US private equity firm buys charcoal chicken chain El Jannah for $800m
A former taxi driver and his wife have defied all odds by transforming a single Sydney chicken store into an $800m juggernaut that has global ambitions.
A Lebanese migrant couple from Sydney’s outer west joined the ranks of Australia’s wealthiest people with the $800m sale of their fast-growing El Jannah charcoal chicken franchise.
Andre and Carole Estephan, 60 and 51 respectively, started El Jannah with a single store in Sydney’s Granville in 1998. They have pursued an aggressive expansion strategy around Australia that has culminated in a sale to US private equity firm General Atlantic in a hotly contested auction.
The chain known for its garlic sauce now has 50 stores in NSW, Victoria and the ACT, and plans to open 150 outlets across Australia in the next two years under chief executive Brett Houldin. It has expanded into breakfast menus and drive-through formats.
Annual sales for the business are now reportedly pushing $300m. El Jannah – which means paradise or heaven in Arabic – has achieved something of a cult status for its chicken, chips and tabouleh.
“It did start from humble beginnings with Andre and Carole Estephan, who were immigrants to Australia and who started the brand out of a desire to bring some food that they loved from home to Western Sydney,” Mr Houldin told The Daily Telegraph this year.
Mr Estephan, a former taxi driver, is the only shareholder of dozens of El Jannah companies registered with the corporate regulator, and 31-year-old son Charles Estephan is listed as the sole director of a string of those entities.
Charles Estephan also owns Shareefs – The Shawarma Social Club – a 1960s-’70s Beirut cafe-inspired street food restaurant in Sydney’s Concord.
The Estephan family may be headed for the ranks of The List – Australia’s Richest 250 when The Australian publishes the 2026 edition. General Atlantic will take a large stake in El Jannah and drive its expansion plans, although the Estephan family is understood to be staying on as minority shareholders and in management.
Mr Houldin is also likely to emerge with a shareholding in the new entity that will own El Jannah. He is a former executive at Craveable Brands, the franchisor behind the Red Rooster and Oporto chicken chains.
“We expect to be in Queensland with multiple sites in the next 12 months, focusing on southeast Queensland, pretty much from Noosa to the border,” Mr Houldin told The Daily Telegraph in July. “With Adelaide, we expect to be there in the next 12 to 18 months. We are just finalising plans there.
“South Australia is really our next big push. Drive-through or shopfront locations are our preferred format and we have been very successful with the drive-throughs.”
The Estephan family was originally in business with Andre Estephan’s sister, Samira, and her husband, Simon Azzi, in a chicken store in Granville called Awafi.
The couples later parted ways and the Estephans started their own shop, El Jannah.
For most of its history the business has been strictly a NSW operator, and its chickens are cooked by “charcoal masters” who are said to not be allowed to touch the charcoal until they have had six months of training.
It took more than 10 years before El Jannah’s second store opened in Sydney’s southwest suburb of Punchbowl and then it took more than two decades for interstate expansion. El Jannah moved into Victoria in 2022 with the opening of its first Melbourne store in the emerging inner-north suburb of Preston.
By then, Mr Houldin was in charge of the business, having joined after departing Craveable Brands at the end of 2019.
As well as expanding around Australia, there are plans to take the brand global.
“The founders are from Lebanon. They came to Australia and brought their cuisine here and they have a strong belief that this product and brand will do well in key markets in the Middle East,” Mr Houldin told The Daily Telegraph.
The Estephans have been trying to sell their six-bedroom mansion in Sydney’s Dural, northwest of the CBD, listing it with a $15m price guide for a 2.1ha property that comes with a pool, championship-sized tennis court, six-car garage shed and space for horse stables.
General Atlantic saw off competition from BGH Capital and Goldman Sachs Asset Management to buy the business.
It has previously invested in Australian companies such as fashion brand Zimmermann and aged and disability care platform Mable.
The New York headquartered business has more than $US118bn in assets under management.
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