FORBES • April 17, 2023
In the early 2000s, a footlong frenzy swept the U.S. More than three decades after the first Subway opened in Connecticut the sandwich shop started appearing everywhere. Since the 2015 death of Subway cofounder and longtime CEO Fred DeLuca, nearly a quarter of the over 27,100 U.S. stores have closed. So it wasn’t a huge surprise when in February, 15 months after its second cofounder, Peter Buck, passed away, the company officially said it’s for sale. Through its ups and downs, one thing has remained constant: Subway has been paying out generously to its owners and their families for years. Peter Buck, left instructions in his will to leave his half of the company to his family foundation after his November 2021 death, a bequest that might hit $5 billion pending final sale. Separately, the Buck family bought up forestland in Maine worth up to $1 billion, parts of which the late Subway cofounder passed onto his heirs using a tax-minimizing maneuver that was challenged by the IRS.