Tigard’s T.G.I. Friday’s closes doors after long legal battle

T.G.I. Friday’s corporate officials claim the local owners refused to pay franchise fees totaling $4.5 million

By Geoff Pursinger

The Times, Sep 30, 2009, Updated Oct 30, 2009 (2 Reader comments)

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“The owners of these restaurants have not met their obligations to T.G.I. Friday’s Inc. during this time. We truly believe we have exhausted all reasonable possibilities to resolve this situation and have concluded that we have no further options other than enforcing the court order from Aug. 20 which requires the owners to cease using the T.G.I. Friday’s brand name.”

That court order stemmed from a civil suit filed by T.G.I. Friday’s Inc. in a Dallas, Texas, Federal Court, alleging that Mike Alizadeh, owner of Kobra Associates, and his father Abe Alizadeh, had opened franchise agreements with T.G.I. Friday’s for 10 West Coast stores — including Tigard and Vancouver, Wash. — and then failed to make their monthly payments to the company. By October 2008, the document stated, Alizadeh owed the Texas-based restaurant company more than $4.5 million.

Because of this, T.G.I. Friday’s suspended Alizadeh’s license in December 2008, Freshwater said, meaning that signs, recipes, uniforms — anything that claimed that the restaurants were affiliated with T.G.I. Friday’s Inc. — would have to go, effectively closing the franchises down.

But, the court document claims, that didn’t stop the restaurants from staying open for nearly a year.

A judge ruled in favor of T.G.I. Friday’s, and the 10 restaurants owned by Alizadeh were closed Sept. 18.

Seventy-five employees at the Tigard T.G.I. Friday’s lost their jobs, according to Great Northwest Restaurants, a subsidiary of Kobra Associates. Across the 10 T.G.I. Friday’s, a Great Northwest spokesperson said, more than 450 people found themselves without work.

Freshwater said that although there are no other T.G.I. Friday’s left open in Oregon, or Southwest Washington, “if a team member is interested in transferring to another location we will do what we can to assist with that transfer.”

Meanwhile, the automated message said, talks are in the works to reopen the restaurants as soon as possible.

In December, Kobra Associates also filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy for 71 Jack in the Box restaurants it operates.

The 10 T.G.I. Friday’s closed by Kobra Associates, besides Tigard’s, were in Roseville, Elk Grove, Vacaville, and Sacramento in California, and Seattle, Tacoma, Vancouver, Puyallup and Spokane, in Washington.

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