Two California-born chains, Fatburger and Round Table Pizza, have quietly gone dark at the Marketplace shopping center along the I-35 corridor in New Braunfels, less than two years after both opened. Handwritten and printed notices now cover the windows and doors, leaving two empty spaces in one of the city's busiest retail strips.
Notices on the doors
Paper signs and handwritten messages on the front doors thank customers and confirm the shutdowns, with Fatburger's window marked in thick marker and Round Table posting a printed note to patrons, according to MySA. The neighbors opened side-by-side in late 2024 as part of an expansion by parent company FAT Brands. The notices steer customers to other area locations but do not offer any explanation for the closures.
How they arrived
Fatburger launched at the MarketPlace complex in mid-November 2024 as a dual Fatburger–Buffalo’s Express setup at 675 Business Loop I-35, and the New Braunfels restaurant was promoted as the chain's 10th Texas location, according to Express-News. Round Table had opened the month before as part of the same FAT Brands growth push into Texas, with company materials at the time casting the region as a key piece of a broader statewide rollout.
Parent company in Chapter 11
FAT Brands, the franchiser behind both concepts, filed voluntary Chapter 11 petitions in Texas earlier this year as it works to restructure securitized and other debts, according to the Wall Street Journal. The company has said its brands are expected to keep operating while it pursues a reorganization. Public filings indicate the franchiser has been carrying roughly $1.3 billion in whole-business securitization obligations, a debt stack analysts say has complicated the chain's rapid expansion strategy.
Not an isolated pullback
The New Braunfels closures come on the heels of other recent shutdowns in the area. MySA reported a Fatburger on San Antonio’s Far West Side recently closed and a Round Table location off I-10 and Huebner shuttered in February. Those quick reversals mirror a broader pattern of rapid openings followed by equally swift pullbacks for some franchised concepts across the city. For New Braunfels shoppers, it means fewer quick-service options lining the I-35 corridor.
Why it matters
Industry coverage and company filings point to overexpansion and heavy securitization as core sources of strain. Analysts cited by Bloomberg flagged the company’s securitization stack and rising costs as major headwinds. The company's SEC disclosures show the whole-business securitization balance was roughly $1.3 billion at the end of 2024, a structure that left the franchiser exposed when traffic softened, according to public filings. That combination helps explain why some of the newest locations, including the New Braunfels pair, were among the first to be pared back.
The Marketplace storefronts now sit empty while landlords and potential tenants size up their options. Local diners are left to watch whether new operators move in or whether FAT Brands' restructuring changes the fate of other recent openings.
