Grand Parade Investments (GPI) has announced that it has closed down Dunkin Donuts and Baskin Robbins in South Africa due to poor performance.
In a shareholder statement on Friday (15 February), GPI said it has filed an application for the voluntary liquidation of these businesses.
“The decision to exit Dunkin Donuts and Baskin Robbins was made following sustained losses in these businesses and an unsuccessful process to dispose of these businesses,” it said.
“The decision is in line with the company’s value-based strategy, which aims at improving the group’s capital allocation by channelling capital to high-value potential assets, such as Burger King.”
The brands have been in South Africa for little over two years, after GPI launched them in country at the end of 2016.
In January 2016 Grand Foods acquired the South African master franchise licences for Dunkin’ Donuts and Baskin-Robbins, from the Dunkin’ Brands group.
According to the Dunkin’ Brands group, under the agreement, Grand Parade would develop more than 250 Dunkin’ Donuts restaurants and more than 70 Baskin-Robbins shops in South Africa time, with an initial focus on Cape Town and Johannesburg.
However, the brands never exited the Mother City, and rollouts slumped in 2018.
As of February 2019, there are only 11 Dunkin Donuts stores in the country – all in Cape Town and surrounds – while only 5 Basking Robbins outlets opened, all in the same city.
Source: BusinessTech – www.businesstech.co.za