"Cops and Dougnuts" Bakery Business

2011 January/February Review

You see, as the name indicates, the owners behind the bakery are actually police officers. Content in their jobs, the officers had no intention of opening a bakery until they learned that the Clare City Bakery—a staple in Clare’s downtown since 1896—was about to close its doors.
“Three of us were sitting around eating pizza and talking about the fact that the bakery was going to close and one of us said, ‘Why don’t we buy it,” said Alan White, one of nine officers who decided to buy the historic business rather than see it close.

The move has made news nationwide and the bakery is a hit with the locals and beyond. Cops & Doughnuts is a great example of the League’s entrepreneurship asset in its Center for 21st Century Communities initiative. Municipalities that focus only on attracting large manufacturers or big box retailers overlook the positive impact that entrepreneurs and small businesses, like the Cops & Doughnuts, can have on local communities. That’s not a mistake City Manager Ken Hibl will make; he’s seen firsthand the impact a small business can have.

“I can’t say enough about Cops & Doughnuts,” Hibl said. “Like a lot of communities in Michigan, the current economy has hit us hard and it meant a lot that those guys got together to keep the bakery open.”

A business plan written on a pizza box sounds a little crazy, but even crazier was the time frame with which the officers were dealing.

“We only had three weeks to make this thing happen,” said Officer Alan White, the vice president of Cops & Doughnuts. “We had this crazy plan and it turned out every member of our department, nine of us total, were interested in doing it. Part of the thinking was that split nine ways there wouldn’t be as much to lose if things went wrong.”

Initially, officers were simply trying to keep the bakery open, but it didn’t take long for them to see that they had a hit on their hands. “Something really magical happened,” White said. “People really responded to the story. We had press from all over. We were featured on Good Morning America and Fox News. It’s just a good story.”