By James Lomuscio
Opening a franchise can be risky, even riskier if you are the first franchisee — riskier yet if your business is doughnuts and Dunkin’ Donuts seems to be everywhere, three in Westport alone.
Joan Tuckman with a customer at the Westport Donut Crazy. (CLICK TO ENLARGE) James Lomuscio for WestportNow.com
Not to mention that Coffee An’ Donut Shop at 343 Main St. has the storied history of its doughnuts going to the White House during the Clinton Administration.
Call them crazy, and Joan and Joe Tuckman of Fairfield would probably take it as a compliment. They decided last month to literally put their money where their mouths were, becoming the first franchise owner of Donut Crazy at 1 Ferry Lane in the New Haven-bound side station house.
The trackside location was opened in April 2017 by entrepreneur Jason Wojnarowski. He owns three in Stratford, Shelton and Hew Haven, and plans to open another in West Hartford in the coming months, the second to put on the franchise block.
“Our plan is to grow the Westport business,” said Joan Tuckman, who has a background in marketing and whose husband works in media sales in Manhattan.
“We just fell in love with the brand,” she said, touting the unique niche it fills.
True, there are the standby doughnuts you are likely to find at other outlets — and then there are the crazy ones, or as the website says, “Crafted with Love, Covered with Crazy.”
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Twixsters (l) and Monster Red Velvet doughnuts at Donut Crazy. (CLICK TO ENLARGE) James Lomuscio for WestportNow.com
First of all, they are larger than the average doughnut, so large, Joan Tuckman says, “It’s hard to finish on your own.”
And they are elaborate, from the Monster Red velvet Decked out with chocolate, cookie dough and candies, to the Twixster sporting Twixt candies like arms to a massive maple bacon doughnut covered with bacon bits to the S’mores Cookie Dough that looks like it was just pulled from the campfire.
“It’s the first time I’ve been here,” said Theresa Blinder of Wilton as she surveyed the display case. “I’m going to get the Cookie Monster for my daughter. Hopefully they taste as good as they look.”
The doughnuts, made at overnight at Wojnarowski’s bakery in Stratford, arrive in Westport around 4:30 a.m., Joan Tuckman says, just in time for 5 a.m. commuters.
The store is open until 8 p.m. weekdays, from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Saturdays and from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sundays, she said.
For Joe Tuckman, deciding to invest in the franchise seems the clichéd love at first bite.
“They had a small location in Black Rock, and my husband and son Ryan used to go there every Sunday after hockey,” Joan Tuckman recalled. “They went there one Saturday, and it wasn’t here anymore.
“So, my husband reached out to Donut Crazy in Instagram and said, ‘Hey, where did the doughnuts go?’
What followed were several months of discussions with Wojnarowski and the Tuckmans about the Westport business.
Asked if going up against megabrands, such as Dunkin’ Donuts, was risky, Joan Tuckman said, “Aren’t all businesses risky?”
Determined, the couple sees the doughnut, not the hole, when it comes to offering a new twist on a time-honored treat.
