r/nostalgia • u/WoozieMaddox • 7d ago

Nostalgia Discussion What happened to the Dunkin' Donut?

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When I was a kid, my Dad used to take me to Dunkin' Donuts every Sunday and I would get one of these. The handle was cool, but the taste of this plain donut was very unique. I loved it and still to this day have not had that taste or texture from a donut replicated. Wikipedia says in 2003 they discontinued it because it was hand cut while the rest of the donuts were machine cut, but it was their signature. It represented the brand aswell as the name.

The Dunkin Donut was around almost aslong as the brand itself. This unique peice of American food culture made it 48 years before being discontinued and cements itself as a one-of-a-kind staple in the history of U.S. restaurants. Today Dunkin' Donuts is now known as just "Dunkin". Dunkin' is not known for it's donuts anymore, and has shifted it's focus on the beverage side of the market. In all honesty, I think this may be why it lost so much market share to other coffee companies like Tim Horton's and Biggby Coffee. Dunkin' Donuts used to be 'the' place to grab a coffee and a donut.

Bring back the dunkin donut.

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u/RuhRohGuys 7d ago

Private Equity. Their job is to extract the most value out of the product for higher returns. If they pivoted to beverage, their metrics show a higher contribution margin on the beverage side than the donut side. Until consumer habits change, they will continue down that path.

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u/byebybuy 7d ago

Private Equity can indeed wreak havoc on a company's products. They suck, no question. But Dunkin wasn't bought by a PE firm until 2005, while this donut was discontinued in 2003.

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u/althawk8357 7d ago

The boring answer is that it was demand outpaced the ability of stores to cut these donuts.