Nov 18, 2021 - Economy

Sweetgreen stock soars after its IPO, valued at $5.5 billion

Illustration of a bowl of salad made out of money — Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios

Salad restaurant chain Sweetgreen was valued at $5.5 billion when it began trading as a public company on Thursday.

By the numbers: The Los Angeles-based company priced its IPO shares at $28, which was above its proposed $23-$25 offering range, for a $2.98 billion market value. It then didn't begin trading until after 1:30pm, opening at $52 per share.

For context, Sweetgreen was valued at nearly $1.8 billion in its last round of private funding, which closed early this year.
Private investors included investment firms Revolution, T. Rowe Price, Red Sea Ventures, Collaborative Fund, Signatures Capital. Plus tennis star Naomi Osaka and restaurateurs Danny Meyer and Daniel Boulud.
Earlier this week, the company updated its IPO prospectus to acknowledge past misstatements about profitability.

Comps: Even at its original IPO price, Sweetgreen outpaced several other restaurant companies that went public earlier this year.

Its IPO enterprise valuation was nearly 9.5X LTM revenue.
Dutch Bros was at 7.1x LTM, Portillo's was at 4.5x and BurgerFi International was at 4.1x.

What to watch: Steakhouse chain Fogo de Chão just filed for an IPO, while P.F. Chang’s, Torchy's Tacos and California Pizza Kitchen are rumored to be prepping offerings.

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Sweetgreen stock soars after its IPO, valued at $5.5 billion

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