BananaBro: A RM70 Million Business With Overseas Franchising Aspirations

BananaBro is a chain of banana leaf restaurants founded in 2018 by Tony Lim, who isn’t a stranger to the F&B space. He previously started Boat Noodle back in 2013 and before that set up a Chatime franchise in Cambodia in 2011.

In 5 years, BananaBro has grown to over 30 outlets nationwide and made RM70 million in revenue in 2023, with EBIDTA margins around the 15%-20% range. The business is still actively expanding and is looking to take their store count to 60 by 2026. At present, Tony sees potential revenue for the Malaysian market hitting between RM150 million to RM200 million in time.

From bubble tea to thai boat noodles and now Indian banana leaf, in this edition of Open For Business we explore the business rationale and promise for building a banana leaf restaurant chain, how Tony's past experiences have helped with the starting and scaling of this venture, and much more.