Daylight Donuts adds location, changes hands

After recently opening a third location in Nixa, Tim Tasker, owner of the area Daylight Do-nuts franchise, sold his doughnut shops to Dwight and Susan Martin. The Martins purchased the licensing agreement Sept. 21 for an undisclosed amount.

The sale includes the shops at 1915 S. Glenstone, 1020 U.S. Hwy. 60 in Republic and the Nixa location, 550 W. Mount Vernon, Ste. A, which opened in the middle of August.

Tasker, who is a "third-generation doughnut guy," opened Daylight Doughnuts in Spring-field in June 1997.

Along with the sale, Tasker offered training to the Martins, who had no experience in the food industry.

"We needed some guidance and direction, and the Taskers were able to provide us with that. ... They've been very successful in it. We felt like it was something we could learn," Dwight Martin said.

Martin is not new to owning and operating a business, however. He started his first business, a carpet cleaning operation, in his teens to pay his way through college. Now, 25 years later, he has a business to call his own again. Martin has been working in the health care industry managing nursing homes and long-term care/retirement communities.

It sounds like an odd transition, he said, because it is. Martin said the change came about because he and his wife wanted to work together in their own business.

"We didn't set out to buy a doughnut shop. ... But the more we found out about it the potential to grow, the new location in Nixa it piqued our interest," he said. "I love challenges. This is a challenge. I wanted to take something and grow it, that's what motivates me."

So now he brings his nearly 30 years of health care experience to the world of doughnuts, which, he said, offers a nice change.

"People get a doughnut and it's a treat," he said. "I admire the people (in health care), but it's a nice change to be in something that's not so serious even with the long hours."

The Martins begin their doughnut days at midnight and work through 3 or 4 p.m. "Right now for us it's seven days a week, and it's about 15- or 16-hour days," he said. "We're still working through that because we've only been at it a week and a half."

He said his wife, Susan, focuses on the production end and he works on the business side.

Martin said 60 percent of the business is retail and 40 percent is wholesale, which includes deliveries to hotels, Quik Trip convenient stores, churches and Southwest Missouri State University. Routes are run seven days a week, he said, and he employs 15 people between the three stores.

A large incentive for him to purchase the business, he said, was its growth potential.

"We didn't get in it just to maintain what we have," he said. "Our customer base is good, but we want to try and let people know we are here and increase awareness, advertising and exposure."

While it's still early, he said he hopes to add another location in the area. "There's room for growth," he said. "That was one of the things that was attractive to us."

According to its Web site, Daylight Donuts has 500 shops worldwide, 72 of which have been added in 2000. The company began in Tulsa, Okla., in 1954, and Tasker said the company concentrates on Oklahoma, Kansas, Arkansas and Missouri.

Martin's doughnut shops offer both raised and cake doughnuts, pastries, twists, cinnamon rolls, long johns, Bismarcks, pine cones, bear claws, yum-yums, small hand-made baked pies, fritters, doughnut holes and sausage rolls, as well as coffee, cappuccino, milk, orange juice and fountain drinks.

"Other than that little college thing, this is really the first time it's been my deal," Martin said. "I've always worked for someone else ... but this one's ours. We're having fun at it."