Crumbl Cookies is a

franchise chain Franchising is based on a marketing concept which can be adopted by an organization as a strategy for business expansion. Where implemented, a franchisor licenses some or all of its know-how, procedures, intellectual property, use of its bus ...

of bakeries in the United States and Canada that specializes in baking a variety of

cookies A cookie is a baked or cooked snack or dessert that is typically small, flat and sweet. It usually contains flour, sugar, egg, and some type of oil, fat, or butter. It may include other ingredients such as raisins, oats, chocolate chips, n ...

and serving ice cream. Based in Utah, it was founded in 2017. , the company has over 850 stores across the United States. The chain maintains a strong presence in social media, to which the ''New York Times'' has attributed the business's growth.

History and operations

Crumbl was founded by cousins Sawyer Hemsley and Jason McGowan in 2017 while Hemsley attended

Utah State University Utah State University (USU or Utah State) is a public land-grant research university in Logan, Utah. It is accredited by the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities. With nearly 20,000 students living on or near campus, USU is Uta ...

Logan, Utah Logan is a city in Cache County, Utah, United States. The 2020 census recorded the population was 52,778. Logan is the county seat of Cache County and the principal city of the Logan metropolitan area, which includes Cache County and Franklin ...

. Hemsley and McGowan utilized

A/B testing A/B testing (also known as bucket testing, split-run testing, or split testing) is a user experience research methodology. A/B tests consist of a randomized experiment that usually involves two variants (A and B), although the concept can be als ...

methods to come up with their final milk chocolate chip cookie recipe. In 2022, Crumbl sued Crave Cookies and Dirty Dough, two fellow cookie companies, in the

United States District Court for the District of Utah The United States District Court for the District of Utah (in case citations, D. Utah) is the federal district court whose jurisdiction is the state of Utah. The court is based in Salt Lake City with another courtroom leased in thstate courtho ...

, alleging that the defendants had "unique ties" to Crumbl and had a "confusingly similar ... marketing and business model".

Reception

The company relies heavily on social media to promote its products; according to the ''New York Times'', whether the products themselves are "the best or the worst" is immaterial to their popularity, as the online "debate is good for business".

Mashed.com 7Hops.com Inc., doing business as Static Media, is an American internet company established in 2012 based in Indianapolis. It operates ZergNet, a content recommendation business. ZergNet Established around 2011, ZergNet has been compared to Ou ...

noted in August 2021 that Crumbl had garnered unfavorable reviews from

TikTok TikTok, known in China as Douyin (), is a short-form video hosting service owned by the Chinese company ByteDance. It hosts user-submitted videos, which can range in duration from 15 seconds to 10 minutes. TikTok is an international version ...

users for the quality of cookies customers were receiving through delivery. The article cited four videos of poor-quality cookies that did not arrive as advertised, with one such negative review receiving over 400,000 likes within 21 hours. ''

Honolulu Honolulu (; ) is the capital and largest city of the U.S. state of Hawaii, which is in the Pacific Ocean. It is an unincorporated county seat of the consolidated City and County of Honolulu, situated along the southeast coast of the islan ...

''s Emily Smith tried six Crumbl cookies, writing in a 2022 review, "The price is reasonable considering that these are very large cookies packed with flavor. All the cookies looked delicious and visually pleasing. If you love sugar, I recommend trying Crumbl at least once."

Growth

The company has experienced rapid franchising, which has been attributed to its presence on social media. The company's following on TikTok reached 1.6 million within six weeks in February 2021, and , they have over seven million combined followers between TikTok and Instagram. During the

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. The disease quickl ...

pandemic, Crumbl Cookies expanded to 100 locations by August 2020 and 149 locations across the United States by July 2021. By the end of 2021, the company had grown to over 300 stores in the country, and by July 2022, grew to over 400 locations in 45 states. In 2023, the franchise expanded to Canada with 4 locations: two in

Alberta Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest Ter ...

and one each in

Saskatoon Saskatoon () is the largest city in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. It straddles a bend in the South Saskatchewan River in the central region of the province. It is located along the Trans-Canada Yellowhead Highway, and has served as ...

and

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central C ...

Labor law violations

In December 2022, the

U. S. Department of Labor The United States Department of Labor (DOL) is one of the executive departments of the U.S. federal government. It is responsible for the administration of federal laws governing occupational safety and health, wage and hour standards, unemploym ...

fined 11 Crumbl Cookie franchises across six U.S. states for violations of child labor laws impacting 46 workers who were minors. Violations included assigning underage employees to shifts that exceeded the permitted hours and to tasks involving "potentially dangerous ovens and machinery". The parent company issued a statement apologizing and affirming their commitment to "a safe and welcoming work environment". Crumbl was fined $57,854 in total for the violations.

Notes

References

{{Fast-food chains of the United States American companies established in 2017 Brand name cookies Food and drink companies based in Utah Food and drink companies established in 2017 Franchises 2017 establishments in Utah