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Spunky Dunkers Donuts in Palatine, Illinois, was prepared for Mardi Gras: the store stocked up on ingredients for paczki, a traditional doughnut that Americans eat on Fat Tuesday. Paczki Day usually helps sales at the shop for a full month or two, but during a pandemic with people working at home and back-to-back snowstorms, traffic at the shop was dismal. The shop owner asked employees to put out a call on Facebook; not expecting that the post would be shared more than 1,000 times on Facebook and liked more than 6,000 times on Instagram. Business at the shop picked up right away and the bakery had to double its baking shifts. The store went through 10,000 baked goods in three days and only stopped baking when it ran out of basic doughnut supplies. We knew people liked us, but I had no idea, said shop owner Jan Daczewitz.
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