The answer seems to be “no,” potentially owing to the fact that Krispy Kreme was so intentionally personal. There are only so many times we can replay the same sepia-tinted memory before it loses associative power. It also doesn’t help that Krispy Kreme chose to attach its image to eras that have been critically re-contextualized as internet culture caught the social justice bug. For millennials — already more likely than their older counterparts to skip grease in favor of kale — the era Krispy Kreme evokes represents a time in which women and minorities had it bad. Not exactly social dynamics 20-somethings are itchin’ to recreate.

And so the chain has had its associative legs cut out from under it. You can only appeal to a customer’s memories of retro America as long as those memories remain happy. Once they sour, the jig is up. The façade has been stripped of its comfort.

When societal sea changes render a brand’s image worthless, the company is left with only its product. And fortunately for Krispy Kreme, the product happens to be unchanged. Call it the hard lesson of the Beatrice acquisition, but even when the brand was in jeopardy (between ’05 and now), corners weren’t cut. The flipside of this commitment to quality, however, is a reticence to change, a determination to dance with the one that brung you, even after it’s clear the one that brung you is all but danced out. Whereas Dunkin’ caters to changing tastes by adding “DD Smart” items as alternatives to their sugar-heavy staples, Krispy Kreme remains committed to hot, sticky sweetness. In fact, Krispy Kreme’s refusal to pander to health-consciousness seems almost intentionally obdurate: They know what you’re there for. They aren’t going to patronize you with a shelf full of kale.

Which is what’s actually kind of “Southern” about the brand, after all. Like the South itself, KK is hesitant to bend to the browbeating of interlopers who have no investment in its continued survival in the first place.

Broadly speaking, eras of great social upheaval tend to engender one of two polarized responses. There are those (often young), who blindly side with "progress," determined to ride happily into the future. And there are those (often old), who insist that what’s worked for eons shouldn’t be tampered with. For whatever reason, human beings tend either to jump headlong into the unknown future or fight change kicking and screaming. Now, there’s no doubting which personal response Krispy Kreme’s obduracy more closely resembles. And there’s even less argument over which paradigm Dunkin’s perpetual rebranding represents.

Notice that, for example, Dunkin’ Donuts does not demand that you “slow down” or “enjoy the moment.” Rather, it fits into your life as fuel to “run on,” feeding the frantic pace of modernity.

This is its success.

Krispy Kreme, on the other hand, asks you to stop, take a moment, and be present doing a single, pleasant, unproductive thing.

This is its failure. The notion of “slow” is entirely antithetical to modern urban life. And if there’s one thing “Southerners” distrust, it’s urban modernity.

Krispy Kreme belongs to the red-state world of porches and rockers and sweating pitchers of sweet tea, and it seems to be retreating as that world itself disappears. Dunkin’ Donuts is designed for the blue-state world of breakfast in the car and 90-minute commutes and late nights at the office, and it is expanding as that world tirelessly expands, creeping onto other continents and into rural America.

This all-consuming modernity is a stressor, a change that catalyzes our need to identify with something stable.