FRISBY SPAIN LAUNCHES ON A LAWSUIT

Frisby España SL will open dark kitchens in Madrid and Barcelona on 1 July 2026, selling fried chicken under a brand it won from the Colombian original in court.

This is not a franchise. Frisby Spain operates as a completely independent entity from the Colombian chain founded by Alfredo Hoyos Mazuera and Liliana Restrepo, who built the brand into a national institution over five decades.

In March 2026, a Spanish court confirmed Frisby Spain's exclusive right to the name and logo across the European Union, barring the Colombian company from using its own trademark in European territory. The ruling also ordered Frisby Colombia to pay damages that have directly funded the Spanish rollout.

The model is delivery only. Frisby Spain has signed a two-year exclusivity agreement with Uber Eats, bypassing the cost of physical restaurants entirely while locking down digital storefronts so that any search for "Frisby" in Spain routes to its kitchens.

The target customer is not the average Madrileño. Spain's Colombian diaspora provides built-in brand recognition that no marketing budget could replicate. The company plans to use ordering data from the dark kitchen phase to identify demand clusters for physical flagship stores by 2027.

The Colombian founders are left watching a European company monetise their heritage with no mechanism to intervene.

Trademark law did what fifty years of recipes could not: separate a brand from the people who created it.

Source: Colombia One