Update: Bentonville’s Big Whiskey Plans Sours Little Rock Operator

A screenshot from Big Whiskey's franchise website highlights the move into Bentonville in a February 2016 post.

The news that a Big Whiskey’s franchise is opening in Bentonville left the owners of the Big Whiskey’s in Little Rock with heartburn.

Big Whiskey’s of Little Rock LLC said it had the franchise rights to Big Whiskey’s American Restaurant & Bar in Arkansas. That’s according to a four-page complaint filed last month in Pulaski County Circuit Court.

The Little Rock Big Whiskey’s alleges it has the right of first refusal for any Big Whiskey’s in Arkansas, according to the lawsuit filed by John Keeling Baker of the Mitchell Williams law firm in Little Rock. The Little Rock operator said it didn’t find out until after the fact that Whiskey Holdings LLC, owned by Shane Miller of Bentonville, had secured the rights to a location in Bentonville. It is expected to open in early 2017.

The Little Rock Big Whiskey’s wants the judge to award the franchise rights to it and prevent the northwest Big Whiskey’s from operating the franchise.

Whiskey Holdings of Bentonville said in a court filing Monday that the case should be thrown out.

The Bentonville company “contractually and lawfully obtained” the franchise from Big Whiskey’s Franchising LLC, which isn’t named as a defendant in the lawsuit, according to the pleading by attorney Kevin Crass of Friday Eldredge & Clark LLP in Little Rock.

Whiskey Holdings paid a $50,000 franchise fee and agreed to pay a 5 percent royalty to obtain the location, Crass said.

“This should not come as a surprise to Plaintiffs since they would have had to make similar payments if they executed the right of first refusal,” Crass said.

Crass argued in the filing that the Bentonville Big Whiskey’s “owes no legal duty, contractual or otherwise,” to the Big Whiskey’s operators in Little Rock.

“As we’ve laid out in our motion to dismiss, this lawsuit is 100 percent without merit,” Miller said in an email statement to Arkansas Business. “We look forward to putting this behind us quickly so we can focus on opening our restaurant and meeting the overwhelming demand for the Big Whiskey’s brand in Bentonville.”