On Wednesday, February 7, Snack Food & Wholesale Bakery Senior Editor Liz Parker and Art Director Sarah Zagacki were able to attend a media event at the newest Crumbl Cookies location, in Brighton, Michigan. Crumbl is currently the fastest-growing cookie business nationally, expanding to over 800 bakeries in 50 states.
Crumbl fans know that the franchise's menu of cookies rotates weekly. In addition, some weeks the franchises will have special one-day-only flavors, in which case, each franchise location will have a different flavor to offer—ostensibly, consumers could stop by a few different locations to try various flavors at each. For example, last week on February 7, the Royal Oak, MI location offered an Oatmeal cookie, whereas the Novi, MI location offered a Raspberry Butter Cake variety.
The Brighton store had a soft opening on February 8, and its official first day open was this Friday, February 9. The new store is located at 9864 E Grand River Avenue, Suite #150.
This is the second Crumbl franchise location for Dr. Bobby Grossi, a dentist, and his wife, Sabrina. Their first location opened in Fenton, MI, about 25 minutes north of Brighton, in November 2022, to much fanfare.
"I'm a dentist during the day, which is crazy; my hashtag is #CookiesAndCavities—don't steal that," joked Bobby Grossi. "And then I'm a Crumbl cookie owner 24/7, because technically Crumbl [stores] are open from 6 am to 10 pm, Mondays through Thursdays, and then 6 am to midnight [Fridays and Saturdays."
"But I love being busy, and creating smiles [at both jobs]," Grossi added.
When asked what made him want to open a Crumbl franchise, he says the first time he heard about the cookie store was in Grand Rapids (Michigan), although he knew it was a TikTok craze due to his daughter, Angelina. His family was in Grand Rapids for his daughter's volleyball tournament, and stopped by the Crumbl location there.
"She was like, 'Dad—you have to try these cookies, they are the greatest cookies,'" he enthused. "So I went there and I saw the [large] line, and the entrepreneurial [part of] my brain is going, 'Oh wow. Let me try this cookie.'"
He tried Crumbl's chocolate chip cookie and his wife tried one of its peanut butter cookies, and it was love at first sight—or rather, bite.
His wife suggested that there should be a Crumbl in their hometown, and Dr. Grossi decided to open one in Fenton. Although he originally wanted to open a Brighton store first, he knew there would be a "learning curve" to being a franchise owner, and wanted Fenton to be the "test location," so to speak, before opening Brighton's.
When asked if he plans on expanding his Crumbl franchise, he said Davison, MI will be the next spot, and later, Canada, which currently has four locations.
And his favorite Crumbl cookie? "That's a tough call—the cinnamon square just came out last week, and the waffle [cookie] is also amazing. But if I'm going to pick between the Chocolate Chip [varieties], the semi-sweet or traditional, I prefer the traditional, and my wife likes the semi-sweet," he said.
