In the current age of social media, trends seem to come and go quickly, along with celebrities and companies being “canceled” left and right.
Crumbl Cookies, a popular sweets shop founded in 2017, has been sitting idly on the bench of the social media playing field since it began trending throughout many platforms. When it first started to rise in popularity, seemingly everyone was talking about the new flavors every week. However, recently, nothing but crickets.
Crumbl was popular among students, but its popularity has died down some after many students saw how unhealthy the cookies are. The nutritional value of Crumbl is not the best, with each cookie at around 700-1200 calories. There are around five servings per cookie and each serving is 150 calories, making Crumbl an unhealthy treat that you should indulge in only once in a while.
Freshman Hadiah Heydari goes to Crumbl once in a while, but is concerned about the overall health of the cookies.
“I do like [Crumbl’s] cookies but they are definitely not my favorite,” Heydari said. “They are too sweet and some of them even taste a little raw. And not to mention the crazy number of calories per just one cookie. This being said, I try to limit the amount of times I eat Crumbl.”
Although Crumbl is definitely unhealthy for consumers, many social media influencers promote it, which is one way it has stayed in business.
“I see a lot of influencers on social media posting their reviews of the weekly Crumbl rotation,” Heydari said. “Most of these influencers’ reviews are overly positive and I have noticed that a lot with specifically Crumbl reviews, not just typical food reviews.”
Another way Crumbl has retained customers is their weekly rotation of flavors. Each week they have a new set of six cookies and cakes for consumers to try. This keeps people interested and coming back, as they want to try the other unique flavors available, profiting off of the modern short-term attention span from constant scrolling on social media.
This being said, Crumbl has been successful because of its well-thought-out marketing strategy. The combination of social media promotion and weekly flavors is what helps keep Crumbl in business, even though their cookies may not be the best.
“I think people are starting to realize how overpriced and unhealthy Crumbl is and soon people won’t go there anymore,” Heydari said. “If there are other cookie companies that are better than Crumbl, advertising and marketing could be the main reason why Crumbl is way more successful than any other competitors. If other businesses are able to improve their marketing then this could help them become more profitable.”
Although they seem to have hit the ground running, Crumbl has slowly become less and less relevant since their opening, to the point where people have forgotten about, or maybe just never knew about, some of this company’s legal troubles.
Typically when a company does something like violating child labor laws, people are quick to call them out. However, no one seems to be talking about Crumbl Cookies and their dance with the devil a couple of years ago.
According to the US Department of Labor, “11 of Crumbl Cookies’ franchises violated Child Labor Regulations in six states” back in 2022. These laws state that minors may not work more than 48 hours per week: over four hours per day on a school day and over eight hours on a non-school day, slightly differing per state. The Wage and Hour Division also found that over 3,800 minors were hired in violation of these laws, with employers overworking and hazarding their minor employees, causing Crumbl to pay $57,854 in penalties.
As of recently, Crumbl Cookies has changed its policies and does not hire employees below the age of 18 anymore.
So, has Crumbl declined in popularity? We believe they have become less popular than when they first opened. For Crumbl, many people know of them but don’t go to it anymore because Crumbl has gone “out of style,” per se. They aren’t as “trendy” as they were in the beginning, and they are less popular than they used to be, but not to the point where they will go out of business.
Crumbl still gets customers and plenty of people like to look at the weekly flavors, but more people will start to realize just how unhealthy this sweet treat actually is.
