# Fast Casual Concepts

Fast Casual Concepts is an Asset Manager based in Nashville, United States.

## Overview

- **Organization type:** Asset Manager
- **Headquarters:** Nashville, United States
- **Region:** North America
- **Address:** Nashville, TN, United States
- **Founded:** 2014
- **Assets under management:** Undisclosed
- **Website:** fastcasualconcepts.com

## Regulatory record

- **Reports private funds:** No

## About

John Michael Bodnar established Fast Casual Concepts in 2014 to pursue control acquisitions of early-stage, high-growth quick-service and fast-casual restaurant brands. The firm is headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee, a market that has become a hub for restaurant entrepreneurship and a testing ground for national concepts. Fast Casual Concepts targets fragmented consumer franchises and founder-led brands with demonstrated unit-level economics. Its portfolio reflects a multi-brand, multi-unit strategy rather than a single-concept fund. The firm has consolidated and scaled operations for brands including BurgerFi, Anthony's Coal Fired Pizza, and The Taco Shop, an upstart taco and burrito chain. The investment thesis hinges on applying institutional operating standards — centralized supply chain purchasing, accounting consolidation, and real estate site-selection analytics — to brands that are typically too small to support such infrastructure independently. In September 2022, the firm announced a partnership with the founders of The Taco Shop to acquire a controlling interest and accelerate the concept’s franchising and corporate-store expansion across the Southeast (per the firm, September 2022). That operating posture, where Bodnar's team often takes a hands-on management role, defines the franchise aggregation model. What separates Fast Casual Concepts structurally is its operationally concentrated model — a small, centralized team runs back-office functions for all portfolio brands, allowing individual restaurant general managers to focus entirely on throughput and guest experience. It functions more like a restaurant platform holding company than a blind-pool fund, with indefinite hold periods on brands that continue to generate cash flow and unit-growth potential.

## Sectors

- Consumer & Retail
- Food & Beverage
- Hospitality

## People

- John Michael Bodnar — Founder & Managing Partner

## Questions

### Who runs investment decisions at Fast Casual Concepts?

John Michael Bodnar, the founder and managing partner, leads all investment and operational decisions. He sources and evaluates acquisition targets directly, with support from a lean internal team that handles financial due diligence and post-close integration. The firm does not maintain an external investment committee.

### How does Fast Casual Concepts source its deals?

The firm's primary sourcing channel is founder-direct outreach to emerging, capital-constrained restaurant operators, particularly those with 3–15 units. Bodnar's operating background and the firm's reputation for preserving brand identity post-acquisition differentiate its approach from larger private equity aggregators. The firm's Nashville base provides geographic proximity to a dense cluster of Southeast growth concepts.

### What is Fast Casual Concepts' typical hold period for its brands?

The firm does not operate with a fixed fund life or required exit timeline. Its structural model functions like a holding company with indefinite hold periods, allowing brands to mature and compound cash flows. Exits, when they occur, are opportunistic rather than mandated by a vintage-year deadline.

### Which segments of the restaurant industry does Fast Casual Concepts explicitly avoid?

The firm focuses almost exclusively on counter-service and fast-casual formats with limited kitchen complexity and repeatable labor models. It has not signaled interest in fine dining, full-service casual dining with high server-to-guest ratios, or capital-intensive experiential concepts, aligning its acquisitions with franchise-ready, high-throughput brands.

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Last updated: 2026-06-03T20:00:00.000Z

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