This Just Came In The Mail

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Dreaming of Krispy Kreme Original Glazed Doughnuts!

Before I got hooked up with Krispy Randy and Krispy Mark, my two mighty fine partners in Glazing Saddles here in Texas where we operate eight Krispy Kreme doughnut stores strategically located in Laredo, Austin, San Marcos, San Antonio, and El Paso, I was head of marketing, off and on for 10 years, for corporate Krispy Kreme located in Winston-Salem, NC. I say “off and on” for an interesting reason that might show up as a blog some day in the future.

By the late 1990′s as Krispy Kreme’s national awareness was really taking off, the marketing department began receiving unusual things in the mail every day of the week. Things like pictures of a wedding day couple standing beside their Krispy Kreme wedding cake. Hundreds of requests to “build a Krispy Kreme store across the street from my house’” were popular items. Occasionally a napkin, or a piece of our dozen box or someone’s KK hat would arrive with a request for an autograph! Also, lots of stories about Krispy Kreme adventures people had had, mostly about how good our doughnuts are, and “My grandmother ate them when she was a little girl and she says they still taste the same today.” Things like that.

Last week I was rummaging through some of my old KK corporate files and came across a story we received from a young teenager. He had attached a letter to his story and said he was proud of his original story and could we publish it if we thought it was good enough. I don’t have the boy’s letter or his name. He signed the letter but not the story and somewhere the letter got away. I remember responding to him and thanking him but was sorry that we had no place to publish it at the time. You’ll recall that back in the 90′s communication vehicles were still a bit horse and buggy. Over the years I have felt a tinge of regret at times when I think of how the young writer must have felt at being rejected. I know how I have felt in similar circumstances and it’s not pleasant.

So, at last his story will be published. Probably not where he had hoped it would be, in a blog with a small following (but loyal Krispy Kreme fans, at least!), but still it will be in print. I hope he sees it and responds with his name. If nothing else, I think you might enjoy it and maybe be inspired to write a Krispy Kreme story of your own. If you do, send it to jwillard@glazingsaddles.com and she will see that it finds its way into our social media and then out to the world.

Here’s the story -

There’s Nothing Better Than A Krispy Kreme Doughnut

This is a true story about a young boy who attempts to rescue his family from a hungry bear in a mountainous forest. The family has been trapped in their remote vacation cabin for a day and a night, boarded up inside as the bear has ripped open their car to get at food and has sat himself down on the small front porch, making this place his new home. They have no guns or phones and no way out as long as the bear resides on their front steps.

It is still dark out and the mother, father, and sister have gone off into a restless sleep. The son, who is 12 years old, is awake and his mind is racing. He knows that bears love sweets. He also knows that the only food left in the cabin is a dozen Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnuts. He hatches a plan, grabs the dozen Krispy Kremes and silently tiptoes away from his sleeping family. He knows that if they wake up his father and mother will kill his dangerous idea. The cabin has no backdoor so he slips down into a small root cellar and gets out the back way by removing two loose foundation stones and squeezes through with his one dozen Krispy Kremes going out first.

Meanwhile the hungry bear is still sleeping on the front porch next to several broken honey and jam jars he has cleaned out. The bear hears the boy, looks around, sniffs the wind that is luckily blowing toward the boy, lowers his shaggy head and falls back to sleep. The boy makes quiet, fast work of his scheme to drop pieces of Krispy Kreme glazed doughnuts on the ground in a snake-like trail along the hill leading away from the cabin. He uses eleven doughnuts and when he is through, he is over a mile away and the morning sun is beginning to turn the sky slightly pink in the east. Now he must really hurry because he knows that his dad is probably already up and has missed him. He also knows that the bear will soon be up, hungrier than ever and might even start trying to break the door down again like he did yesterday causing his father to nail it shut.

Now the boy has to do the most dangerous thing: put the final doughnut into close proximity to the bear so that the bear smells it, eats it, and then hopefully picks up the scent of the next piece and then begin to follow the trail far from the cabin. He knows the plan can work because once a human eats a Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut he immediately wants another, then for sure the bear will feel the same way and start following the trail laid out for him.

To give himself some strength the boy eats half the final doughnut and dreams of going to Krispy Kreme with his family when the Hot Light is on. Nearly falling to sleep he nods and awakens and climbs a tree. From up high in the tree he can see the front of the cabin where the bear is sitting up sniffing the morning air. It is much later than the twelve year old wants it to be and daylight has begun filling in the corners where the darkness was.

Suddenly he hears his father calling his name from inside the cabin and the bear gets up and begins scratching at the door. The boy loses his balance, teeters and falls, making a loud crashing noise that immediately gets the bear’s attention. As our bait-setter falls from the tree his boot catches in a limb leaving him hanging upside down causing the last bit of his Krispy Kreme bait to slip from his shirt pocket and fall to the ground out of view of the bear who is by now leaving the porch and heading for the commotion in the tree.

The bear circles the tree looking up at the suspended child. The bear puts one paw on the tree to begin a climb but then pauses, sniffs and looks down at the little Krispy Kreme doughnut piece lying on the ground next to his hind foot. He scoops up the doughnut on a claw tip and eats it hungrily. He then pauses for what seems like an eternity to the boy who dangles there looking down at his enemy. Will the bear notice doughnut piece number two resting on a rock just 30 feet away? With tension causing the inverted boy’s heart to beat harder than at any time in his life, a light morning breeze whips up from the valley below and with it carries the smell of the next tasty Krispy Kreme bite. The bear lumbers away, looks back up at the boy, and deciding a Krispy Kreme would really taste better than a boy, turns to find that rock with the next sweet treat waiting for him. He eats it and picks up the aroma of the next one and moves down the hill toward the river below, far away from the cabin.

The boy can’t afford to shout, but he has to get to his family before the bear comes back. He unlaces his boot, slides his foot out and drops to the ground. He lands on his back in a nest of pine needles. His breath is knocked out but he struggles to his feet and runs to the cabin and tells his family through the door to hurry and get out while the bear is gone.

His father tears open the door, grabs his son and the family runs around behind the cabin past their destroyed car with flattened tires. They run like the wind with fear giving them speed. When they come to a paved roadway, a couple on their way home from church, and on their way to Krispy Kreme, stops and gives them a ride to safety in the back of their pickup truck. Just as they cross the bridge at the bottom of the hill the boy stares in shock…there just a few yards away sits the bear eating the last piece of Krispy Kreme…the boy swears that the bear is smiling. The happy bear slowly gets up and turns back toward the cabin then lumbers up the hill into the forest. The boy and his family hug and laugh. Everyone is safe. Krispy Kreme has beaten the bear and saved the day.

It’s 1 o’clock on Sunday afternoon when the pickup truck, with four people in the back, pulls into the Krispy Kreme store. Customers in the store look out the window and wonder why those people are riding in the back of that truck. “Maybe just a fun little Sunday afternoon joy ride,” someone says. “Probably so,” says a lady. This just goes to show you that you don’t always know the truth about everything you see. But at least you now know the truth about the power of the Krispy Kreme doughnut.

The End.

There Are Some Things You Can’t Teach A Teacher

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The 2012 Krispy Kreme Austin Teacher of the Year Winners!

Last night there was a Texas-sized storm that ripped and raged through Austin with drowning rain blowing horizontally at a reported 70 mph, hail on the windows, and power going out all over the place. It lasted about an hour or so and left me thinking about our Krispy Kreme stores in Austin, San Marcos, and San Antonio and how they might be weathering the weather. We had significant damage to our store on 183 in Austin last year from a storm and the safety of our employees and customers certainly loomed in my head as the storm howled on into the night.

It also reminded me of a time when I was in the fourth grade and my teacher’s name was, and this is the truth, Mrs. Austin. It was in the afternoon and we were in her class when a storm very similar in strength to the one here last night came roaring in causing several of my classmates to lapse into screaming panic attacks just after the first mega-boom thunder rattled our cage. The screaming scared me more than the storm and I had never witnessed such fear over thunder-boomers in my young life. Somehow I must have been reassured about storms by my parents and had respect for severe weather but not body-shaking fear like I was seeing in that fourth grade room. What was more amazing, now that I look back on it was the way Mrs. Austin was able to quiet the freaking out kids with just a few words she whispered in their ears. I don’t know what she said but while the thunder pounded our ears, her whispered words into the scared one’s ears calmed them right down and dried out their tears. It was like hypnotism or magic or something, and today, some fifty years later I discovered what Mrs. Austin had that made that moment such a special memory for me.

It happened during a Teacher of the Year ceremony this morning in Cedar Park, Texas. So you’ll know, Teacher of the Year is a very special program that our mighty fine franchise company (that we call Glazing Saddles) orchestrates every year out of our eight stores in our Krispy Kreme markets, including Laredo, Austin, San Marcos, San Antonio, and El Paso. Krispy Randy, my partner in this business, hatched the idea over five years ago as a way to give back not only doughnuts but also money to deserving teachers who go beyond the expectations of fellow workers, school administrators, and students. Krispy Randy, Krispy Mark, my other partner, myself, and virtually every employee in our company believes in always giving back to our communities because we live here, too, and without your support, we’d be nothing. We take the word “community” very seriously and our Teacher of the Year program is a good reflection of that seriousness. This program was created and is maintained exclusively by Glazing Saddles in support of our great Texas Teachers and going into our fifth year it has really started to grow.

Very briefly (if that’s possible by Krispy Mike) here’s how TOTY works. Even though this is our own statewide event, we tie it to National Teachers Week in May which is when we present awards to our winners. We start the program in February and it covers 1,600 schools across all our markets. Each school is given the opportunity to nominate teachers they believe are the best in the world. The ones making the nominations of full time teachers in both public and private schools can be selected by a student, fellow teacher, parent, or administrator. The best part of the nomination is that a letter of 250 words or more must be submitted explaining why the teacher deserves to be Krispy Kreme Doughnut’s Teacher of the Year. The letters are priceless and make the decision process very difficult for us. We read all the letters, find the top ten in each market, and then we send those letters to top educators in other metro areas (other than the one the nominee is in) to select the top three. The winning teacher in each of our markets receives a check for $500 as well as a check for $500 for the winning school. First runner up teacher, $250 and $250 to the school; second runner up teacher $100 and $100 to the school. That’s the basics but the fun part is the awards ceremony.

Which brings me to this morning; and the thunder storm last night and Mrs. Austin’s whispers from long ago, and what I discovered that has actually always been right under my nose. This morning we had one of our many Teacher of the Year awards presentations that we make around the state at this time of the year. It’s not only a presentations ceremony; it’s a doughnut party as well. What else would you expect from Krispy Kreme!? Lots of teachers gather for the big moment, some of the winners don’t even know they’ve won, so surprise is another fun element. Principals are there, school officials, school board members, and others gather in a room and us Krispy partners and our area General Managers and some helpful Krispy Kreme store employees make the presentations and then everyone makes some chocolate-iced sprinkled doughnuts of their own design. A few around the room make spontaneous speeches. It was during one of the winner’s remarks that my epiphany appeared. As she made her remarks tears were beginning to well in her bright eyes, and a quiver entered her voice. She said something that I will not forget because it told me why Mrs. Austin was able to talk fear out of the hearts of her “children” during that storm. What the teacher this morning said was, “I was called to be a teacher…I love my students, I pray for their future, I work 12 hours a day because I want to…and work weekends, too…I am blessed to have this career and I am honored like never before by being recognized by you for what I do…thank you from deep inside me… thank you.”

What she was expressing cannot be taught. It was just there in the very essence of that teacher and all the teachers in that room and probably all the dedicated t

eachers in America. You can teach reading and writing, and math and history, but you can’t teach “heart”. Heart HAS TO just be there. Why? Because it’s the single most important thing that you can never teach a teacher.

Congratulations to our winning teachers and schools. And congratulations to all their students who are learning lessons from these mentors they will carry with them throughout their lives.

See you in class.

Krispy Mike

The Day Krispy Kreme Took Hot Doughnuts To The Street, Wall Street That Is

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Taking Krispy Kreme to the Street...Wall Street

I have always had this thing about a bumble bee. Someone, years ago, who was something of a scientific PhD type at a major university, told me that the bumble bee, from a physics point of view could not fly due to its large body weight and extremely tiny wings. Couldn’t be done. Yet just last year I had a fat queen bumble bee, the meanest and most aggressive in early spring before the smaller drones come out and do the nectar drinking, flew at my face for no apparent reason and stung me in the right eyebrow nearly sending me to the hospital…my tolerance for bee stings had maxed out so I now have to carry a little needle thing around all summer to stab myself with in case of another sting. Bummer.

So if the bumble bee can’t fly, how does it? The answer – nobody told her she couldn’t; so she flies anyway. This results in the memorable life statement: “If you’ve got the right attitude, facts don’t count.” I have seen this little tidbit of back pocket philosophy come true countless times over my career, for me and for others around me. For many years I wore a solid gold bumble bee on my lapel to stay reminded of the strength of the human mind over obstacles ahead. Especially when you don’t know you can’t get over those obstacles.

When my partners and I started up Glazing Saddles, our franchise group which has eight Krispy Kreme stores scattered around the mighty fine state of Texas, we were so full of resolve that we never stepped back to say, “Maybe we can’t pull this off.” The three of us partners had been involved on the corporate level with Krispy Kreme and other major food service businesses so we had solid experience that we felt would make us successful as a Krispy Kreme franchisee. But, none of us had ever been a franchisee at anything so we really knew nothing…yet we flew. With Krispy Kreme stores today in Laredo, Austin, San Marcos, San Antonio, and El Paso we’re not a huge business by any means, but we’re a hugely successful business by all means. Successful because we didn’t know we could fail? Who knows? All I know is that the bumble bee is still flying pretty strong around our markets in the Lone Star state.

One of the biggest bumble bee stories in Krispy Kreme Land probably ever is when corporate KK made the decision to move from NASDAQ where they had pulled off a whopping IPO a little over a year earlier, to the New York Stock Exchange where they’re still being traded today. The move was to happen on May 17, 2001 and prior to that someone at corporate said something that really started a buzz around the office. “What if we set up a complete 270 dozen an hour doughnut line in the street right in front of the NYSE and serve HOT original glazed doughnuts to the investment community as they run around that morning going to work?” What?! If that’s not grounds for applying the bumble bee theory to something I don’t know what is. Have any of you taken a good look at our doughnut making equipment in our stores? It’s big and heavy, filled with hot vegetable shortening, and hot glaze and uses massive amounts of power and diligent work to get the doughnuts to the customers. And, oh yes, the equipment sits inside our building and not out on the un-level Broad Street which runs in front of the NYSE headquarters in lower Manhattan.

Remember, I was at corporate at the time and can say with clarity that no one ever doubted that something like this could be done; especially Fred Mitchell who was responsible for pulling it off. The “what if it doesn’t work and we all look like we just fell off a turnip truck” never once came up, so off we went. My job was to document the whole thing on film from start to finish which was easy compared to what we saw through our viewfinders.

Once the clearances to close down several streets around the NYSE beginning at 10PM on May 16th were obtained, the equipment, which was scheduled to be installed in a new store in New York later that month, was sent through its final prep stages in Winston-Salem where it was manufactured in Krispy Kreme’s equipment department. The equipment department, under Fred’s guidance, installs doughnut making equipment every day which usually takes three or four days to complete. However they had never installed a complete system outside on a tiny city street in New York in 10 hours in the middle of the night. But that’s what they set out to do. AND, they planned to serve coffee to go with the Hot Original Glazed Yeast Raised doughnuts! Can’t have our doughnuts without our coffee is a well-known theory, so there.

Our film crew arrived at the NYSE around 8:30PM and began positioning camera and lights where we needed them. Being there at that moment was a bit un-nerving because it was very breezy, slightly foggy and there was hardly any sound in what is always a very loud and boisterous place. Wall Street was literally closed for the night and the Krispy Kreme installation engineers had the short night to do the un-doable…set up an entire, functioning Krispy Kreme doughnut store under a long, open-sided tent and be handing out just-off-the line hot doughnuts by 8AM the next morning.

Then we heard the sound. Big diesel engines slowly rumbling up the narrow streets. We couldn’t see them at first but the sounds gave us all chill bumps. Around the tight corner came the first Krispy Kreme logoed 18 wheeler followed by others along with an army of other panel trucks and cars with trailers. Within minutes Broad Street was full of good ole boys and girls from North Carolina on a mission like no other in their lifetimes. Watching everything begin to be unloaded and positioned was identical to watching a circus or state fair being set up. No one was laughing or joking, yet no one looked frightened or intimidated. It was easy to believe that these folks did this type of unlikely assembly on some street somewhere every night of the year. It was smooth, rehearsed and focused. Every detail was planned, right down to food for the crew several hours in, and every movement to the man was so precise that you knew this was their Super Bowl, the Olympics even, and the Gold would be theirs. The bumble bee was in full sting mode!

As we filmed and watched, all sorts of engineering and menial tasks were taking place simultaneously. The multi-ton equipment had to be assembled and leveled; massive generators had to make quiet power; cables run in all directions; teams of workers covered it all with a tent; serving tables set in place; helium balloons filled by the hundreds; music playback installed for ambience; coffee makers filled and heated; cups, plates, napkins by the tens of thousands laid out; customer service personnel dressed and ready – this list could go on for another full page. To sum it up at this point: by 5AM they were making doughnuts and doing major “high-fives” and by 7AM every detail was completed, the Hot Light was on, and the “customers” (brokers and bankers and everybody else who works on “The Street”) started arriving by the hundreds, then by the thousands! It was the happiest circus I have ever witnessed, and I’ve been to a few. I would say it might have been one of the happiest days on Wall Street…couldn’t deny that if you had seen the looks on the faces of all the doughnut eaters scurrying around in the street. Krispy Kreme was working its’ Magic Moments on some of the toughest business people on earth. Total success! By very late morning it was over and the crew faced even less time to break everything down, load up and be out of there.

The final tally? 43,000 Hot Glazed Krispy Kreme doughnuts had been served to the traders and anyone else who happened by, along with 70,000 cups of Krispy Kreme coffee! No hitches that couldn’t be solved. No errors that couldn’t be reversed. And, no smiles that could be wiped away.

And the bumble bee? If you believe it can fly, it will fly.

Krispy Mike

Krispy Kreme Is Sometimes Hard To Shake

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Krispy Kreme AND In-N-Out?? A Dream Come True!!

If you know anything about Krispy Kreme you know that one of its many personality quirks, if doughnut shops have personalities, is that it is not on every corner and can sometimes be a bit off the beaten path when you’re in the mood for a hot original glazed doughnut right off the line. You kind of have to seek out Krispy Kreme doughnut stores but after nearly 75 years there have been a few complaints about availability. It’s just the way it is when you don’t saturate the market the way, say, Subway does. They market on every corner, we market to our customers who know where we are and when the Hot Light’s on our loyal friends are always there for us just as we’re there for them.

We’re The Only One

In Texas, there is but one Krispy Kreme franchisee, and that’s us, Glazing Saddles. We operate eight stores spread out all over the place because that’s the way our franchise agreement told us where to build them, and that’s just what we did – one in Laredo, two in Austin, one in San Marcos, two in San Antonio, and two in El Paso. Now when you take a gander at the size of Texas, those eight stores might seem a little thin on volume but I assure you they’re not thin on quality and taste. “Yet and still” as my uncle used to say, we ain’t doin’ too bad with just eight, but we sure could use a few more.

Having So Much Fun We Just Had To Get Away

When you work hard at something you love then you hardly ever get tired of it. But, I almost hate to say this, sometimes you do. My very fine partners in Glazing Saddles who are identified as Krispy Randy and Krispy Mark are hard workers, like me, when I work. Krispy Randy cracks his benevolent whip over the operations while Krispy Mark keeps up with the numbers on every single tidbit of the company, while I oversee our in-the-trenches marketing efforts and then write blogs every week for whatever reason I haven’t quite figured out yet except that Jennifer said I ought to, to be ‘social’ and all. By and by us three partners were reaching a point where we thought “wouldn’t it be nice to not think a single thing about Krispy Kreme for a while.” That sounds worse than it is, but I’m trying my hardest to tell the truth in this blog this week. That feeling of wanting to get away came, I feel certain, after never ending internal and store meetings; dealing with corporate attorneys who don’t return phone calls; replacing grease traps; doing very high multi-hundreds of thousands of dollars renovations on several stores to keep them pretty; dealing with banker’s endless forms and real estate people’s endless property to look at; buying new trucks; repairing old trucks, repairing major pieces of equipment, opening new stores, buying billboards; designing new marketing campaigns; implementing corporate programs; reading the economic news everyday; and all the other things you have to do to keep the Hot Light on at our Krispy Kreme stores. It’s not all fun all the time but the hard-nosed realities of being in a business you love is just part of working hard in the American capitalist system that we also deeply appreciate (and we pray that it begins to become more capitalistic like it once recently was, when this November rolls around).

Time For Some Head Clearing

So, while us partners were growing weary and a bit grouchy, we hatched out an R&R idea and decided to cash in some frequent flyer miles and get away from the glaze of Krispy Kreme for a couple of days, you know to clear out the sinuses of a long, busy winter and think about things other than the mighty fine business we’re in. To re-state a powerful Japanese saying, “Space is the key to closeness,” we decided to make space and head out to San Francisco, rent a car with some other points we’ve accumulated, then maybe just drive up to wine country and sit in some chairs and sip some wine. Krispy Randy and Krispy Mark are real experts on wine and they know how to buy the finest wine there is for the cheapest prices there are. I don’t know which one of the two is tighter but when they’re together the pennies and nickels really start to roll. Now, me, I enjoy Ketle One up and chilled and I put ice in it to make it last. So I guess I have my own way of pinching little Lincolns, maybe not as classy as a smooth cab or merlot bought right, but certainly I fit into our frugal philosophy just by adding ice to stretch the drink.

Flying Into Nose Ring Country

We fly from Austin to California with a pledge to not say one word about our Krispy Kreme business or even think about it for three days, then when we get back we’ll be re-glazed and fired up – totally ready to tackle anything that rolls our way through the long hot summer months looming at us right now. Flight goes perfect, conversation turns to all kinds of worthless things that makes us feel better by trying not to be serious. Landing by the bay in San Francisco was flawless, rental car was ready, and the drive up the 101 wasn’t even jammed as usual. With a good flight, which is so rare these days, a quick journey through the rental car line and an un-crowded highway we had no distractions to bother us other than nearly every guy we saw had an earring or two, and one guy in a tailored suit had a tiny silver nose ring dangling there in broad daylight! But hey, we’re from Austin so nothing seems weird to us most of the time.

Time To Forget And Eat A Burger

I don’t know what Krispy Randy and Krispy Mark were thinking as we headed north but I know I was trying my hardest to forget our doughnuts and enjoy the day. I was doing pretty good at it when we all decided we were hungry and started enthusiastically talking up In-N-Out Burgers, an iconic California hamburger chain with a serious cult following much like, should I say it…Krispy Kreme. My partners and I love the burgers and fries at In-N-Out and since we spend our time mostly in Texas we don’t get many chances to chow down on these memorable bun meats and taters. Hunger called for a re-route on the Garmin by Krispy Randy after Krispy Mark located the closest In-N-Out on his IPhone. Daly City, California is the place and it’s just ahead off the freeway. By now I am certain that Krispy Kreme had vacated our heads and we’re free to enjoy not only the burgers but also the R&R as we intended.

Getting Close To The Prize – Then SURPRISE!

Off the freeway (which costs $5 to ride on, so it ain’t free) we go following the tinny female voice barking orders at us from the Garmin. We’re all salivating by this time as we make the turn into Daly City, onto Washington Street then to Sullivan Street. Even the lady in the Garmin seems to gain excitement as we close in on In N Out. Krispy Randy, who is driving, sends out a challenge when he almost shouts, “First one to see the the sign doesn’t have to pay!” Krispy Randy’s into sports so everything becomes a contest sooner or later. Krispy Mark and I have our eyes focused ahead as Lady Garmin begins to scream with joy, “You’re at your destination!” she says, at the same time us three partners see the sign. It was a total shock! We sighed in unison, “I can’t believe this,” as we encountered the In N Out sign at the same visual instant. But it wasn’t the In N Out sign that we couldn’t believe, right beside it on a shared sign was a name we were trying to forget for a while: Krispy Kreme Doughnuts. There it was; a free-standing In-N-Out Burgers store right beside a free-standing Krispy Kreme Doughnuts store. Of all the many In-N-Outs in Northern California we picked the very one that has a Krispy Kreme cozied up next to it. WE CAN’T SHAKE KRISPY KREME.

We Did What We HAD To Do

What‘d we do after parking the car? We went straight into Krispy Kreme to check it out. Couldn’t wait to see what the doughnuts looked like. They looked great and this made us display big smiles of brand-pride. The store was immaculate and the employees were outstanding. Forgetting Krispy Kreme was now out the window. We’re hooked on our business!

After a fabulous lunch of burgers and fries we were satisfied with our serendipity and never stopped talking about Krispy Kreme for the length of the trip, between tastings of wine, of course. This whole adventure ushered us into some mighty fine planning for the growth of our business, with no remorse over not trying to get away from doughnuts for a while.

So even though Krispy Kreme stores are not on every corner, sometimes you might be surprised about a certain corner you find one on and what that discovery might do for your future. What a magical business to be in.

Krispy Mike

Why Krispy Kreme Doughnuts Are A Shade Better When They’re Hot

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Hot Doughnuts Now!

As the 75th Anniversary of Krispy Kreme is just around the 180 curve (July 13th) my thoughts slide the other direction on the calendar to ramble around in some history of this always fascinating company. The company is brimming with stories, some true; some, well maybe true; and also overrun with characters who have come and gone, some who have left, came back then left again. And, yes, it’s very true that some characters are still here.

We’re creating our own history in Texas with stores in Laredo, Austin, San Marcos, San Antonio, and El Paso. Eight stores in all operated with great efficiency and very little duct tape by our franchise company, Glazing Saddles, headquartered in our offices which we call The Ranch in Austin, Texas. Wanna rub elbows with some real characters? Then spend a few days in Austin. Even though its’ claim, “Keep Austin Weird”, is a bit far-fetched, you’ll still fall in love with the place but never stop scratching your head in wonderment.

I’m writing this in Austin at this moment sitting in our store at 8AM and looking at what we refer to as the “Hot Light” in the window. The neon “light” states – HOT DOUGHNUTS NOW – and there’s a line of people at the drive-thru and a nice line inside with kids at the production room window watching the Hot Original Glazed Doughnuts come down the conveyor. That’s why the “Hot Light” is on – to signal passersby’s that our original yeast-raised rings are coming hot off the line right now. This is an icon of our Krispy Kreme stores and when the light comes on in the morning and evening, people come in to enjoy.

Krispy Kreme stores all over the country have been turning on this delicious symbol for decades but only a few out there have ever heard how the Hot Light was originally invented. Now through the power of Krispy Mike’s blog, the handful of loyal readers will also know the story…one of the bigger stories in our remarkable history. Oddly, the Hot Light didn’t come out of ancient history. It got itself created in the late 1970’s by a fellow named Bob Glidden who was manager of the Krispy Kreme store in Chattanooga, Tennessee. To be clear, Bob didn’t build a neon sign and flip a switch. Far from it, but what he did was invent the very thing that would become iconic in our doughnut business.

Sales in the Chattanooga store were OK but Bob felt like if he could just get more people to try our original glazed doughnut, hot off the line, then he knew he would increase his sales. Even back then the original glazed doughnut was our signature product as it still is today. No one, except maybe Bob, and he’s not saying, knows what triggered in his brain to do what he did. What he did was, on his lunch hour he drove over to JC Penny’s and bought a large white window shade. Then he cruised over to a local sign painter and had him put the following words on the opened shade in big block letters that you could see from far away: HOT DOUGHNUTS NOW. By now I’m sure you know where this is heading. Bob went back to the store and hung the shade in the front window late at night. At that time the shade was rolled up. The next morning our Hot Doughnuts Now sign inventor, Bob Glidden, did something when the hot glazed doughnuts were coming down the line which changed Krispy Kreme forever. He pulled down the shade! That simple move marked the beginning of what we call the “Hot Light” today. The shade was down. Hot Doughnuts Now was visible to anyone going by the store and sales suddenly took a magical turn upward. When the Hot Original Yeast Raised “Krispy Kremes” were coming out, the shade was down. When other doughnuts were being made during the day or late at night, the shade was up. It didn’t take long for customers to figure out what the sign stood for and sales of glazed dozens continued to climb.

There’s a lot more to the Hot Light story than how it originated. Corporate Krispy Kreme in Winston-Salem, NC got so curious about the sales increase in Chattanooga that they went to investigate. It wasn’t too long before corporate KK had developed a better way to make the Hot Light more powerful by turning it into a neon sign not dissimilar from the ones you see in our store windows today. Instead of pulling down a shade all you had to do was flip a little switch. What Krispy Kreme corporate did was take a primitive yet powerful marketing invention, dreamed up by a store manager in a small Krispy Kreme doughnut shop in Tennessee and turned it into the very essence of what Krispy Kreme is all about to this day. But the idea had to come first. It always does.

I guess this story is not as glamorous as you might have thought it would be. But I think it clearly illustrates the simple brilliance of Bob Glidden’s idea – an idea that I assure you was never called “marketing” by him as it is by us today. And to put it a little more poetically, historical events like this make our doughnuts a shade better than all the rest – and with that little quip, it’s time to pull down the shade on my blog.

Finally I can have a hot doughnut, right off the line.

Krispy Mike

With Krispy Kreme Texas It’s Not Just About The Doughnut

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FCA

Ever heard about Krispy Kreme Original Hot Glazed Doughnuts coming hot off the line signaled by the “Hot Doughnuts Now” neon sign glowing red-hot in the window of one of our stores? We hope you have. We have eight stores in Texas that turn that signal on every day and we have loyal customers, company-wide dating all the way back to 1937 when Krispy Kreme was started, who respond to that signal and come in for a hot dozen glazed “when the hot light hits em.”

Now, next question…Ever heard about FCA? Like us, they have a hot sign in their window but it says “Hot Jesus Christ Now”. If you’ve been reading my blogs for a while you know that I’m not making all this up. Though I classify some of my blogs as part of my “Shoveling Smoke Series,” this one is on solid ground. FCA stands for “Fellowship of Christian Athletes” and this is no small organization even though ‘fellowship’ might be a bit of an old-fashioned word, and until Tim Tebow started kneeling and winning last NFL season, ‘Christian Athlete’ might as well have been a statement of the nearly unknown.

But let me tell you, this FCA non-profit which started out in 1954, is as well-known in the Christian world as NFL is known in the rest of the world. And the rest of the world knows a lot more about being Christian than the main stream media outposts would ever let on to. Wait-a-minute, I’m not running off in a religious rant here, I just want to tell you something about a cause that we at Glazing Saddles/ Krispy Kreme Doughnuts in Texas is very involved in and we find that our customers want to be involved in it too. Because what FCA does for young, aspiring athletes and non-athletes as well, is a powerful thing and one that’s steeped in their key words ‘integrity’, ‘serving’, ‘teamwork’, ‘excellence’. You can Google FCA for the details behind these words and the whole organization itself.

FCA has many different spiritual-based sports activities for kids. We like to get involved in raising money to help kids go to FCA leadership and sports camps who might not otherwise be able to go. These camps take place on college campuses and involve powerful sports programs fired by spiritual meaning under the guidance of some of the country’s best sports trainers. We ask our customers to add a $1 or more to their Krispy Kreme bill which we then turn over to FCA, and they, in their usual non-profit-organizational way see that the money helps fund the attendance of kids who want to go to these camps where there’s a long line of hopefuls wanting to get in, and our donated dollars open doors so they can. We relish doing this because we don’t just stay involved in our communities because we have to; we’re involved because we’re driven to. We live where we work. Our Glazing Saddles’ staff , our General Managers, our Managers, and our front line employees are a permanent part of the places where we live and work and we all give back as much as we can because that’s the way it’s always been at Krispy Kreme. Our communities make us what we are and we want to give back to them in meaningful ways just as they always give their loyalty to us. In the retail food business of any kind it’s a two-way street where everyone, retailers and customers, all ride the same buses, go to the same schools, shop at the same stores, watch the same little league games, go to the same churches and watch the same sunrises and sunsets…in short, we’re in it together and we play on the same team.

To illustrate how real and I dare say, honest, our commitment to community and FCA is, I want to share with you a very inside look at what happened to one of our General Managers when he attended an FCA event in El Paso where the key speaker was the Longhorn’s former quarterback, Colt McCoy, who, in addition to having been drafted into the NFL, also plays a major guiding role to the FCA generation today. Our Krispy Kreme General Manager’s name is Ricardo Vela and he oversees the operation of our biggest store, which is in El Paso. Ricardo had a chance to join an FCA group meeting recently headlining Colt who spoke with his usual passion and conviction to the attendees. Ricardo sat and listened and by the end of Colt’s remarks something very special had happened to him…without a doubt, he got it right at that moment. He understood what FCA means to everyone it touches and on that night it touched Ricardo.

Following is an internal email he sent us at Glazing Saddles office in Austin. It is a simple, straightforward look at the kind of people we’re fortunate enough to have working with us. This email shows how we really care about what we do in our work and in our lives. I hope his words will speak to you the way they did to us…

Wow, what a very inspirational speech from Colt McCoy and the Students of the Year for FCA. I did get to meet him but was too embarrassed to ask for an autograph. It is really amazing hearing stories of these kids after going through FCA camp and the weekly huddle classes and how they just get inspired by the coaches and leaders. I am truly blessed to be working for such fine folks at Glazing Saddles, and believe me I want to do so much more for this company every day but there are only so many hours in a day. The one thing I remember most is when Colt talked about being content with life and in every situation like when losing football games, money, relationships, job, car, etc…that no matter if circumstances take everything from you that you will still be content as long as you still have Jesus in your life. I can relate to this because when I look at my numbers every week and don’t hit my budget or see something that is not being done right and nobody takes the time to correct the issue it is very frustrating, but I know that as long as I keep doing the right thing from my point of view that things will eventually get better. My family and I are truly blessed because I have a job, a roof over my head, food on the table and our health. Thanks so much for everything you all do for me and my family each and every day!

>> Ricardo Vela
>> General Manager (Krispy Kreme)

After that there isn’t much more to say about FCA and Krispy Kreme. Hope to see you soon in one of our Texas stores and hope you’ll share a little for FCA when you get ready to dig into a dozen original hot glazed doughnuts with your family and friends.

Krispy Mike

Glazing Saddles Goes Out To Dinner and Takes Aunt Mae Along For The Ride

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Krispy Kreme and El Paso Sunset both aglow!

(Note: This is Number Six in the SHOVELIN’ SMOKE Series)

You might be thinking that all we do at our Glazing Saddles’ Krispy Kreme stores in Texas is work, work, work. Well, if you thought that you’d be right, partly. We do go out to eat at other places from time to time and really enjoy a good meal in a fine restaurant or a good meal in an established dive – as long as it’s a good meal it doesn’t matter too much about where we enjoy it, especially if the drinks are just as good as the food. When I say “we” I mean my partners Krispy Randy and his wife, Jennifer and Krispy Mark and his wife, Sharon and me and my wife, Karen. We’re all serious foodies and especially appreciate local food whenever we can get it. And since we have stores in Laredo, Austin, San Marcos, San Antonio, and El Paso we always have a chance to snag a locally sourced meal done just right in one of the cities where our stores are serving up hot original glazed doughnuts and all the other varieties some say we’re pretty well-known for.

Speaking of El Paso, it was in this hot and un-humid west Texas outpost last July that we had a mighty fine evening at a mighty fine place that chef’d up some really well-designed vittles of the country club gourmet variety, which is a distinction all its own in most country clubs in the US of A. Good food, done right, in an atmosphere where friendship and camaraderie are always present in double servings. We were in the midst of opening our second store in El Paso and things were going so well that we accepted an offer to dinner at the Coronado Country Club by an old friend of ours. There would be my partners and I and our wives and a couple of others in our group to wind our way up into the mountains behind El Paso to one of the most beautiful views you’ll ever lay your eyes on – that view from the venerable Coronado Country Club. The club itself is an old established one that wears its age well and makes you feel like you could wear your jeans to dinner and feel right at home…of course, it is Texas where jeans and boots are acceptable forms of formal informality. In short this club is the kind of club I would join because there’s no pretension in the rarified air like there is in some clubs I’ve stumbled into and out of.

Thank goodness the club had that style of laid back character as I had a character with me who had ridden the train out to see our new store opening who might not have fit in all that well at a stuffier venue (please remember, I’m writing this on April 1). That character was my Aunt Mae from North Carolina. Before she passed she was married to my favorite uncle, Uncle Nub, so-named due to his shortness. A man from a neighboring farm nicknamed Uncle Nub, “Nubbin” when he was just a little country boy and the name stuck. Uncle Nub’s still with us and is 94. I’m extremely proud of my family although I’m the only one who ever went into the Krispy Kreme doughnut business and they’re proud of me because I did. All my family going back many years were farmers and mechanics and hard workers and all had common sense and senses of humor that could keep you up laughing all night. Aunt Mae was no different in the funny department.

Well the dinner went well and our friend who invited us talked a lot about himself, which was somewhat pleasurable at times. Employees of the club were nice enough to bring around some little gifts, logo-ball caps for the men and golf socks for the ladies. My wife doesn’t play golf so she later gave her pair to our daughter-in-law who does. The view across the greens from the club windows was filled with a sunset of which there are probably few that ever came close to being so stunning. Aunt Mae was impressed, though kept very quiet in this, somewhat to her, overwhelming setting. When she got back to North Carolina she called her niece, Shirley, and recreated that evening at the Coronado CC in great detail. Shirley who is a wiz at technology as she works at an IT company in the Research Triangle in Raleigh, recorded Aunt Mae’s Krispy Kreme dinner party story, something Shirley does a lot of for posterity sake – she, like all of us in the family relish hearing Aunt Mae spin out a tale.

So here from last July is Aunt Mae’s rendition of what happened at “supper” in El Paso, Texas just after we had successfully opened our second Krispy Kreme store there. This story is #6 in the Shovelin’ Smoke series which runs from time to time in Krispy Mike’s blog. Hope you enjoy.

Phone rings and Shirley says, “Hello.” Then Aunt Mae starts in with her dinner story.

Aunt Mae: “Hey Shirley this is your Ain’t Mae. I couldn’t wait to call you about this. I just got back from El Paso and while I’s there I went with Nephew Mike and his wife and a bunch of doughnut sellers who were all invited to supper at the El Paso supper club called the ‘In-car-o-nation’ or sumpin like at and they musta liked us cause they had a big ol’ long table a-set with so many dif-rent kinds of forks and spoons and milk glasses that I like to hissied out what with all them choices to make in front of important people like at. The head feller down at the main seat – he’s the one who asked us out there, smiled all night showin off his purty teeth, and talked a lot about hisself and all he had did in the business he was in – which I can’t say what that was as I was a-settin far down the table from him so I couldn’t place ever word he spoke, which I fig-ered was just as well cause I was havin to deal with all them forks and glasses and that kept me pretty tied up…

…Aunt Mae continues: “Well, Shirley, the view outa them tall windows was especial and you could see I don’t know what-all out there with all them mountains a-pokin up ever-where. I was really a-cravin on a Schlitz beer in a bottle with some salt but was fraid that might not look right so I went with some kind of fancy wine they gave us. Guess what!? Them wine bottles had corks in em that some guy popped out. I always found metal screw-off caps go better with my style of wine, and they’re easier to use…but, anyhow, I sipped along like ever-body else.

“But that’s not the good part. The food they laid out had a real ‘shine’ to it settin up air on the Chiner plate but I got comfort that it tast-ed zackly like the food me and mother used to get at the K&W cafeteria, that is before they closed it for good. What a tasty surprise-like membrance it was. But that’s not the main thing I wanted you to know about and that is the prizes the women got who was eatin there along with me. All of a sudden this pretty young lady come up outa nowhere and give each girl at our supper table a pair of socks!! Don’t that take the cake, honey! That little girl just laid them socks down right besides that small plate, which I never could fig-er what that was for. Now think, Shirley, new socks with supper! They never once did that at the K& W, although Uncle Henry, when he was a-gittin on in life, took his socks off one night while us family was sayin the blessin. Bad part about that, other than his bare feet, was that one sock was blue an the other’n was of plaid, like them guys who wear skirts and blow music outa them bag pipe machines. Don’t you miss Uncle Henry? I sure do.

“Nuther thing – them socks that supper club give out were different from what I done ever seen and I speck it’s cause-a hard money times we’re all strugglin’ at, even supper clubs, I reckon…them socks didn’t have no tops on em so there ain’t be no way they’d ever keep a girl’s ankles warm. Course it’s so hot in El Paso that I seen how most people don’t even wear socks. But I’ll bet money for dad-gum sure that our doughnut girls will show off in em ever chanst they git. But not to church. That’d be plain wrong.

“Git-in late, gotta run, honey. You can call me any time now cause I laid out some money on my phone bill an I’m good to talk all this month…love ya, Shirley. Bye.”

And I gotta run, too…see you next blog – it’ll be smoke–free.

Krispy Mike

Krispy Kreme Is Not Crispy Cream and Doughnuts are not Donuts

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Krispy Kreme is not Crispy Cream!

Scratch on a plastered wall with your fingernails and what do you think of? If it’s me, I can’t think of anything but running away. There are some sounds and sights, inappropriate words or phrases that send most of us into some sort of chill bump creepiness, disgust even.

Well as a franchise partner in Glazing Saddles out here in Texas I can speak only for myself and maybe Jennifer Willard, our Facebook orchestrator at GS headquarters in Austin, that when I see the word doughnut not spelled out as d o u g h n u t but rather, spelled D O N U T, I recoil almost in anger. And when Donut is used with our brand name Krispy Kreme, words can’t describe how I mentally recoil. Doughnuts are made of dough, at least Krispy Kreme doughnuts are, and they’re not made of DO, as in the wedding vow, “ I Do.” The proper spelling of the word is D-O-U-G-H-N-U-T and the reason should be clear to anyone who has a google button on his or her computer screen and cares to check out some doughnut history.

Short doughnut history from Krispy Mike – It is said that doughnuts have been around for centuries but arrived in this country when some pilgrims from Holland showed up with fried cakes holding fruit in the centers. These doughnuts were called “olykoeks” which literally means “oily cakes”, but later were referred to as ‘doughnuts’, the term first printed in a short story in 1808. The writer Washington Irving’s The History of New York made doughnuts sort of a household word in 1809 when he describes “balls of sweetened dough, fried in hog’s fat, and called doughnuts, or olykoeks.” So, as 1809 is quite a distance back in time and doughnuts was spelled doughnuts then, I think it’s safe to say that that’s a pretty good back-up to what the correct spelling ought to be today. Experts say that “doughnuts” is the proper, formal spelling and that “donuts” is ok, too, as certain others use it frequently.

I’m glad that “Oily Cakes” as arriving immigrants referred to them didn’t catch on because it would have constituted a marketing nightmare. I can only imagine walking into one of our eight stores, conveniently located in Laredo, Austin, San Marcos, San Antonio, and El Paso and asking for two dozen glazed oily cakes and some coffee and milk to wash it down. The word doughnuts is looking better right now than when I started writing this down. But we doughnut lovers would enjoy them no matter what they’re called and that brings me to another spelling quiz, which you may not have even considered.

Krispy Kreme, the brand is spelled Krispy Kreme not ‘Crispy Cream’ which are dictionary words. Why? Well, 1937 marketing might have had something to do with it. In those times people did funky things with product words to gain attention of potential customers. In fact that still goes on today…check out some of the names of cars to see what I mean – SMART CAR? Pretty dumb when the car looks like a La-Z-Boy recliner wrapped in thin layers of tin and glass…AND ON THE HIGHWAY WITH 18 wheelers! Smart? Vernon Rudolph, our visionary founder wrote out the first Krispy Kreme logo by hand in blue ink. Why he purposely misspelled and mis-lettered the name is not important today because we accept and enjoy the fun aspect of how it’s presented. At least I do.

Now, about DONUT, the word. At the time of the 1939 World’s Fair in New York, the NY Times used the word “donut” in two out of four articles about the Fair. That was just two years after Krispy Kreme Doughnuts was started in Winston-Salem, NC. Doughnuts continued to be spelled correctly until a New England company originally called Open Kettle morphed into a company in 1948 called Dunkin Donuts. After that the spelling donuts got a lot of exposure and still does today. I believe that, in obvious ways, that brand name reflects the fact that ‘dunkin’ is something you physically do…you know, ‘dunk’ a donut into coffee…great name for a coffee company that also sells ‘donuts’ which is what DD essentially does and always has done by design. I’m proud to say that Krispy Kreme Doughnuts is a doughnut company that also sells coffee. So there.

But there’s room for all of us doughnut makers and I’m certainly not complaining about certain spelling-challenged marketers and article writers. At the very best, our language is a tough one. We have many great Hispanic employees working in all our Texas Krispy Kremes and they often remind me that English ain’t easy (the way I say it). Think about spellings and definitions of just a few words in our vocabulary for example: grey/gray – to/too – skilful/skillful – spelled/spelt – checkout/check out – defence/defense – flier/flyer – capitol/capital – burned/burnt – champing at the bit/chomping at the bit…See what I mean…it can be tough to spell things right in America.

There’s so much I don’t know about a whole lot of things that getting worked up over the spelling of doughnuts might be a big waste of time when I could be at UT getting a doctorate in something fancy, although that’s not on the immediate horizon. For now I’ll put it this way, I’m going to leave this desk post haste and drive over to our Krispy Kreme doughnut store in San Marcos and order a dozen hot original glazed doughnuts, and a dozen assorted doughnuts including Easter special HOP doughnuts, chocolate iced doughnuts, cruller doughnuts, and whatever other doughnuts catch my eye, and many often do. Then I’m going to take them home and share them with my family and neighbors and not say one word about how doughnuts should be spelled. Because Krispy Kreme Doughnuts should just simply be enjoyed and that’s all there is to it. Mostly.

Got to run. Better spell-check this blog before I publish it. Wonder how spell-check will spell doughnuts?

Krispy Mike

Glazing Saddles Cruises Across the Gulf to Start a Rodeo

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Just when you thought I’d discontinued my regular blog distribution of shameless self promotion for Glazing Saddles, our franchise in the Lone Star state for Krispy Kreme doughnuts, here I go again touting some picture images of us enjoying a cruise across the Gulf of Mexico over to a little place called Cozumel, which is an island sitting in the Caribbean Sea just east of the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico. My two sea-going partners, Krispy Randy and Krispy Mark, and me decided a good while back that the General Managers of our eight Krispy Kreme stores sprinkled all across Texas had done a whole lot of good work toward everyone’s prosperity that we should throw a party for them as thanks for their jobs well-done. As my partners and I were having this little conversation over brisket and beers -  or maybe I should say ‘beers and brisket’, the former taking precedence  that night – the “party” gradually grew and shortly became a full-sized cruise across the Gulf in a ship called Carnival Triumph.

So about a week ago we gathered all eight of the GM’s and guests, and us three with our wives, went down to the dock in Galveston, climbed aboard with our duffle bags and sailed into the afternoon rain, which soon turned to sun which shown on our heads for nearly the whole trip, except at night when all picked up the glow from the bright lights in the casino.

The point of the trip was simple: to share some fun. The subtext of the trip hit a different, more competitive note. In short, on this cruise we started a 13 week ‘trail ride’ under the banner “Rodeo Dough” which will culminate with much money and points (towards great prizes) being awarded and the Grand Champion store at the end of the competition will see its General Manager and spouse being sent to watch The National Rodeo Finals in Las Vegas in December. The Rodeo Dough is a serious competition among our stores and has challenges in categories covering virtually every part of what takes place daily in each of the eight: operations, marketing, product quality, cleanliness, store appearance, speed of service, quality of service and so on (don’t need to reproduce the rule book here). Judging will be weekly and other city events will happen throughout the trail ride awarding prizes and points along the way. As our GM’s are very competitive this will be a barn-burner which you’ll be able to see for miles. But it will be an honest burn as “cheatin’ won’t be tolerated but our deputies will have the calaboose unlocked and ready, just in case one of the buckaroos get a little cruller-happy.

So now following the above little, understated intro, we will now indulge ourselves with some pictures and captions from the cruise. All of us at Glazing Saddles/Krispy Kreme will enjoy looking over these photos cause it’s about us. And since you don’t really know us that well maybe seeing our pictures will let you know a little more about who we are and better understand that the doughnut business really is about having fun.

Ahoy! Ride Hard and Ride Fast!

Krispy Mike

 

 

Who’s Got the Best Doughnut?

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Krispy Kreme Double Dozen

The above question can’t be answered by me or my Glazing Saddles/Krispy Kreme Texas franchise partners, Krispy Randy, and Krispy Mark or our General Managers and Managers: David in Laredo, Wagon in Austin, Rusty in Austin, Brian in San Marcos, Wiley in San Antonio, Tory in San Antonio, Ricardo in El Paso, Mando in El Paso, and Robert in El Paso. All us Krispy Kremers have an unspoken, though occasionally spoken, agreement that it’s never good to boast about the quality of our doughnuts because it’s not our place to do so. That’s left entirely up to our customers. The quality of our doughnuts speak for themselves. Is that a boast? No. That’s just our doughnuts talking. I’m interpreting.

But I’d like to get a tad more specific, especially regarding Krispy Kreme’s competition. When I first arrived at corporate Krispy Kreme in 1994 I soon realized that I never heard anyone mention any of Krispy Kreme’s competitors. In none of the seemingly thousands of never-ending meetings in those great halls of glaze did I ever hear the words, Dunkin, McDonalds or any other operation that made products that I would have considered being in competition with us. One day I asked ‘why the silence?’ The answer was overwhelming: “We don’t have any competition, that’s why we never talk about it.” What?! Well that answer has stayed with me for nearly two decades and there are times I believe it and there are other times that I believe it is possibly even dangerous to think that Krispy Kreme’s the only one. On this point, I’ll let you the reader decide.

I suppose there’s nothing wrong with just thinking but not saying that our finely tuned original hot glazed yeast-raised doughnut has yet to be matched in quality, appearance, taste and ‘wow’ (when a newbie takes their first bite). I’m speaking just from my own personal perspective from the days prior to becoming involved as an employee and then franchisee of Krispy Kreme – back to the days when I was, in fact, a very devoted customer from my childhood in North Carolina in the real early fifties and onward. I guess I can brag a tiny bit about my doughnut ‘likes’ from those days, I just don’t do it now, as a purveyor of the brand. This is not a stretch, just a fact.

But let’s not be too limited in how we see our Krispy Kreme doughnuts when stacked up against other doughnuts and pastry products. Do you think we never sample a ‘competitor’s’ product? Of course we do, as they do ours. This is an interesting area to delve into because sampling competitor’s products can actually be a lot of informative fun and something I’ve found that invokes tremendous reassurance for me in the choice of business I’m in.

I’ll call out a recent sampling foray I made into a new doughnut shop, which opened just one block from a Krispy Kreme store in a good-sized market. The small store was the second in town for the owners, who were from Los Angeles where there are nearly 2,000 doughnut shops sitting on every corner and in every alley you’re wandering down. The doughnuts created by Krispy Kreme’s new neighbor were made virtually by the hands of the hard-working owner and his family. His doughnuts were big and beautiful and were priced right in line with Krispy Kreme’s. I met the owner who was congenial but looked tired. I bought some of his products to take away and sample and what I found was that the doughnuts were a bit heavy but had tremendous taste and “bite” and not very greasy in their finishes as many handcrafted doughnuts can sometimes be.

Upon tasting the third sample I had a serious epiphany right there in the driver’s seat of my pickup truck (a really fine place to enjoy an epiphany, especially when the truck’s idling in the safety of the parking lot of the Krispy Kreme store down the street). What was the epiphany? I was actually enjoying some very good handcrafted doughnuts fried up by a new competitor. That family can turn out a few dozen an hour to meet the demand of their 4-table store with no drive-thru. Our Krispy Kreme store, which is really a factory, can produce 270 dozen an hour to meet our peak demands for dozens. Usually when you think factory and mass production sometimes quality may be compromised in return for high quantity. Hand-made generally denotes high quality. Yet skilled doughnut makers at Krispy Kreme long ago mastered the ability to produce the absolute highest quality doughnuts in mass production factory stores. Our doughnuts don’t give up anything in quality even though they’re made in great quantities. As I sat there in my truck and ate a very good doughnut from a competitor’s shop I was reminded of the comment made to me years ago at corporate when I was told, “Krispy Kreme has no competitors.” Well, we do have competitors. They just don’t make doughnuts the way we do. Is that bragging? Doesn’t sound like it to me. How ‘bout you?

Footnote: So, what’s the final word on not bragging about our products? Can’t say. BUT I will brag about this: when someone buys one doughnut, it’s usually for himself. When someone buys a dozen Krispy Kremes, it’s usually to share with others. And to me, sharing Krispy Kremes with family and friends and office workers…well, I think that’s something to brag about. Who would ever share something they didn’t love?

Krispy Mike