Business & Tech
Locally Focused Dunkin Donuts Plan Comes to Belmont CTA
The new coffee and doughnut kiosk integrated in the Belmont CTA train station will open later this year for "El" riders on the go, and the CTA says they're shifting to supporting small businesses.
A new Dunkin Donuts for “El” riders on the go will soon open inside the Belmont CTA train station, both Dunkin and the Chicago Transit Authority confirm.
Located in a little kiosk on the right side of the entry gates at 945 W. Belmont Ave., the new storefront is literally just a window meant for walkup customers. It sits less than a block from the newly renovated Dunkin Donuts on the corner of Clark Street and Belmont Avenue.
The fixed kiosk was once home to Hawaiian coffee and smoothie shop Maui Wowi before shutting its doors—and window—in early summer of 2012. The new Dunkin Donuts will be open for business in early fall, a company spokesperson said.
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And while a lease for the Belmont location couldn’t immediately be found, leases uncovered for other kiosks on the Orange and Blue lines were for 10 to 15 years and rented between $2,600 and a little more than $3,000 a month.
"We do have a lot of Dunkin Donuts in our system, and we consider those to be locally owned businesses."
But Dunkin isn’t just another chain restaurant. CTA spokesperson Lambrini Lukidis says the doughnut and coffee shop is franchised, and therefore treated as a small businesses. It’s part of a shift the transit company is hoping to achieve with its vendors.
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“We do have a lot of Dunkin Donuts in our system, and we consider those to be locally owned businesses," Lukidis said. “They’re locally owned franchises. In the last 18 months or so we’ve really tried to diversify our concession options that we have in our system… Ultimately we do take (who owns the businesses) into consideration when approving a new concessions business.”
It’s a move that’s even more apparent when the company recently approved leases for similar kiosks on other train lines from local Wicker Park café owners and a Wilmette-based caterer.
The new locations will join the other five Dunkin' Donuts locations in Lake View:
- 3200 N. Clark St.
- 801 W. Diversey St.
- 3949 N. Broadway St.
- 1755 W. Addison St.
- 3000 N. Ashland Ave.
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