Dunkin' Donuts

• 1. Introduction

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  Dunkin', for most of its life called Dunkin' Donuts, once sold a doughnut built with a handle. Johnny Spartos, one of the men running the original location, convinced founder Bill Rosenberg to make a shape designed for dunking into a cup of coffee. The handle had to be cut by hand, and that detail sealed its fate. In 2003 the company retired the handled doughnut everywhere except Singapore, because machine-cut doughnuts were so much cheaper to produce.

  The American coffee and doughnut company now has roughly 14,000 locations in 39 countries. That makes it one of the largest chains of its kind in the world. Its counters carry bagels, breakfast sandwiches, muffins and doughnut holes sold under the name Munchkins, alongside the coffee and doughnuts that built the business.

  The map behind those numbers is uneven. How did a single restaurant grow into a global brand? Why did the chain drop a word from its own name? And why did it vanish from some countries while thriving in others?

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• 2. From Open Kettle to Chain

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  Bill Rosenberg opened a restaurant called the Open Kettle in 1948, in Quincy, Massachusetts, a suburb of Boston. It sold doughnuts and coffee. In late May 1950 he renamed it Dunkin' Donuts, after discussions with company executives. The idea came from his earlier work selling food in factories and at construction sites, where doughnuts and coffee were the two most popular items.

  Identity came quickly. The company introduced its first logo in 1953 and a mascot called Dunkie in 1954. Because the restaurant was a success, Rosenberg began selling franchises to other operators in 1955.

  In 1963 Rosenberg's son Bob became CEO at the age of 25. The hundredth location opened that same year. At the time, Dunkin' Donuts was a subsidiary of Universal Food Systems, a conglomerate of 10 small food-service businesses. Shops varied wildly. Some served full breakfasts, while others sold only doughnuts and coffee.

  Over the following years, the other businesses in the portfolio were sold or closed, and the parent company took the Dunkin' Donuts name. The menu and shop format were standardized, and new items were added. The company had already gone public in 1968. In the early 1980s, counter service and ceramic coffee cups gave way to self-service counters and paper cups. By 1998 the brand counted 2,500 locations worldwide and $2 billion in annual sales.

  The 1990s also brought a pair of buyouts. One target was Dawn Donuts. The other was Mister Donut, a rival founded by Harry Winokur, who had once been Bill Rosenberg's partner.

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• 3. Changing Hands

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  In 1990 Allied Lyons, the holding company that also owned Baskin-Robbins, acquired Dunkin' Donuts. The chain also took over Mister Donut that year and converted its shops to the Dunkin' Donuts brand. That conversion helped the company grow across North America.

  In 2004 Dunkin' and Baskin-Robbins became subsidiaries of Dunkin' Brands, headquartered in Canton, Massachusetts. The old headquarters in Quincy had been built in 1950. In December 2005 a private equity consortium of Bain Capital, the Carlyle Group and Thomas H. Lee Partners bought Dunkin' Brands for $2.4 billion. By 2010 global sales had reached $6 billion.

  On the 9th of February 2017, the company reached a milestone in how it was run. From that date, every Dunkin' location was owned and operated by a franchisee.

  In October 2020 Dunkin' Brands said it was negotiating a sale with Inspire Brands, a private equity-backed company. A deal was announced on Saturday the 31st of October 2020. Inspire agreed to pay $106.50 in cash for each share, for a total of $11.3 billion, which included debt that Inspire would pay off. The acquisition closed on the 15th of December 2020. Dunkin' Brands ceased to exist as a separate company, and Dunkin', Baskin-Robbins and the trademark management of Mister Donut became part of Inspire Brands.

  In the United States, many shops pair Dunkin' with Baskin-Robbins ice cream under one roof. The two chains usually keep separate counters, but depending on the day, both can be served at a single one.

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• 4. Selling the Brand

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  Fred the Baker, a sleepy-eyed character, anchored the 1980s Dunkin' Donuts campaign called "It's Worth the Trip." His catchphrase was "Time to make the donuts." The Television Bureau of Advertising honored the campaign as one of the five best television advertisements of that decade. Actor Michael Vale played Fred for 16 years, until he retired in 1997. The catchphrase later became the title of founder William Rosenberg's autobiography, Time to Make the Donuts: The Founder of Dunkin' Donuts Shares an American Journey.

  In March 2006 the company changed its slogan to "America Runs on Dunkin'." Songs by They Might Be Giants also appeared in a series of advertisements for new products, meant to boost summer sales. That same year, a run of commercials invented a language called "Fritalian." The agency Hill Holliday created it to mock pretentious, Starbucks-style coffee chains. In the spots, a chorus of customers faced a long menu of non-English terms and sang, "Is it French? Or is it Italian?" The punchline was "Delicious lattes from Dunkin' Donuts. You order them in English." The joke aimed at ordering words such as grande and venti rather than at Italian itself. Commercials in 2007 went further. A customer who asked for a "large" was chastised to use the term "dieci."

  Rachael Ray began starring in Dunkin' Donuts commercials in 2007. In May 2008 the company removed an online advertisement in which she wore a fringed black-and-white scarf. Commentator Michelle Malkin and others claimed the garment resembled a keffiyeh and symbolized support for terrorism. The company pulled the commercial off the air, and that decision drew its own criticism. In March 2009 the brand unveiled a second slogan, "You 'Kin Do It!", with a $100 million advertising campaign.

  Sports have been a steady partner. Dunkin' makes commercials at the start of each season for the Boston Red Sox and the New England Patriots, and it sponsors teams such as the Dallas Cowboys, New York Yankees, New York Mets, Philadelphia Eagles and Tampa Bay Rays. In 2001 it bought the naming rights to the former Providence Civic Center, which became the Dunkin' Donuts Center. Locals call it "The Dunk," a nod to its long association with Providence College basketball. In January 2014 the English football club Liverpool announced a multimillion-pound global partnership with the company. A sponsorship with the National Women's Hockey League followed in December 2015, and in 2016 Dunkin' became the National Hockey League's official coffee, doughnut and breakfast sandwich partner.

  In April 2018 the brand teamed up with the Massachusetts shoemaker Saucony for the 122nd running of the Boston Marathon. The Saucony X Dunkin' Kinvara 9 was themed after a strawberry-frosted doughnut. It arrived in a doughnut box, and its heel was covered in rainbow sprinkles. The same month, BBDO replaced Hill Holliday as primary advertising agency. Hill Holliday had produced print, digital, broadcast and billboard advertising for almost twenty years. ARC/Leo Burnett was named to lead in-store promotions.

  Ben Affleck began starring in Dunkin' commercials in February 2023, alongside his then-wife Jennifer Lopez. Their first spot aired during Super Bowl LVII. A follow-up aired during Super Bowl LVIII, with Affleck's long-time friend Matt Damon and former NFL star Tom Brady. The chain then added Affleck's own order to its limited-time DunKings Menu. It is an iced coffee with cream, sweet cold foam and cinnamon sugar.

  On the 29th of July 2025 Dunkin' launched a campaign called "King of Summer," featuring actor Gavin Casalegno and its fruit-flavored Summer Refreshers. Reception was mixed. Some social media users thought a mention of genetics evoked eugenicist ideas. The campaign came less than a week after American Eagle launched "Sydney Sweeney Has Great Jeans," which met similar backlash.

  On the 8th of February 2026, during Super Bowl LX, Affleck starred in a parody of Good Will Hunting, the film he co-wrote and starred in. The ad recast it as a 1990s sitcom, with Affleck as "Will Dunkin'," a play on Damon's character Will Hunting. It cast him beside sitcom stars Jason Alexander, Jennifer Aniston, Jasmine Guy, Alfonso Ribeiro, Matt LeBlanc and Jaleel White. Tom Brady appears again too.

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• 5. Dropping Donuts

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  A script version of the words Dunkin' Donuts was filed as a logo on the 31st of March 1955 and registered on the 2nd of February 1960. A second design showed a figure with a doughnut for a head and a coffee cup and doughnut for a body, wearing a garrison cap. It was drawn mainly in yellow and brown. The company applied for it on the 23rd of June 1958 and registered it on the 23rd of May 1961. It went into use on the 1st of July 1964.

  In 1966 the brand switched to hot pink, with a stylized coffee cup and the name written in a circle, evoking a doughnut dunking into the cup. Bright orange joined the pink in 1980. As of 2014 the logo remained a variation of that design. The word Dunkin' was orange and Donuts was pink, in a thick Frankfurter typeface, beside a brown-outlined cup with a "DD" monogram.

  The real change started with small experiments. In June 2013 the company unveiled a new store design, its first in almost seven years. In December 2016 a Dunkin' Donuts in Natick, Massachusetts launched a program to test curbside pickup. In 2017 the company began testing the plain name "Dunkin'" at some shops, because it wanted to be seen as a destination for coffee, its most profitable product.

  In January 2018 new concept locations began opening, starting in Quincy. They offered modern decor, cold beverages on tap and a single-cup brewing machine. They also offered more packaged takeout options and dedicated pick-up lines for mobile ordering, both inside and in the drive-thru. The company described the concept as part of a shift toward an "on-the-go, beverage-led brand."

  In February 2018 Dunkin' announced plans to phase out polystyrene foam cups globally by April 2020, for environmental reasons. In July 2018 Dave Hoffmann replaced Nigel Travis as CEO. He aimed to add 1,000 locations outside the Northeastern United States by the end of 2020, and to raise revenue 3 percent at stores open a year or longer. In late 2018 the chain installed espresso machines wherever possible and launched espresso drinks using a new recipe.

  In September 2018 the company announced that it would shorten its name to Dunkin', with a wider rollout beginning in January 2019. It noted that customers already used the short name. It also pointed to consumers who ate fewer doughnuts and preferred healthier options. The company intends to extend the new name to all of its international locations.

  Partnerships followed. In June 2019 Dunkin' joined Grubhub to start its Dunkin' Delivers service. In July 2019 it worked with Beyond Meat on a meatless breakfast sandwich in Manhattan, becoming the first U.S. restaurant brand to serve Beyond Sausage. The sandwich went national later that year. In early 2025 Dunkin' announced that it would stop charging extra for dairy alternatives in drinks.

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• 6. Around the World

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  By March 2014 South Korea was Dunkin' Donuts' largest international market, accounting for nearly 40 percent of all international sales. With over 900 outlets, it had three times as many as McDonald's and about a third more than Starbucks. It is also home to the only Dunkin' coffee roasting plant outside the United States. Korean shops even sold a doughnut shaped with fried chicken legs, made in cooperation with the chicken franchise Kyochon.

  The Philippines grew just as hard. The first store opened in Makati on the 12th of April 1981 under the franchisee Golden Donuts Incorporated. Another operator opened its first outlet in Cebu City in 1986, and the first two Mindanao branches opened in Cagayan de Oro in 1991. In mid-August 2023 the 800th Philippine store opened in Laoag, making Dunkin' the largest coffee operator in the country. The 900th followed on the 1st of June 2026, less than a year later.

  Saudi Arabia got its first Dunkin' Donuts in 1986. As of October 2022 the kingdom had over 500 stores, with plans for more than 600 by the end of that year because of high demand for coffee.

  In Spain, a trademark problem shaped the brand. The word "Donuts" already belonged to the large bakery firm Panrico. So the Spanish business began as a joint venture between Panrico and the then-parent company, each holding 50 percent. In 2007 Dunkin' Donuts bought out Panrico's share and rebranded the stores as "Dunkin' Coffee." By 2017 there were 59 locations, mostly in Barcelona, Madrid and Málaga.

  Other arrivals came in steady order. Brazil's first building opened in 1980, and Colombia's first store opened in Bogotá in 1983. Singapore's first opened at Goldhill Square on the 3rd of April 1983. Malaysia followed in 1987 with an outlet in Bukit Bintang, Kuala Lumpur, and its 100th outlet opened in 2024 at Kota Kinabalu International Airport. Lebanon's first location opened in 1998. New Zealand's opened in Manukau, Auckland, in 2001.

  In India, Dunkin' Donuts signed a master franchise agreement with Jubilant FoodWorks on the 24th of February 2011. The first outlet opened at Connaught Place, New Delhi, in April 2012. By the 31st of December 2019 there were 32 outlets across 10 Indian cities.

  The newest markets keep arriving. The first Costa Rica location opened in Heredia in August 2024. In May 2025 the chain opened its first French store in the 2nd arrondissement of Paris. As of 2025 Dunkin' operates 22 sites in the United Kingdom, all in England.

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• 7. Retreats and Returns

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  In Tel Aviv in 1996, a new Dunkin' Donuts broke the company's own sales records by selling 3 million doughnuts in its first eight months. The chain's manager marveled that Israelis bought boxes of 12, ate them on the spot and then bought more to take home. At its peak the country had 9 branches, three of them in Jerusalem, short of a goal of 15. In 2001 the Israeli franchise closed, weighed down by debt and by a slump in tourism after the Second Intifada. About $2 million had been invested.

  Japan was the first Asian country to get a Dunkin' Donuts, with a shop in Ginza, Tokyo, around 1969. After 28 years, the company ceased business there in 1998 because of declining sales. Non-military locations were either closed or converted to Mister Donut. Shops on United States military bases remain, open only to military personnel.

  China took a different path. The first Shanghai restaurant opened in 2008, as a first step in a China expansion strategy. By March 2014 there were about 50 stores and an agreement for 100 more over five years. Under its franchisee Jollibee, however, only seven stores opened in Beijing instead of the planned 100. Jollibee announced in 2022 that it would end the franchise, and as of 2025 there are no Dunkin' stores in mainland China.

  Sweden's first location opened at the Täby Centrum shopping mall, outside Stockholm, on the 5th of December 2014. On the 24th of July 2018 the Swedish operations filed for bankruptcy and every location closed immediately. In South Africa, a January 2016 agreement called for 250 Dunkin' Donuts and 70 Baskin-Robbins outlets. Only 11 and five opened, and in February 2019 the partner permanently closed all of them. In 2024 the operations in Belgium and the Netherlands went bankrupt, although the company insisted that its locations would stay open.

  Australia saw Dunkin' Donuts open in the 1980s and leave by the late 2000s. In 2014 Nigel Travis, the global chairman, said there were no short-term plans for a return.

  Canada's story was the most dramatic. Quebec once had 210 stores, but by mid-2017 only three remained, the last franchises in the country. Only one freestanding store could still make doughnuts fresh on site. The other two were shopping-mall food court stands that relied on deliveries. Competition from Tim Hortons was a main cause, just as Tim Hortons itself declined in the northeastern United States under pressure from Dunkin' Donuts. A group of franchisees won a C$16.4 million civil judgement against the parent company for failing to promote the brand adequately. In September 2018, after 57 years in Canada, the company refused to renew the license for the few remaining stores. Baskin-Robbins kept operating there.

  On the 12th of May 2026, the Montreal-based holding company Foodtastic agreed with Inspire Brands to bring Dunkin' back, with hundreds of locations expected in late 2026 or early 2027. Peter Mammas, Foodtastic's president and CEO, said the return would differ this time and would focus on Canadian ownership. "We have boots on the ground, so we're going to have local support to support the franchisees," he said. He expects to open about one cafe a week, or about 50 cafes a year, starting with Quebec and Ontario for the first two years before heading to the Maritimes and the West Coast.

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• 8. Criticism and Charity

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  In 1997 a customer set up Dunkindonuts.org, a site where disgruntled consumers and employees could lodge complaints. It appeared ahead of the company's own website in many search engines and drew national media coverage. Dunkin' Donuts bought the domain in 1999.

  Franchisee relations drew sharper criticism. One franchisee accused the company of forcing single-store owners into buyouts at a loss over minor infractions. Dunkin' Donuts sued franchise owners 154 times from 2006 to April 2008. McDonald's faced five lawsuits in the same period, and Subway, which has four times as many locations, sued franchisees 12 times. In May 2010 the company advertised a "Free Iced Coffee Day" on its national Facebook page, but it ran in only 13 cities, and frustrated customers vented online.

  Other lapses were international or ethical. In 2013 the Thai branch ran an advertisement with a photograph of a woman in black facepaint, which Human Rights Watch called "bizarre and racist." The United States headquarters apologized. In 2012 the company published its first Animal Welfare Policy, which pledged to eliminate gestation crates from its U.S. pork supply by 2022. Progress reports promised for 2018 and 2020 never appeared, and as of 2025 there is no public commitment to that goal.

  Security and safety also came up. In September 2019 the New York attorney general's office alleged that Dunkin' mishandled cyberattacks in early 2015 that stole thousands of usernames and passwords from mobile app customers. In January 2025 the manufacturer FGF Brands recalled 2 million donuts for Listeria contamination, some sold by Dunkin' Donuts. No illnesses were reported.

  The pandemic hit hard. On the 30th of July 2020 Dunkin' Brands announced it would permanently close 800 US stores by year-end after a 20 percent drop in second-quarter sales. Of those, 450 were part of the previously announced closing of locations inside Speedway gas stations.

  A different side of the company is the Dunkin' Joy in Childhood Foundation, an independent charity founded in 2006 to bring simple joys to children battling hunger or illness. It works with food banks, children's hospitals and nonprofits, and has granted more than $70 million to hundreds of charities. In December 2018 executive director Kari Bornhorst McHugh launched Dogs for Joy, with more than $2 million in initial grants. It places specially trained facility dogs full time in children's hospitals. The first ambassador was Cooper Dunkin', a Black Lab and Golden Retriever mix trained by Canine Assistants, who served as the foundation's Chief Joy Officer.

  In 2020 the foundation launched Joyful Spaces, which funds playgrounds, healing gardens and play spaces at children's hospitals. During the COVID-19 pandemic it also created Hero Recharge with the nonprofit First Descents to support healthcare workers. That program won an honorable mention in the Corporate Social Responsibility category of Fast Company's 2021 World Changing Ideas Awards.

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