Mavis bought Midas, not Big O Tires. Big O remains a TBC subsidiary with a 3.5% to 5.0% royalty matrix and a two-part Item 19 averaging $2.82M per store.
Quick answer Mavis never acquired Big O Tires. It bought TBC's company-owned NTB and Tire Kingdom chains in 2023, then closed on Midas June 16, 2025. Big O Tires, LLC is still a wholly-owned TBC subsidiary, with a $17,500 franchise fee, a 3.5% to 5.0% royalty matrix, and an Item 19 averaging $2,824,712.79 across 457 stores.
Mavis closed its purchase of Midas on June 16, 2025, about eleven weeks after TBC announced the agreement on March 31. Roughly 1,300 franchised Midas shops moved into a group already running more than 2,300 service centers across 39 states, and the Midas 2026 FDD now names Metis HoldCo, the Mavis holding entity, in its ownership chain.
Big O Tires was not in that transaction, and it was not in the earlier one either. Mavis bought NTB and Tire Kingdom from TBC in 2023. Those were TBC’s company-operated retail chains, not its franchise systems. Every version of the story that has Mavis acquiring Big O in 2021 has stitched two real deals into one that never happened.
The correction inverts the question a buyer should be asking. You are not buying into a Mavis brand. You are buying into the brand Mavis did not get, from a seller that just took the check for the one it did.
Item 1 of the FDD issued June 30, 2025 sets the structure out plainly. Big O Tires, LLC is a wholly-owned subsidiary of TBC Shared Services, LLC, which sits under TBC Corporation, which sits under TBC Holdings, LLC. No Mavis entity appears anywhere in that chain.
The franchisor traces to Big O Tire Dealers, Inc., formed in 1962 as a purchasing cooperative so independent dealers could buy tires at prices they could not get alone. TBC has held the brand since 1996. After the Midas closing, TBC said it would concentrate on wholesale and distribution and expand the Big O franchise network. Treat that as a positioning statement rather than a commitment, and note that Big O is one of the few franchised routes into this category at all, since Discount Tire does not franchise.
Item 6 of the 2025 FDD does not set one royalty rate. A new store pays 5.0% of gross sales through the partial year in which it opens. After that it moves onto a Royalty Matrix running between 3.5% and 5.0% for new stores.
The 2% figure circulating on aggregator pages is real, but it is a special-class rate covering national and key-account sales, farm-class tires, and excess service department sales. Quoting it as the brand’s royalty understates the recurring take by roughly half.
Advertising is the line most buyers skip. The Local Fund minimum is 4% of gross sales, currently reduced to 3.6%, and the National Marketing Program fee sits on top at 0.9%, raised from 0.25%. Royalty plus advertising commits 8.0% to 9.5% of gross sales at today’s reduced Local Fund rate, and up to 9.9% if that rate returns to its 4% minimum, all of it before a tire is paid for.
On the capital side, the initial franchise fee is $17,500, split $10,000 with the application and $7,500 at signing. Opening inventory runs $75,000 to $187,500 against a 700-tire minimum, and a resale carries a $5,000 fee. The FDD’s cover page puts the total investment at $511,500 to $1,882,500, including $385,000 to $1,596,000 paid to the franchisor or its affiliates. Our extracted copy of the line-item Item 7 table is incomplete, so ask the franchisor for Item 7 in full and read it against those inventory figures.
The claim that Big O files no Item 19 is wrong, and what it does file is more detailed than most brands bother with.
Part A reports average annual gross revenues of $2,824,712.79 across 457 of the 463 stores in the reporting group. The number doing the real work sits beside it: 40.9% of stores landed above that average. A mean with fewer than half the population above it is being pulled up by a tail at the top, which is the standard shape of a system-wide mean and the reason a median would have been more useful to disclose.
Part B is the rarer half. The 280 stores that submitted expense data, 61.3% of the group, produce averages down the whole statement:
| Line item | Average |
|---|---|
| Total income | $2,941,799 |
| Cost of goods sold | 42.1% of income |
| Gross profit | 57.9% |
| Total labor | 26.7% |
| Operating expenses | 49.1% |
| Net income from operations | 8.8% |
Net income of 8.8% on $2,941,799 works out to roughly $259,000 of store-level operating income before debt service, owner compensation taken separately, and taxes. That is a figure you can underwrite against, drawn from 280 stores rather than a top-quartile selection, and the FTC Franchise Rule left the franchisor free to publish nothing at all.
Considering Big O Tires? The full 12-section FDD analysis covers Item 19 earnings, litigation history, fee footnotes, and a buyer verdict personalized to your capital and market: $49 per brand, or three brands for $99 if you’re comparing finalists.
Franchised outlets moved 434, then 460, then 462, then 461 across the reported years. Company-owned outlets moved 32, then 17, then zero. Transfers ran 44, then 24, then 19.
A franchisor with no company stores has no corporate-versus-franchise build conflict, which is the exact tension the Mavis story was invented to explain. It also keeps no company-operated units to benchmark against, so Item 19 is the only internal evidence on offer.
What TBC does have is a wholesale relationship with every franchisee in the system. Consolidated revenue of $385,060,332 for the twelve months ended March 31, 2025 included $342,729,760, or 89.0%, from products and services sold to franchisees. Royalty is the smaller share of how this franchisor earns. The larger share is selling you tires, and that margin lives inside the 42.1% cost of goods line on your own statement.
Nothing in your franchise agreement. Something in your trade area.
Midas now belongs to an operator with 2,300-plus centers and a demonstrated appetite for buying more. Its own disclosure puts 889 US franchised shops on the ground at December 31, 2025, at a $35,000 franchise fee, a royalty of 2% to 10% of net revenue rising to 11% with co-branding, and $385,450 to $940,050 for a new 8-bay shop before real estate. Midas sells brakes, exhaust, and alignment work alongside tires, so the overlap with a Big O bay is partial rather than total.
Two consequences follow. First, pricing pressure on the tire line, because a consolidator buys at volumes a network of 461 independent operators cannot match. Second, concentrated franchisor attention: TBC now has one franchise brand, one wholesale business, and the proceeds of a sale, which helps marketing weight and hurts if the promised expansion lands next to you. Item 12 settles that question, not the press release, and the Big O territory disclosure is where to start reading.
There is a third, quieter effect on supply. A parent narrowed to distribution plus one franchise brand has a plainer reason to keep that network buying than a multi-brand retailer does. Weigh it against the general case of what happens when a franchisor changes hands mid-agreement.
Five questions the document does not answer on its own:
The first two are answerable in a phone call, and a development rep should not need a week to produce them. The last three separate someone who knows the business from someone reading a script.
Then work the operator questions against a list of more than 450 franchisees rather than the three names you are handed.
Big O is a mature tire franchise with a real Item 19, a royalty higher than the internet says, and 461 stores under a parent that has just narrowed its focus. The Mavis story was never true, and it pointed buyers at the wrong risk. Corporate competition from the franchisor cannot happen here, because the franchisor owns no stores. Price the supplier relationship instead: TBC’s margin sits in the 42.1% cost of goods line that Part B hands you.
Not sure which franchise fits you yet?
Take our free 2-minute quiz. Tell us your capital, experience, and goals; we surface the brands worth researching. When you've narrowed your list, our full FDD reports are $49.
Take the free quiz Curious what you get? See a sample report →
Not ready to decide? Take the checklist with you.
Get the free Franchise Red-Flags Checklist: the things to verify in any FDD before you sign. We'll email it now, plus occasional buyer research from our team. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
✓ Check your inbox
The Franchise Red-Flags Checklist is on its way. While you wait, see a real $49 sample report →
The only franchise report written entirely for the buyer. 12 sections covering financial risks, legal obligations, and a personalized recommendation.
Browse Franchise Library See a real sample report →
$49 per brand · $99 for a 3-brand pack
big o tires franchisemavis tiremidas franchisetire franchiseTBC Corporationautomotive franchise
About this analysis The franchise data in this article is drawn from VetMyFranchise's structured analysis of 2,300+ Franchise Disclosure Documents filed with U.S. state regulators. See our data & methodology.
No. Mavis acquired NTB and Tire Kingdom, TBC's company-operated retail chains, in 2023. TBC then announced on March 31, 2025 that it had agreed to sell Midas to Mavis, and that deal closed June 16, 2025. Big O Tires was in neither transaction and remains a TBC company.
TBC. Item 1 of the FDD issued June 30, 2025 identifies Big O Tires, LLC as a wholly-owned subsidiary of TBC Shared Services, LLC, which sits under TBC Corporation and then TBC Holdings, LLC. The brand has been a TBC company since 1996, and the franchisor traces back to Big O Tire Dealers, Inc., a 1962 purchasing cooperative.
A store pays 5.0% of gross sales during the partial year in which it opens, then moves onto a Royalty Matrix that runs between 3.5% and 5.0% for new stores. A separate 2% rate covers special classes of business: national and key-account sales, farm-class tires, and excess service department sales. Advertising sits on top, with a Local Fund minimum of 4% currently reduced to 3.6%, plus a National Marketing Program fee of 0.9% raised from 0.25%.
Yes, and it runs two parts. Part A reports average annual gross revenues of $2,824,712.79 across 457 of 463 stores, with 40.9% of stores above that average. Part B covers the 280 stores, or 61.3% of the group, that submitted expense data: average total income of $2,941,799, cost of goods sold at 42.1%, gross profit 57.9%, total labor 26.7%, operating expenses 49.1%, and net income from operations of 8.8%.
It changes the competitive map rather than the franchise agreement. Midas now sits under the Mavis group, which runs more than 2,300 service centers in 39 states and picked up roughly 1,300 franchised locations in the deal. Where a Midas shop sits inside a Big O trade area, the tire portion of the mix faces a buyer with consolidator purchasing volume. On the other side, TBC has one franchise brand left and has said it plans to expand it, so Item 12 territory terms deserve a closer read than they did two years ago.
This page is part of VetMyFranchise. View all pages: llms.txt · llms-full.txt