NEW YORK, NY.- Jimmy Buffett, who died of cancer Friday, was many things: a singer, a songwriter and a spokesperson for tropical escape.

But beyond crafting music that inspired listeners to grab a cold drink and take it easy, Buffett was also a businessperson who turned his personal brand into a lifestyle empire that included everything from restaurants and resorts to lines of merchandise such as at-home “frozen concoction makers” and cornhole game sets.

Along with music sales and tours, Margaritaville’s success helped propel Buffett into the billionaire ranks; in April, Forbes estimated his net worth at $1 billion. Now Buffett’s empire, named Margaritaville Enterprises after his signature song, must find ways to sustain its business without its founder.

“On behalf of everyone (who works, visits or lives) in Margaritaville, we mourn the loss of Jimmy, a true national treasure, and express our heartfelt condolences to his family and everyone around the world who loves him,” Margaritaville wrote in a statement posted on its website.

Representatives for the company declined to comment on its business.

In the days after Buffett’s death, retail and marketing experts said his legacy would continue to lure his fans — known as Parrot Heads, along with their children, called parakeets — and others to his businesses.

“It’s definitely a lifestyle associated with him and his personality and his music that he created,” said Barbara Kahn, a professor of marketing at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. But, she said, because his business is “bigger than just that, it could definitely live on.”

Buffett’s original idea for Margaritaville was “to expand the opportunity for as many people to experience the lifestyle immortalized in his iconic song as possible,” according to the statement on the company’s website. The company had $2.2 billion in gross annual revenue last year.

Most of Margaritaville’s revenue comes from licensing and franchising deals with various ventures, often with references to Buffett’s songs like “It’s Five O’Clock Somewhere.” The enterprise is linked to more than 100 restaurants, bars, grills and “lodging locations” in places as diverse as Ambergris Caye, Belize, and Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, a short drive from the Dollywood Theme Park, named for Dolly Parton.




There is Latitude Margaritaville Watersound in Panama City Beach, Florida, a planned adult community of homes for those age 55 and up, and the Margaritaville Vacation Club by Wyndham on St. Thomas. There are luxury condominiums and a cruise ship, as well as a new podcast, “License to Chill.”

According to Forbes, Buffett had an estimated 28% stake in the company, which is headquartered in Orlando, Florida. Margaritaville also has other investors, including private equity firms. Billionaire investor Warren Buffett — a longtime friend, but not a relative, of the musician — is an investor in Margaritaville through subsidiaries of his company Berkshire Hathaway.

Last year, the company said its partners had invested, or committed to invest, $7.5 billion in its hospitality real estate projects.

More Jimmy Buffett-related properties are coming, including a restaurant in Boston. A resort recently opened in San Diego, as did a LandShark Bar & Grill in Miramar Beach, Florida. But Margaritaville could risk overextending itself, Kahn said.

“This is a lifestyle, and it’s a chill, fun island lifestyle,” Kahn said, adding that if it isn’t managed properly, it “can be something that loses some of its esteem without the founder’s identity.”

The Margaritaville Casino in Biloxi, Mississippi, closed just two years after opening in 2012 and then sat empty for nine years before another resort company bought it last month. The last location of Buffett’s fast-food chain, Cheeseburger in Paradise, closed in Secaucus, New Jersey, in 2020; Buffett sold his stake to the restaurant operator Luby’s for $11 million in 2012.

In 2021, Margaritaville Resort Times Square opened in New York to great fanfare. The $370 million property, which features a 32-foot-tall replica of the Statue of Liberty hoisting a margarita glass, is owned by Soho Properties. Soho’s partner, IMCMV Holdings, leased the location and struck a trademark license agreement with Margaritaville Enterprises.

In July, the resort entered Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings in an attempt to stop a foreclosure auction sale after Soho failed to make a debt payment, according to court filings. The hotel was valued between $266 million and $350 million as of May, with revenues expected to exceed $25 million by the end of next year — a sign of the property’s potential despite the pressures of the pandemic, according to the filings.

Soho Properties declined to comment.

When reached Sunday by phone, a worker at the Times Square location said people had been leaving flowers by the towering statue of a glossy blue flip-flop in the lobby as part of a makeshift memorial to Buffett.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.