Coral Tree Partners, a private equity firm based in Los Angeles, has taken a strategic stake in
Plein Air, the Dallas marketing and technology consultancy. Terms were not disclosed.

What the deal covers

Plein Air was founded in 2016 and now employs around 120 people, serving more than 75 clients
across restaurants and retail. Big Colony, the restaurant marketing platform it launched in 2023,
is deployed in more than 15,000 locations.

Co-CEOs Jason Abelkop and Paul McEnany continue to lead the business. Canaccord Genuity acted as
financial adviser on the transaction. Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough advised Plein Air, and
Goodwin Procter advised Coral Tree.

Why a growth investor rather than a strategic buyer

The structure is worth reading closely. A strategic acquisition by a holding company or a larger
platform would usually mean absorption — shared services, a rebrand, and a slow migration of
clients onto someone else’s stack. A minority growth investment does something different: it
funds expansion while leaving the operating model in place.

For a business whose product is a platform its clients build on, that distinction matters. Fifteen
thousand locations is a large enough installed base that continuity is itself a feature. Brands
that standardised on Big Colony did so on the assumption it would still be there, and still be
theirs, in three years.

What it signals about restaurant marketing technology

Three things stand out about the coverage this attracted:

• Private-equity trade press picked it up alongside restaurant press, which suggests the category
  is being read as software rather than as agency services.
• The employee-to-client ratio — roughly 120 people to 75-plus clients — is closer to a product
  company than a traditional agency, where headcount usually scales with accounts.
• The platform launched in 2023 and reached 15,000 locations inside three years, which is the
  number an investor is actually underwriting.

The broader pattern is familiar. Restaurant brands spent the last decade assembling digital
ordering out of point solutions, and are now consolidating onto fewer, deeper platforms. Capital
tends to follow that consolidation about a year behind it.

Sources

The announcement went out on the wire and was picked up widely, including by
PE Hub,
S&P Global Market Intelligence
and Pulse 2.0.
The fullest editorial account is David Seeley’s writeup for
Dallas Innovates.