Krispy Kreme, McDonald’s Are Expanding Their Sweet and Savory Team-up

Dunkin’ just got dunked.

Krispy Kreme — the bakery known for its gooey, glazed pastries — saw its share price surge more than 40% on Tuesday after it reached a deal to sell its donuts at McDonald’s locations throughout the country. 

Freshly Baked

Everyone loves a burger. And everyone loves a donut. Some people even love a burger with donuts for buns. But securing one of each normally involved two drive-thrus; not anymore, though. McDonald’s first partnered with Krispy Kreme in 2022 to sell donuts at 160 McDonald’s outlets in Lexington and Louisville, Kentucky. But customers can soon expect to see the Big Mac and the Original Glazed on McDonald’s menus throughout the US:

• The partnership is quite the deal for Krispy Kreme; it gets to expand its distribution without having to build new stores. 
• Krispy Kreme CEO Josh Charlesworth said the company — which has more than 14,000 locations, storefronts, and kiosks — expects “to more than double our points of access by the end of 2026.”

Donut Holes: The deal is good news for the Charlotte, North Carolina-based chain. After returning to the public markets in 2021, its stock had fallen below its IPO price, partially due to the growing use of weight-loss drugs like Ozempic and Mounjaro, Truist analysts told The Wall Street Journal. Krispy Kreme also owns Insomnia Cookies, a chain that the parent company is potentially looking to sell so it can focus on and expand the core donut business. It also makes sense for McDonald’s to pair up with a donut shop: you can practically fry them donuts in that hot-as-heck coffee.