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Shipleys

Shipley responds to harassment allegations

Mar 15th, 2018
by Charles Kuffner.
4 comments

Admit nothing, deny everything, make counter-accusations.

The sexual harassment lawsuit filed against the owner of Shipley Do-Nuts this month is the latest in an ongoing legal fight between the doughnut maker and other former workers over an alleged fraud scheme.

Three women claim Lawrence Shipley III routinely groped them and used racial slurs for Hispanics in a lawsuit filed in Harris County district court earlier this month.

He has flatly denied those allegations, and says the women are retaliating against his company after it fired a former plant manager for allegedly steering more than $1 million worth of contracts to distribution companies he owned.

Shipley sued Julian Garcia, the plant manager, for the alleged fraud scheme in September.

“These people were employed and cared for by my family for over 20 years,” Lawrence Shipley wrote last week. “What they are doing now is nothing more than hateful retaliation for becoming corrupt, entitled and self-serving.”

Murphy Klasing, who is representing Shipley Do-Nuts, said he was unsure of exactly what roles Esmeralda Sanchez, Martha Garcia and Elizabeth Peralta played in Julian Garcia’s alleged scheme.

See here for the background. I don’t see any reason to believe Shipley’s claims about his accusers, but one way or another the story will come out. In the meantime, I’m still not buying any of his donuts.

Oh, no, Shipley’s

Mar 6th, 2018
by Charles Kuffner.
7 comments

Disgusting.

Three former Shipley Do-Nuts employees are suing the company’s owner for allegedly groping them and making racist remarks, accusations that are consistent with a bevy of civil rights lawsuits filed by former workers since 2004.

The women claim that Lawrence Shipley III “regularly subjected them to unwelcome touching, other inappropriate physical behavior and unwelcome sexual comments,” according to a lawsuit filed in Harris County on Friday against the donut company and its owner.

“(Shipley) hugged Elizabeth Peralta tight across her front and touched her rear and buttocks,” the suit says. “He stared at her breasts and crotch areas. He spanked her rear.”

The other plaintiffs allege similar action from Shipley while working at the Houston-based chain’s North Main Street location. During one incident, plaintiff Esmeralda Sanchez claims Shipley did not punish a male supervisor who made sexual innuendos to her, instead saying that the way she dressed encouraged the behavior. They seek more than $1 million in damages.

The three women are also plaintiffs in a federal lawsuit filed against the company last year for failing to pay overtime, an allegation that’s been lodged many times against the company in suits.

In an email Sunday, Lawrence Shipley said his accusers were caught “red-handed in an elaborate corruption scheme whereby they duped the Shipley companies and more than 20 franchisees out of legitimate delivery and freight services for their own financial gain.”

“And if I were to become somebody I’m not and stumble over to the dark side, it wouldn’t be with these low lifes,” he wrote. “What a baseless, pathetic accusation. That’s my comment.”

An attorney for the three women said it was unclear what Shipley meant in his statement. Karla Evans Epperson said she was not aware of any legal actions against her clients that would explain Shipley’s comments. Two of the women worked in housekeeping, and the other did clerical work, according to the first suit.

Epperson said she wasn’t surprised by Shipley’s comments, though.

“This isn’t his first rodeo,” she said.

There’s more, so go read the rest. That North Main location is where I take the girls for donuts when they convince us to buy them. Not anymore. I will not darken the doorstep of a Shipley’s till this jackass has sold his shares and they have put in real reforms to treat their employees better and prevent crap like this in the future. What a damn shame.

It’s a dog eat donut world

Dec 29th, 2012
by Charles Kuffner.
1 comment

What interested me the most in this story about the locally-based Shipley’s Do-Nuts is what wasn’t said.

The changes are coming at a time when competition in the breakfast industry is stronger than ever.

Coffee chains are offering more breakfast pastries, and even ethnic bakeries are gaining favor with the general public, said Chris Tripoli, a restaurant consultant.

“We just have more choices now,” Tripoli said. “So what they’re trying to do is position the standard doughnut place for the next decade because it’s never going to be like it was 10 or 20 years ago.”

A national doughnut chain is about to crowd the field even more.

Earlier this year, the Canton-Mass.-based parent of Dunkin’ Donuts said it would expand here.

There are five Dunkin’ Donut stores here today, compared to Shipley’s 115 locations.

Remember when Krispy Kreme came to town a decade or so ago, to much hype and fanfare? A few years later, the franchise was gone from Houston as the national business experienced problems. If they can survive that, I figure they can survive whatever else comes their way. Be that as it may, I find it interesting that this piece of history went unmentioned in the story. You’d think the fact that they’d been down this road before would be worth noting.