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Dot's Pretzels, a snack born and raised in North Dakota, will be acquired by The Hershey Company in a deal worth $1.2 Billion.

Dot's Pretzels started in Velva, North Dakota, but now operate facilities in Lenexa, Kansas; Edgerton, Kansas; and Goodyear, Arizona. None of Dot's Pretzels plants make pretzels. Not even their first facility, still hard at work with 55 employees.

Dot's buys premade twisted pretzel sticks and the plants add the seasonings and then repackage the yum-sticks.

Hershey Didn't Just Buy Dots In That $1.2 Billion Deal

Dots
Dots
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Hershey's also bought Pretzels Inc. to make sure they have a constant supply of pretzels for coating. Does that mean they'll shutter the current coating plants? No word on that, except for the original plant with 55 employees. That'll keep running.

Who Is This Dot Anyway?

Dot is a real person. Her name is Dorothy Henke, and she started the business not that long ago, in 2012, in her Velva, ND kitchen.

Dot says she'd retired, and after attending a wedding reception where she tasted some buttery pretzel twists, decided to find the perfect coating for pretzels. It wasn't until she and her husband were wintering at their Arizona home that friends liked her pretzels so much, she thought, "This could work!"

They grew not-so-slowly, and suddenly, we started seeing Dot's Pretzels all over Southeastern Minnesota. It seemed like it happened overnight, and since Dot's is the fastest-growing pretzel brand in the USA, it kinda did...with a ton of hard work.

Dot's RUB? Yep. (Dot's)
Dot's RUB? Yep. (Dot's)
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As always, if you have a comment, complaint, or concern about something I wrote here, please let me know: james.rabe@townsquaremedia.com

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