Leadership

Krispy Kreme to promote Josh Charlesworth to CEO

The company’s chief operating officer will take the top job in January. Current CEO Mike Tattersfield will remain on the board and will serve as a senior advisor.
Krispy Kreme CEO
Josh Charlesworth, who has been with Krispy Kreme since 2017, will take over as CEO next year. | Photo courtesy of Krispy Kreme.

Krispy Kreme on Monday said that company president Josh Charlesworth will take over as CEO in January.

Mike Tattersfield, who has led the Charlotte-based chain since 2016, will remain on the Krispy Kreme board as a significant investor. He will also be a senior advisor and “Krispy Kreme ambassador.”

Charlesworth has been with the company since 2017. He was promoted from CFO last year to president and chief operating officer.

Olivier Goudet, Krispy Kreme’s chairman, said in a statement that Charlesworth “has played a critical role in Krispy Kreme’s growth the last six years and will now lead the company’s next chapter of success and value creation.”

Krispy Kreme under Tattersfield shifted to an omni-channel strategy, turning the company’s doughnut shops into factories that produce doughnuts that are delivered daily to kiosks inside grocery stores and convenience stores and other locations. The company also returned to the public markets in 2021.

The company “grew from a complex, multi-product, primarily-U.S. model to a more global, capital efficient hub-and-spoke omnichannel model, focused on delivering fresh, awesome doughnuts, all while nearly doubling adjusted EBITDA of the business,” Goudet said, referring to earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization.

But the stock hasn’t quite responded, having lost a third of its value since shortly after the IPO.

Charlesworth will take the company and work to continue its global expansion while finding more locations for its doughnuts in the U.S. The company generated nearly $1.5 billion in global system sales and operates more than 1,900 locations worldwide, with 13,000 “points of access” where its doughnuts are sold.

“We will continue to make fantastic, fresh doughnuts conveniently available to more and more consumers around the world,” he said in a statement.

UPDATE: This story has been updated to correct the number of locations Krispy Kreme operates. 

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