YESTERDAY, THE HIGHLY anticipated Dublin Doughnut Festival took place in The Palace Bar on Dublin’s Camden Street.
The event was touted as a celebration of “all things doughy and delicious” and promised doughnuts from six of Dublin’s leading doughnut stores including Krust, Treasured Sugar and The Rolling Donut.
Over 2,000 people clicked attending on the Facebook event with a further 3,000 expressing interest.
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Unfortunately, many of those who attended the festival yesterday reported long queues and not very many doughnuts in sight.
Many took to social media to complain about the organisation of the event.
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And the Facebook event itself was inundated with complaints from those who paid €2 and queued only to discover that many of the doughnuts had sold out.
So, what went wrong?
Organiser Rory Dinnigan told DailyEdge.ie that over 3,500 doughnuts were sold during the day with Treasured Sugar selling out within an hour of opening. He explained that the vendors were simply unable to keep up with the demand.
The bakeries were working as hard as possible to re-stock, but these are small, independent businesses without huge resources.
“We had informed all the vendors how busy it was going to be,” he explained. “However, these are small companies that have to calculate real risks.”
It is unfortunate that the doughnuts sold out, but we at Market.Share are delighted that the bakeries had such success and are confident they prepared as much doughnuts as possible.
He confirmed that five of the six advertised vendors were present on the day with Krust Bakery pulling out at the last minute due to a family emergency.
As for the €2 entry fee? Dinnigan stated that was to gain entry to the Dublin Rave Market, which Dublin Doughnut Festival was a part of.
He stated that organisers didn’t quite expect the enormous interest in the Dublin Doughnut Festival and said that it was merely intended to be “a fun addition” to the market.
The Dublin Doughnut Festival was meant as a fun addition to this monthly market. We didn’t anticipate the massive interest. The €2 entry was to enjoy the overall market, not just to look at and buy doughnuts.
He advised those who simply wanted to look at doughnuts to, er, go to a doughnut shop.
If the purpose of coming to the market was simply to buy a doughnut and leave without enjoying a dance or a hang out in the setting then I recommend simply going to a doughnut shop.
He described the queues for doughnuts as “unavoidable,” but explained it was Dublin Rave Market’s first experience of dealing with large crowds and promised that they would use this as a learning experience.
We will learn from our mistakes and improve the layout. We, too, are a small business and will learn from this and improve. That is the journey we are on.
As for those who feel strongly that they didn’t get their doughnut fix? Dinnigan says that they will be happy to offer a €2 refund to any attendee who stops by their office on 31 Aungier Street.
So now.
