For the first time, sweets from 83-year-old doughnut chain Krispy Kreme will be available nationwide thanks to a new partnership with Walmart.
Boxes of the brand's Doughnut Bites and Mini Crullers hit shelves today and the company will hold of a virtual "grand opening," a new, socially-distanced take on the chain's traditional celebrations.
"Every time we open a shop, we have a grand opening, and people sleep out for these things. I mean, people are really excited when we open a new shop," Dave Skena, the chief marketing officer of Krispy Kreme, told Cheddar.
"We thought, 1: How can we do that nationwide? and 2: How do we do it in a time of a national pandemic?"
Like so many other businesses, events, and venues, the pastry chain found a digital way to celebrate the launch. This Wednesday's online Zoom event, like the live openings of the past, will feature music and entertainment guests like NBA Hall of Famer Shaquille O'Neal, according to Skena.
The grand opening will also feature an all-night virtual "campout" contest where 40 die-hards among those staying on the Zoom conference will be selected to win a year's supply of the new doughnut products.
"We can't be everywhere, but with a CPG [consumer packaged goods] offering and Walmart, we can be everywhere," the CMO said.
The launch comes even as surging COVID-19 infections in states like Florida and Arizona are leading some retailers, like Apple, to close stores again. Skena said that Krispy Kreme is adhering to national and local guidelines for its own retail locations.
"We haven't had to close shops. In some places, we do have to restrict them to either the drive-thru or pickup," he said. "So we really follow the situation locally."
When the pandemic began to spread globally, the doughnut chain had to think about how to adjust its business plan as sales - and its marketing budget - began to take a hit, according to Skena.
"We were definitely impacted, but we thought about what can we do, not, what can't we do. We can't make respirators, we can't make surgical masks, but we can bring a lot of joy," he explained.
"How can we celebrate medical workers? How can we help people reach out to a neighbor remotely? How can we celebrate graduates? So we've given well over 20 million doughnuts away in the process of trying to celebrate and bring joy across America," Skena added. "And that has been something that has, I think, kept folks interested in us."
Joe Cecela, Dream Exchange CEO, explains how they are aiming to form the first minority-controlled company to operate an exchange in U.S. history. Watch!
A Michigan judge is putting sponges in the hands of shoplifters and ordering them to wash cars in a Walmart parking lot when spring weather arrives. Genesee County Judge Jeffrey Clothier hopes the unusual form of community service discourages people from stealing from Walmart. The judge also wants to reward shoppers with free car washes. Clothier says he began ordering “Walmart wash” sentences this week for shoplifting at the store in Grand Blanc Township. He believes 75 to 100 people eventually will be ordered to wash cars this spring. Clothier says he will be washing cars alongside them when the time comes.
The State Department had been in talks with Elon Musk’s Tesla company to buy armored electric vehicles, but the plans have been put on hold by the Trump administration after reports emerged about a potential $400 million purchase. A State Department spokesperson said the electric car company owned by Musk was the only one that expressed interest back in May 2024. The deal with Tesla was only in its planning phases but it was forecast to be the largest contract of the year. It shows how some of his wealth has come and was still expected to come from taxpayers.
At 100 years old, the Goodyear Blimp is an ageless star in the sky. The 246-foot-long airship will be in the background of the Daytona 500 — flying roughly 1,500 feet above Daytona International Speedway, actually — to celebrate its greatest anniversary tour. Even though remote camera technologies are improving regularly and changing the landscape of aerial footage, the blimp continues to carve out a niche. At Daytona, with the usual 40-car field racing around a 2½-mile superspeedway, views from the blimp aptly provide the scope of the event.
You'll just have to wait for interest rates (and prices) to go down. Plus, this deal's a steel, the big carmaker wedding is off, and bribery is back, baby!
It’s a chicken-and-egg problem: Restaurants are struggling with record-high U.S. egg prices, but their omelets, scrambles and huevos rancheros may be part of the problem. Breakfast is booming at U.S. eateries. First Watch, a restaurant chain that serves breakfast, brunch and lunch, nearly quadrupled its locations over the past decade to 570. Fast-food chains like Starbucks and Wendy's added more egg-filled breakfast items. In normal times, egg producers could meet the demand. But a bird flu outbreak that has forced them to slaughter their flocks is making supplies scarcer and pushing up prices. Some restaurants like Waffle House have added a surcharge to offset their costs.
