A popular Barrie cafe and bakery shop didn’t let an overnight break-in get in the way of providing regulars with their daily dose of donuts today.
Cheryl McKinlay, owner of MmmDonuts, said their Bayview Drive location was robbed Tuesday night shortly before 11 p.m.
The shop is located between Big Bay Point Road and Little Avenue.
“Our alarm company called my husband and he checked the cameras and saw that there was someone here, so he called 911 and met the police here,” she said.
McKinlay says security video footage shows the thief approaching the doors of the shop before walking by the windows and then returning to the main door.
City police called in the canine unit, she said, which was able to track the thief briefly. However, they were unable to locate a suspect.
The thief, whom McKinlay believes to be male based on how they carried themselves, was wearing gloves and a hoodie that was right up around their face, making it nearly impossible to see the person’s face, she said.
“He had a bag with him. He pulled out a little hammer and smashed the glass, then reached in and unlocked the door. Our alarms did go off,” she said. “He knew where he was going. He went right over to the cash and emptied the float.
"Then, we have a little night deposit box that’s like a safe that he grabbed.”
The thief was in the store for less than a minute, McKinlay added.
“Whether he’d been here before and saw behind the cash where the lock box is, I don’t know. It was a pretty quick thing,” she said.
McKinlay said the thief also briefly opened the door to the store’s decorating area in the back, looked in and then exited through the front door.
“They got away with not a lot of cash, but some cash. The cash box was probably worth the same amount as the cash they got in it," she said.
Fixing the door will be the big expense, noted McKinlay, adding the hope is it will be replaced by the end of business today or first thing Thursday morning.
Despite the damage to their main entrance, McKinlay said they were able to open for business Wednesday morning.
“We just have our main entrance boarded off and then some chairs (around it) just so that no one goes near it," she said. "The glass is still falling. It’s safety glass, but it just keeps dropping, so we want everyone to stay away from it. We have our big open sign in front of the door on the outside.”
McKinlay said as upsetting as the ordeal has been, they’re simply grateful no one was in the store at the time.
“We do have early morning staff that do come in at like 3 a.m., so we were grateful it happened when the place was empty," she said. "It’s scary. We have people in the back and they wouldn’t necessarily know what’s going on at the front.
"That’s all that matters is that everybody is safe. We can fix the door.”
News of the robbery left many customers eager to help, after reading about it via the company’s Instagram page.
“Please tell me they didn't take all the maple dips 🍩!! Cause if so, I'll track them down!! I can smell and find those incredible donuts 🍩 a mile away,” said one person in response to a post this morning letting customers know about the incident.
“That sucks!!! Is it too soon to say, maybe they were so desperate for your insanely delicious donuts that they couldn't wait until morning....” commented another customer.
