Dunkin Donuts Working on Adding Vegan Donuts. We’d Run for That

Dunkin Donuts is "considering" adding vegan options to its menu, its CEO David Hoffman announced,  in answer to a question on a shareholder call. We say: run.

The restaurant chain has already made waves with its Beyond Meat breakfast sausage sandwich, which has been a runaway hit, but that is not vegan since it contains egg and cheese. (We've tried it, stripped it down to the Beyond sausage and bread and thought: Why didn't someone tell the bosses this ain't it?)

“As it relates to a vegan doughnut, we continue to investigate a viable vegan doughnut option. We are looking at it closely,” Hoffman said during the Q and A part of the call. If we had been on the call we might have added:  What is there to think about? A vegan donut would rock. (Note  to self: Buy many  shares in Dunkin, so we can represent!)

Hoffman's comments came in answer to a question posed by Rachel Pawelski, Senior Campaigns Coordinator for the animal-rights group Animal Outlook (which was once called Compassion Over Killing). “You’re going to continue to see us put more consumer choice on the menu.”  This is when we channel Stormi Jenner and sing "Patience, patience, patiencee!"

The chain's Beyond Breakfast Sausage Sandwich, which was unwrapped last July at a slew of New York City locations, was such a hit that they rolled it out nationally to their 9,000 locations in November. The company reported on its last stock call in February that the Beyond offering had allowed the individual stores to post higher sales figures for the previous quarter, because of the fact that the meatless offering sells for more than other menu choices. So even with fewer overall sales ringing into cash registers, the per-customer sale shot up to over $9 per sale. Score one for plant power. Plant-based is good for business, especially at DD, as The Beet reported last winter.

Meanwhile, last summer  Dunkin's sister brand, Baskin-Robbins, started serving up vegan ice cream flavors, adding Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough and Chocolate Extreme to the freezers. These are made of a base of coconut oil ice cream and almond butter, so vegans have choices. That's good news. Still waiting for donuts to hit the shelves.

Vegan donuts are already making for happy customers at other restaurant chains. So if you're lucky enough to live in LA you can head over to the Donut Friend which is allowing pickup of their awesome vegan donuts (and they are partnering with Support+Feed to supply food to frontline healthcare workers, an initiative started by Billie Eilish's mother, Maggie Baird. And in Cleveland, Ohio, when the opening up after the coronavirus restrictions are eased, you can hit the Vegan Donut Company. Point being: Amazing vegan donuts are happening. Dunkin, run!