Tell us about your first store and your decision to start a chain?

Before I opened the first Yum Yum shop, I had clearly in mind that my long term objective was to start a chain of donut shops, not just operate one store. The beginning store therefore became very important because the success of the future chain depended a great deal on how that store succeeded. Very fortunately when I opened the first Yum Yum, it was in a great location. And I had an experienced crew who taught me everything there was to know about running that donut shop.

I benefited a great deal from running that first store myself for a full year. I did everything. I made the donuts, I took out trash, I washed the windows and from that experience I developed a pilot plan operation that became successful. The future of that chain of Yum Yum stores was therefore kind of a cookie cutter operation. We simply duplicated the success and the methods that were used in the first store. Another benefit from personally running that first store was that, as the company grew, no one could fool me on how to run a donut shop.