[8] In addition to Mark Korzilius, who served as the company's sole Management Board member, other investors were involved.

[8] Based on the model of the original Hamburg location, the company opened additional restaurants, e.g. in 2004 in Düsseldorf[21] as well as 2005 in Frankfurt,[22] Nuremberg[23] and Munich.

[1] In 2011, the private equity firm, Vermögensverwaltung Mayfair, acquired 40 percent of the shares in Vapiano from Gregor Gerlach.

[38] Gerlach had invested in the company already in the start-up phase, acquired the shares of other shareholders and served as Chairman of the Supervisory Board.

[39][40][41] The equity position assumed by Mayfair, which according to Capital had even sought a majority,[42] was intended above all to facilitate international growth.

[44] The change in the shareholder structure[45] led to the resignation of the longstanding Chairman Marko Silz, due to "differing views" concerning the future strategy.

[52][53][54] In 2014, Vapiano altered its strategy and in smaller cities built new corporate-owned restaurants not run as franchise operations.

Losses piled up after sales targets were missed, the share price had slumped by 75% since entering the stock market in 2017, and the company had expanded too quickly.

The consolidated companies in 2014 included some three dozen subsidiaries, associated firms and joint ventures based in Germany and abroad, in which Vapiano SE owned at least 50 percent of the shares.

[80] The company's largest restaurant worldwide, having a floor space of 1,500 square meters, has been operated by Vapiano in Vienna since 2013 in The Mall shopping center in Wien Mitte railway station.

[82] The distinguishing features of all the franchise restaurants are a long service counter, exposed-concrete floors, large wooden tables, basket lamps and Italian tile decor, along with a green wall consisting of real plants in the newest Vapianos.

According to the company, there were 62 in Germany, eleven in Austria, nine in the United States, eight in Sweden, six in France, six in Switzerland, seven in Australia, five in the Netherlands, four in Hungary, six in England, seven in Mexico, three in the Czech Republic, three in Poland, three in the United Arab Emirates, two in Brazil, two in Denmark, three in Estonia, two in Finland, two in Chile, two in Luxembourg, two in Saudi Arabia, two in Spain, one in Bosnia and Herzegovina, one in Serbia, two in Taiwan, two in Qatar, two in Ukraine, two in Latvia, and one in Kosovo.

Vapiano had a presence of one restaurant each in Scotland, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Egypt, Kuwait, Lithuania, Norway, Colombia and South Korea.

[92] A short time later, the Allgemeine Hotel- und Gastronomie-Zeitung, the weekly newspaper for the hotel and restaurant business in Germany, reported that the union and the company had approached one another and resumed discussions concerning the election of a works council.

[93] In June 2015, the company was subject to allegations that it had manipulated the records concerning the working hours of its employees,[94] in order to push down wage costs.

[95] The German weekly newspaper Welt am Sonntag reported on former restaurant managers who claimed they had been instructed by their superiors to retroactively modify the time sheets of their employees and trainees.

[107] The company said it wanted to look into the allegations and cited its strict quality standards, including inspections by SGS Institut Fresenius and TÜV Rheinland.

[108][109] The Bundesverband der Systemgastronomie, the German federal association for that type of industry, publicly defended Vapiano.