Wait, Krispy Kreme Doughnuts aren’t All Natural?

November 15th, 2016. By LucyC

I have to be honest, the last thing I needed to read about this week was a lawsuit that attacks an institution—a food that has earned the right to be considered junk, in part because it makes no bones about it and in part because anything that tastes that good just has to be bad for you.

But heck, everything is fair game these days, it seems. And somebody has managed to drum up a 32-page, 32 pages—seriously?, Krispy Kreme lawsuit against the doughnuts over claims the doughnut chain is telling porky pies (lies) over the ingredients of its fruit-filled and maple-glazed donuts.

The allegations are that Krispy Kreme conducts “false and misleading business practices” because its “Chocolate Iced Raspberry Filled,” “Glazed Raspberry Filled,” “Maple Bar,” and “Glazed Blueberry Cake” doughnuts and doughnut holes do not actually contain real raspberries, maple, or blueberries. Oh dear. They might be able to call consumer fraud on this one, but not defective products, no siree—a box of Krispy Kremes could never be defective in my mind.

Plaintiff Jason Saidian, who for the record, lives in Los Angeles, is claiming the doughnuts are in fact made with nutritionally inferior ingredients.” WTF does that mean? Guess you have to read the whole 32 pages to find out.

Saidian’s story goes he bought the nutritionally inferior raspberry, maple, and blueberry doughnuts at issue from a Krispy Kreme location in Santa Monica. He claims he bought the doughnuts because he believed the company’s representations about the “premium ingredients” in its donuts.

For a little drama, the lawsuit apparently goes on to explain that the doughnuts are displayed in a tray behind a glass counter, along with a small placard in front of each tray that provides the name of the doughnut variety. But, I’m guessing, no laundry list of ingredients.

According to Saidian, the doughnuts appear as if they contain the “premium ingredients” but Krispy Kreme reportedly does not provide customers with access to information on what the actual ingredients are in the doughnuts. Ok seriously—who’s got time to read all that stuff—if you’re in there buying a doughnut I’m guessing you passed on the Kale smoothie for a reason.

Here’s all you need to know about the ingredients in doughnuts. They are, essentially, dough, fat, sugar, sugar, sugar, dough, fat, sugar and maybe some fruit preserves—with sugar in it—thrown in for good measure. Where’s the grey area? They can rot your teeth, expand your waistline, cause heart disease— if eaten liberally—just put that caveat in there—and for one brief moment, as all those questionably wonderful ingredients melt in your mouth in a kaleidoscopic orgasm of pure bliss—make you forget everything that’s wrong with the world. So you know what, just leave the doughnut alone, please.

But no. Not this guy. “Even when consuming the Products, Plaintiff and other consumers cannot easily decipher whether the filling or glazing they are consuming contain actual raspberries, blueberries, or maple ingredients, because the Defendant has formulated and manufactured the Products in a manner that masks the absence of such ingredients,” the class action states. So where’s the problem? Why worry about it?

It appears the rub is that Krispy Kreme is capable of making doughnuts with “real” ingredients in them—just for the sake of clarity—this is explained in the lawsuit as … the “Glazed Lemon Filled” doughnuts contain lemon juice, the “Cinnamon Apple Filled” doughnuts contain both apple and cinnamon and the “Glazed Strawberry” doughnuts contain strawberries.

Therefore, Saidain alleges, one can deduce that Krispy Kreme is not only capable of making the doughnuts at issue with real ingredients but, one would guess, should have, as people believe that’s what they’re getting. Therefore, Krispy Kreme should also have been aware that its products are falsely advertised and would be deceiving to an unsuspecting customer.

According to the lawsuit, Krispy Kreme allegedly (hopefully) uses sugar, corn syrup, gums and artificial food coloring to “mimic the texture, shape and color” of these “premium Ingredients” instead of naturally occurring products with proven health benefits.

Ok—hold on one fat saturated minute here—in no universe either known or as yet undiscovered are doughnuts considered to have any proven health benefits beyond the placebo effect. Somebody please give this guy some Kool-aid. Or a coffee…and a maple glazed doughnut.

This was posted on Tuesday, November 15th, 2016 at 5:11 pm and is filed under Class Action, Consumer Fraud . Feel free to respond, or trackback. Read our comments policy.