SEATTLE — A day after the first Voodoo Doughnut shop opens in Seattle lines are still around the corner, full of customers hoping to try their first handmade super sweet and super pink voodoo bubble gum doughnut.
Chris Schultz, Voodoo Doughnut’s CEO, says that’s just one of more than 40 doughnut flavors offered by the Portland company which got its start in 2003.
We asked what took them so long to get here in Seattle.
“Ahh! Everyone asks us that same question, Schultz laughed. “It was just time. It was just time, right? We’ve grown up. We’re ready to come to Seattle.”
Voodoo Doughnut’s 22nd shop is proudly pink outside and in, with a portrait of Sir Mix-a-Lot in a place of honor. Customers don’t line up for just one doughnut. Many walk out with stacks of boxes.
“If you buy one of each you don’t have to make any decisions.” one man told us, walking away before we could catch his name. We can assume he bought the classics. The voodoo doll and of course the bacon maple bar.
“We invented the bacon maple bar 21 years ago,” Schultz said. ” People have imitated it but there’s nothing like the original.”
That weird Portland vibe and outrageous doughnut flavors keep customers coming back. It appears Voodoo Doughnut has found the right spot in Seattle to call home.
“At the end of the day we sell donuts,” Schultz said. “We’re not curing cancer. We’re not doing anything super special but we sell great donuts in a great environment with really good people.”
Voodoo Doughnut is open every day of the week from 6 a.m. to 3 a.m. Twenty percent of the day’s sales go to the non-profit Farestart which impacts lives through job training in the food industry.
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