Business Entrepreneur Stories

Popeyes founder and local icon dies.
Al Copeland, a hard-charging, high-living entrepreneur who built an empire on spicy fried chicken and fluffy white biscuits, died Sunday in Munich, Germany, of complications from cancer treatment. He was 64.

He had gone to Munich for treatment of his illness, which had been diagnosed in November, said Kit Wohl, his spokeswoman.

Born in poverty, Mr. Copeland burst onto the scene in 1972, when he opened his first Popeyes fried-chicken stand. The Arabi restaurant was the start of a franchise that, under his leadership, had 700 outlets, in the United States, Puerto Rico, Panama and Kuwait.

The money he earned led to public displays of opulence such as speedboats kept in a glass-walled showroom along Interstate 10 when he wasn”t racing them, a Lamborghini sports car parked outside his corporate headquarters and, of course, the massive Christmas displays that required sheriff”s deputies to direct the traffic outside his Metairie home.

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This entry was posted on Monday, July 21st, 2008 at 11:33 am and is filed under Business Entrepreneurs. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.