When the elder Frisch died in 1923, three of his sons, David, Reuben and Irving, continued operating the cafe; twenty-year-old Dave took his father's lead role.

Cincinnati's first year-round drive-in restaurant, it was named after a passenger airplane that flew into nearby Lunken Airport.

By 1944 a second Frisch's restaurant opened, designed to resemble George Washington's Mount Vernon home.

[9] Immediately after World War II, Dave Frisch visited one of Bob Wian's Big Boy restaurants in California.

Unknown to Dave Frisch, Bob Wian was disturbed by drive-in operators outside California using the Big Boy name and hamburger without permission.

The territory included the Cincinnati tri-state region of Ohio, Kentucky and Indiana and added Florida to increase Big Boy's national span.

Most Frisch's Big Boy restaurants still display statues from this design, albeit usually repainted with brown hair and checkered overalls.

Larry Hatch, founder of Eat'n Park Restaurants in Pittsburgh, observed the Frisch's drive-in operation in 1948 in Cincinnati.

Alex Schoenbaum, founder of Shoney's (originally known as Parkette Drive-In) became close friends with Dave Frisch.

Frisch's created the "Brawny Lad" and "Swiss Miss" sandwiches[note 3] which were added to the menus of most other Big Boy franchisees.

Frisch's "Filet de Sole" fish sandwich was also widely adopted by other Big Boy franchises.

[note 4] Frisch's ended Kip's operations in 1991, and sold that territory as well as Georgia and Florida to Big Boy Restaurants International in 2001.

In 2000, Frisch's had the opportunity to purchase the national Big Boy chain, which was in bankruptcy, but declined the offer.

The bankruptcy threatened Frisch's right to operate and franchise Big Boy restaurants but was forever resolved by the separation.

[31] The separation also relieved tensions for Big Boy, who charged other franchisees royalties and licensing fees that Frisch's was exempt from.

Frisch's franchise agreement with Bob Wian, which had no expiration, required a trivial $1 per year licensing fee.

The new owner, an affiliate of National Restaurant Development (NRD) Partners,[note 5] paid approximately $175 million to purchase outstanding shares of Frisch's stock.

[note 6] Other family members were not involved or were too young and expressed no interest in continuing the greater Frisch's legacy.

The new statue resembles the original West Coast design with black pompadour hair and Big Boy hamburger hoisted atop one arm.

The checkered outfit, however, is replaced with striped overalls including slingshot as used on the original East Coast Big Boy.

Now displaying a healthy torso, the Big Boy's black and white saddle shoes are replaced with cap toed sneakers.

[55][56] The debut statue (wearing a Cincinnati Reds uniform) is placed at the Great American Ball Park; another in the Dry Ridge KY location.

Two Frisch's Big Boy concession stands opened in 2013 at Cincinnati's Great American Ball Park.

Frisch's, after hiring a new CEO in 2022, began closing stores en masse in 2023, pointing to the economy and inflation as reasons.

By April 8, 2024, Aziz Hashem, managing partner of NRD Capital, said that the closures were because of rent expiration and financial losses.

[66] As of November 12, 2024, an additional 20 Ohio and Kentucky Frisch's locations were closed or set for closure, with all being evicted by their landlord due to not paying rent.

[73][74] As of December 4, at least a dozen Frisch’s Big Boy restaurants in Kentucky, including both locations in Lexington, have been ordered to close.

Where Bob Wian dressed Big Boy hamburgers with mayonnaise and red relish, Frisch later replaced these with tartar sauce and added dill pickles in his version and applied these in a different order.

[note 9] In earlier years, Frisch's adaptation of the Big Boy caricature was slimmer, had blond hair topped with a cook's cap, cartoon-like eyes, slightly cherubic facial features, and wore striped pants instead of the traditional checkered bib overall-type pants used by Bob's Big Boy.

This Frisch's Big Boy graphic was drawn with the pompadour and lost the cook's cap but otherwise the facial features remain the same as in the 1950s.