History
Fred De Luca borrowed $1,000 from family friend Peter Buck to start his first sandwich shop on August 28, 1965, when he was only 17 years old. He was trying to raise money to pay for college. He chose a mediocre location for his shop, the corner of East Main Street and Boston Avenue in Bridgeport, Connecticut, but by noon on opening day, customers were pouring in. On the radio advertisement they had promoted the name as Pete's Submarines, which sounded like "Pizza Marines", so they changed the name to "Pete's Subs"; eventually it adopted the "Subway" name and they decorated the store with maps of the New York City subway system; a theme that continues to this day. As of March 9, 2011, the company has 33,749 franchised locations in 95 countries and produced US$15.2 billion in revenue every year. In 2007, Forbes magazine named De Luca number 242 of the 400 richest Americans with a net worth of $1.5 billion.
In addition to traditional restaurants, Subway operates in many non-traditional locations. For instance, there are over 900 Subway locations in Wal-Mart stores and 200 on military bases, including several in Iraq and Afghanistan, in addition to three located inside The Pentagon, as well as an increasing number on college and university campuses.
Subway restaurants have been consistently ranked in Entrepreneur Magazine's Top 500 Franchises, and Subway was selected as the #2 overall franchise in 2008. Additionally, it was ranked as the #3 "Fastest Growing Franchise", and the #1 "Global Franchise" as well. In March 2011, Subway was ranked the most popular Fast-Food Restaurant in the United States of America in a poll of over 43 thousand social media users.
As of March 2011, Subway operates 34,246 stores in 95 countries and territories.
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