Krispy Kreme makes sweet deal with doughnut dealer

Minnesotans want their hot doughnuts now, and a college student looking to get out of debt hopes to continue satisfying their cravings. For the past five months, Jayson Gonzalez, a student at Metropolitan State University in St. Paul, made weekly treks to the nearest Krispy Kreme location in Clive, Iowa, four hours away. He would pack more than 100 dozen doughnuts into his Ford Focus to resell in and around the Twin Cities. But the company wasn’t happy with his markup, charging double what the melt-in-your-mouth delicacies cost him. Krispy Kreme initially told him to stop, but a deal appears to be in the works.

What changed? The story of Gonzalez’s business acumen—and Krispy Kreme’s response to it—went viral. On Monday, Gonzalez posted on Facebook that the company wants to make him an “independent operator” in Minnesota, a market Krispy Kreme abandoned in 2008. Gonzalez expects to make his next run in a few weeks and started a GoFundMe campaign to purchase a larger vehicle—maybe an 18-wheeler?