Serving Up Customer Experiences: Holly O’Neill & Dunkin’ President Scott Murphy

I do, I do. Thank you for having me. So excited, two great brands coming together. Looking forward to this conversation.

Sure, so I'm glad you noticed. This is one of our newly remodeled stores. We've got a couple thousand of these remodeled already, and the first thing you see when you come in is the tap system. This serves all of our ice beverages at a crisp 38 degrees, which does two things: one, the drinks come out colder so they last longer in the ice, you have a better experience once you leave the store. The second is the crew members love using these. We like to say our crew members are not baristas, they're bartenders, so they're facing the guests when they get to make the drink. So that's the tap system. And then obviously you pointed out the signature item here, which is the donut case. We've moved them from the back wall to the front, and now you see them beautifully merchandised. I would tell you we saw a huge lift in donuts, and I would challenge anyone to have their kids come in and see this and not choose one of these donuts. It'd be really hard.

So we serve about two billion cups of coffee a year. So we are the market leader in hot drip coffee and iced coffee. We're obviously a market leader in donuts; we sell more donuts than anyone worldwide. So those three items make up a large portion of our sales right now.

Yeah, the refreshers are a great new product. They're a refreshing drink, they're a little more in the afternoon, very bright and colorful, and just like our donuts, they're a very Instagrammable product. So you see a lot of the kids these days taking pictures and posting about it. But it's a new platform for us, doing really well with some great flavors and a little bit of caffeine, which is amazing. New products probably take us anywhere from 12 to 18 months to develop, and then we give it two or three months on the menu boards to see what sells, what doesn't sell. Sometimes things rotate, sometimes things come back like pumpkin in the fall. That's obviously always a favorite, but that's generally how the menu works.

It is. And everything about the new layout is set up for speed. So it's got a very efficient back line for the crew members. We try to do everything in a very standardized process, so small, medium, large always has the same number of pumps of flavor to make it consistent. The lighting, the flow for the guest, everything is set up to get people in and get them out and get them on with their busy day. And of course we're a big drive-through business, so that's a big part of how the store is laid out as well.

And ironically, a lot of the innovation comes from our crew members. They'll make suggestions on where the equipment's laid out: 'Hey, it would be much more efficient if I went here and then there.' So how we moved the donut case, how we replenish — a lot of those ideas come from our crew members because they are working it every single day. They've got to be efficient and fast to get the product out and make the customer happy.

It's literally job number one. And we do have some incredibly loyal customers. When you think about it, every year we get rated the most loyal customer base. A lot of it is we just have great products — the coffee and the donuts are incredible. But it's really about our service. Dunkin' is a unique brand, it's sort of in the fabric of people's lives. It's locally owned in the community by the franchisees, and people grow up with us. It's a brand that's figured out a way to stay relevant for the last 70 years. We evolve, we come up with new products — iced coffee, cold brew, avocado toast now — all these new products, and we've found a way to stay involved with people's lives.

Yeah, so the first thing we have to do is give them a great experience. We have to make their order right, and if we don't make it right, we gotta make it right. So that's a big part of it. The second is we have a new loyalty program, Dunkin' Rewards. We went out and talked to our loyalty guests and said, 'What's most important?' and we made some changes and relaunched the program last year, and we've seen incredible growth. People told us they want to be able to order ahead on the phone, they want to be able to accumulate points and use it for other types of things, and they told us they want to be recognized for their loyalty status. So we've got a boosted tier: if you come 12 times a month — which I know you do — you get your boosted status and you earn even more points. We've seen people really appreciate that.

So I've been a customer of Bank of America for over probably 30 years. I remember that first time I used my ATM card, I tried to take two dollars out and that was not the minimum — it didn't work. I was trying to impress my girlfriend at the time. But that's a brand that stayed with me and has seen me through college, business school, a job, marriage, kids. It's just like Dunkin' — you guys have been there for me.

Yeah, so on the one hand it has been a long time; on the other hand it's gone by really quickly. I think when you love what you do and you love the brand, it just goes by quite fast. I've had a lot of different roles. I started in international — a lot of people don't know we've got 5,000 Dunkin's outside the U.S. I did supply chain, I ran our bakeries that make the donuts, I ran our ice cream factories because we also own Baskin Robbins. Then I got into operations and the customer piece and marketing, and that's really where I've started to enjoy seeing how it all fits together for the guest.

Yeah, so I'll start in reverse. Customers have absolutely loved it. Ben has been a super fan of Dunkin' for the last 20 years since his days in Cambridge, and we've never had a relationship with him — he's just a big fan. He's probably our most loyal fan. We started working with him in December on a commercial, and it was actually his idea to do a behind-the-scenes kind of thing, have him working the drive-through, because he knows a lot about our brand. He knows how to ring things up on the cash register, he knows how they order. So it was his idea, and it came together incredibly fast. When we saw it, and when JLo came through at the end and said 'Grab me a glazed,' we knew we had captured something magic. We bought the Super Bowl spot, and we were rated the number one ad during the Super Bowl, which is incredible. We were the number one searched video on YouTube the day after, and we saw huge spikes in business right after.

Yeah, they're special days for us. They're one-day events, but they're ways to give back. We just did National Donut Day the week before, and we had National Iced Coffee Day where we partnered with our foundation, the Joy in Childhood Foundation. We raised almost two million dollars to give kids in need, hungry kids, kids in hospitals. It's a great way to make the consumers feel good about their purchase, and it's in categories that we own: donuts, hot coffee, iced coffee. It's a way to connect with the consumer and keep the brand relevant.

Yeah, it's tricky, but it's one of the favorite parts of the job for a lot of people. Like anything, we start with the consumer. We do a lot of insights work to understand where the trends are. We go visit different cities, we look to our partners internationally to understand that. And then we just test a lot of products. We've got a world-class culinary team that comes up with all these things. Some of them sound like no-brainers — butter pecan, hazelnut, caramel. Some of them seem a little out there. I'll be honest, I said no to the avocado toast because it felt like a stretch. It was great and a huge success, one of the best products we've launched. It attracted a new generation, younger and a little more female. So we've had a lot of success with that.

Sure. Digital and technology is the wave of the future, whether it's automating things behind the counter, whether it's using AI or data to predict consumer preferences. We're using it across the board now to make it easier and more fun to run a Dunkin'.

Sure, we get a million of them, as you might imagine. The ones that stick out are when we're asked to cater people's weddings with donuts. That happens a lot. Last year we had a bride and groom who met at a Dunkin', and they asked us if they could decorate that Dunkin' and get married — actually have the ceremony in a Dunkin' in New York. So we did that. We get emails all the time with people asking for permission to get our logo tattooed on their arm. We generally say yes. And then we do a lot in the community with our foundation, the Joy in Childhood Foundation. We sponsor rooms in hospitals for kids that are getting better, we have service dogs. We do a lot to give back.

No, I would just say the power of a brand. Dunkin' is in the very fabric of America. We're a household name, but a brand that people are sort of looking to win. We don't take ourselves too seriously, but we're customizing all of our products for our guests, and we're really happy with this brand for the future.

All right. Hot or iced coffee? Hot in the morning when I get up. I come back in the afternoon for an iced latte. All right, nice combo. Donuts or Munchkins? Little known fact: there are 4.3 Munchkins in a donut, so you can do that math in your head. I prefer Munchkins because it feels like I'm having more, less. Well, my teenage boys can crush a box of 25 in about 12 seconds. We do have a box of 50. Okay, I'll have to upgrade that.

Probably from my dad, who's a Marine. His famous saying to me — and I used it a lot during COVID — was 'Keep your head down but your chin up,' and just keep a positive mindset. That's very consistent with this brand, and it's how we try to run the business.

It was great to share the Dunkin' story. I love sharing the Dunkin' story. And I actually have one last thing to share with you as well. I hear you're a big hazelnut coffee fan — that I am. So what we have here is some free coffee for a month for all of your local branches, to enjoy some Dunkin' as we head into the summer season.

Thank you.