After searching statistics regarding various coffee brands, obscure entries on websites helped connect the dots about why Tim Horton’s locations in North Dakota may have closed their doors.
At one time, there were four Tim Horton’s franchises operating in North Dakota; Grand Forks (2), Fargo and Minot. The first to open was a coffee and bake shop across the street from the Alerus Center and Canad Inns in Grand Forks. That shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone since Canadian visitors are the ones who frequent that hotel and shop in Grand Forks.
Shortly thereafter, a satellite opened in the Ralph Englestad Arena on the University of North Dakota campus and then a third shared a convenience store on 13th Avenue South in Fargo.
Finally a fourth Tim Horton’s opened on North Hill in Minot and shared a building with Qdoba.
By the end of 2022, all of those locations had closed their doors despite a 2015 corporate initiative to open 15 locations in both Fargo and Minot.
The official statement of closure from Tim Horton’s was vague, saying the North Dakota locations closed so the company could concentrate on its Canadian franchises.
If anyone believes that, there’s a bridge for sale in Arizona. There are hundreds of locations in several states with most of them being in Ohio and New York. The coffee franchise is a corporate sponsor of the Buffalo Bills football team. Minnesota also has five locations.
In reality, there were a variety of reasons for the North Dakota closures with one of the most obvious being competition from Starbucks, Caribou and McDonald’s, as well as numerous local coffee shops.
Although Tim Horton’s is the third most popular coffee in the U.S. and Canada, Starbucks is No. 1 just about everywhere. It’s difficult to compete against that regardless if you are Tim Horton’s, Dunkin Donuts or Seattle’s Best.
But what it allegedly boiled down to is lack of customer service and poor management.
Unofficial comments from customers about the Grand Forks location didn’t paint a rosy picture. I suppose if you wanted coffee, no problem, but customer reviews complained of cold food, wrong orders and employees not knowing what they were doing, or else providing lackadaisical customer service.
There were also some unofficial employee reviews across the board that didn’t look good. One of them stated employees had to work without breaks and were constantly being yelled at. The comments aren’t verified, but are comments posted from said employees on social media.
It is also known that to get a Tim Horton’s franchise, you have to fork out a lot of money up front, not to mention, having a building, or at least be able to share one with someone else, as was the case in Fargo and Minot.
It’s only a guess, but the Fargo Tim Horton’s was most likely in the poorest financial shape. Seldom were people there even though it was on one of the busiest streets in Fargo near West Acres shopping mall.
Minot and Grand Forks did much better with customer traffic, at least initially. Apparently, the brand was the draw until that alleged poor customer service trumped the quality of the coffee and donuts.
Tim Horton’s remains a popular choice in North Dakota. Its coffee is available at North Dakota Target and some Walmart locations and in some other specialty shops. People living near the border often travel to Canadian locations to get their Tim Horton’s fix.
A new location may have opened on 19th Ave. S., in Fargo, but the Fargo Convention and Visitors Bureau isn’t aware of it and a Popeye’s Chicken is operating in that space in a Petro Serve plaza.
Hopefully lessons were learned, but still the results were unfortunate for customers. Right now, the closest location to Grand Forks is Morris, Manitoba, and Minot’s closest location is Estevan, Saskatchewan.
Grand Forks and Minot continue to grow, but at a slower pace than Fargo, so let’s hope we see the franchise re-emerge in Minot and Grand Forks so we can get our Timbits and coffee.
