Burgerking

The First Burger King: How It All Began

Burger King’s story starts in 1953, when Keith J. Kramer and Matthew Burns, two businessmen in Jacksonville, Florida, opened a small hamburger restaurant called “Insta-Burger King.” The name came from the “Insta-Broiler,” a machine that cooked burgers quickly and evenly.

In 1954, James McLamore and David Edgerton, two Miami-based entrepreneurs, purchased the rights to the Insta-Burger King and began expanding the business. They eventually shortened the name to “Burger King” and focused on creating a brand centered around flame-grilled burgers, which became their signature.

The first official Burger King restaurant under this new branding opened in Miami, Florida in 1954. From there, the company grew rapidly through franchising, eventually becoming one of the world’s largest fast-food chains.

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Burger King, often abbreviated as BK, is a global chain of hamburger fast food restaurants headquartered in unincorporated Miami-Dade County, Florida, United States. The company began in 1953 as Insta-Burger King, a Jacksonville, Florida-based restaurant chain. After Insta-Burger King ran into financial difficulties in 1954, its two Miami-based franchisees, David Edgerton and James McLamore, purchased the company and renamed it Burger King. Over the next half century, the company would change hands four times, with its third set of owners, a partnership of TPG Capital, Bain Capital, and Goldman Sachs Capital Partners, taking it public in 2002. In late 2010, 3G Capital of Brazil acquired a majority stake in BK in a deal valued at US$3.26 billion. The new owners promptly initiated a restructuring of the company to reverse its fortunes. 3G, along with partner Berkshire Hathaway, eventually merged the company with Canadian-based doughnut chain Tim Hortons under the auspices of a new Canadian-based parent company, Restaurant Brands International.