Business feature: Muleshoe Donut expands to Farwell

link Staff photo: Kevin Wilson

Dararithy Kea gets information from Joe Whitney for donut orders at the shop’s new Farwell location.

Anybody who’s had the scenic tour of the Texico-Farwell border — more commonly known as “waiting for the train” — knows that on the Farwell side, there’s a prime piece of real estate for the right business.

Dararithy Kea was told that on both sides of the border, there was a customer base and a high-traffic area waiting to be welcomed in for a donut and coffee.

And so began the expansion of Muleshoe Donut to the edge of Texas.

“It’s been pretty busy; people are kind of getting excited about it,” Kea said on Friday, nearly the end of a successful first week for the second location of the donut shop. “It’s close to the highway, and people waiting for the train can see our sign. It’s a nice thing.”

Kea, a native of Cambodia who went to college in Florida and moved to Muleshoe to be near family, took over the donut shop in Muleshoe from his uncle about two years ago and seemed to do well in his first experience running any business.

“My first business is a donut shop, so I don’t really know how it would be different from another business,” said Kea, who has other relatives in the donut shop business. “The business is just taking care of the customers, having a good product and keeping the prices low.”

Kea said his business employs seven — five in Muleshoe and two in Farwell.

The Farwell branch of Muleshoe Donut, with a custom sign up top and a glowing neon “OPEN” sign and banner at walking level, is tough to miss whether one is entering or leaving Farwell. That’s how Maria Cano, a shop employee, noticed the “Help Wanted” sign.

A Farwell resident for more than 20 years, Cano has admitted the hours are an adjustment — donut people have to get up pretty early — but has few other complaints.

“It’s been wonderful,” said Cano. “I worked 10 years in a flower shop here. It’s the same customer base, I know everyone here. But it is very different, flowers to donuts.”

The unchanging element is the people around the shop, Kea said. He didn’t have grand plans to expand the business west, but was prodded by friends he knew at The BBQ Shop in Farwell. They said if he brought the same quality of donuts to Farwell that he had in Muleshoe, the customers would make the endeavor worthwhile.

So far, the customer base has come in for the variety of everything — donuts in cake, glazed or maple bar for pocket change individually or $7 a dozen; breakfast sandwiches in bacon or sausage and sausage kolaches in regular or spicy.

In addition to customers from the bordering towns, the shop has seen customers from Friona, Bovina and even from Clovis curious about the new place.

The daily batch of food is prepared in Muleshoe, and split between the two shops. The difficult part is finding the balance between bringing too much food, or bringing too few of each thing to last from 6 a.m. to noon weekdays (12:30 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays).

“We close on Monday,” Kea said. “We open on Sunday, because I like to see people getting donuts for the church.”