 55 approvals, Kootenai has 34 and Canyon 18.

Idaho outcomes

Losses are real but moderate. Idaho quick-service loans funded across FY2017 to FY2021 total 65, and 6.2% or more are charged off, 3.1% inside five years. Approvals later cancelled account for 9.8% of the FY2017 to FY2024 Idaho book at minimum, 10.6% at most. FY2025 brought 21 approvals worth $14.3 million, more dollars than any earlier Idaho year shown here.

A quick-service study in Idaho has to satisfy a franchisor's site criteria and a lender's coverage test at once. Demand starts with the trade area around the pad: traffic counts, daypart patterns and the drive-through and counter competitors already there. Cost includes the brand's prototype building or a leasehold build-out, equipment and franchise fees, all priced rather than estimated. Coverage should be run on unit-level sales benchmarked against the brand's existing units, net of royalties and advertising fund contributions, with a weaker second-year case. If the borrower owns the pad, the appraisal will treat it as single-tenant net-lease real estate, and the study should support a rent the site could carry for another operator.

The record shows SBA-guaranteed lending alone, classed by the borrower's own code, so a franchisee funded conventionally does not appear in Idaho's numbers; every rate is a floor.