Thompson Restaurants is preparing to launch franchising for its by-the-slice Wiseguy Pizza brand.
The group, which is a division of Thompson Hospitality, is also thinking about franchising its full-service Milk & Honey concept, a Southern-food chain with 19 units and another four in development, said founder Warren Thompson.
It’s a new direction for the multi-faceted family-owned company, based in Reston, Virginia, which has nearly 70 restaurants across 15 brands, from the quick-service Big Buns (burgers) to the high-end steakhouse Cut132. (The group does have one franchised Matchbox restaurant, which was part of an acquisition in 2020.)
The pizza segment has been under pressure of late, but the time is right for Wiseguy, which is a value-positioned brand where guests can get a slice, a drink and some chips for less than $7, Thompson said.
The eight-unit chain is showing revenue-per-square-foot of about $1,300 to $1,400, depending on location, he said. One store in downtown D.C. has an average unit volume of $4.5 million in about 1,500-square feet.
It’s also a simple operation, with a short menu of pizza and wings.
“We think franchisees will do well with it,” he said.
Thompson Hospitality also has a thriving foodservice management division serving universities, hospitals and school districts. And Thompson is pushing into airports with some of its brands—a Wiseguy is going into Ronald Reagan International Airport in Washington, D.C., for example.
Thompson hopes to reach 100 units within the portfolio by the end of next year, he said. To do that, however, Thompson hopes to make another acquisition.
That’s been a strategy for years. Thompson Hospitality acquired the Wiseguy chain in 2022; Milk & Honey in 2020; and Big Buns in 2018. In 2020, the group also acquired the Matchbox chain out of bankruptcy.
Now Thompson said he’d love to find a coffee brand or something in the Asian space. The group is currently working on a deal that could bring another high-end concept into the fold, he said, but he couldn’t reveal the brand.
And Thompson is developing its own brands to grow.
Earlier this year, for example, the group launched the new casual-dining concept Ms. Peach’s Southern Kitchen in Sterling, Virginia, named for his grandmother Hattie Warren, who was known as “Ms. Peach.”
“She was a midwife in the southern part of Virginia and delivered about over 1,000 babies in her lifetime,” said Thompson. “And she kept a relationship with a lot of the families she worked with. When she passed away, half of the church was full of babies that she had delivered as adults.”
Hattie Warren was also known for her Sunday suppers, with fried chicken, collard greens and other Southern favorites, and that’s what the restaurant Ms. Peach aims to celebrate.
It’s designed to be a bit different from Milk & Honey, which is more of a seafood (think shrimp and grits) concept, he said.
Thompson sees an opportunity to grow dinner concepts with Southern fare.
“If you think about it, pizza, Italian, American—those categories are crowded,” he said. “But Southern fare, you only have a few brands and nothing really on a national scale.”
(Cracker Barrel, he contends, is more a breakfast brand competing with IHOP and that ilk.)
Thompson Restaurants is now looking for a second location to grow Ms. Peach.
Thompson Restaurants reported a 12% increase in revenue year-over-year in 2025, which he largely attributed to new units and acquisitions.
The macro economic climate has been rough. In terms of same-store sales, he said, “We’re happy when we’re flat.”
This year, the group’s restaurants are seeing consumers pull back on spending as gas prices rise. Thompson is hoping the war will be concluded soon. “We need some sense of normalcy,” he said.
Meanwhile, Thompson Hospitality will push on with its planned growth.
“We do believe that this is not going to be a long-term situation, and we think there’s an opportunity, as we’re going through this, to continue to grow our business, to find potential acquisitions,” he said. “Hopefully landlords are more reasonable now, when they’re trying to lease their spaces.
“We’re fortunate to have been around 33 years,” Thompson added. “We’ve been through bad times before. We’ve been through recessions. We’ve been through the pandemic. So we look at this as just another challenge to make us better.”
Members help make our journalism possible. Become a Restaurant Business member today and unlock exclusive benefits, including unlimited access to all of our content. Sign up here.