Married business owners Lisa King-Lynn and Hansel Lynn plan to close their custard and donuts dessert shop Cudos. The last day will be Monday, March 13. (Photo courtesy the Lynn Family.)
By Kate Bradshaw
About a year and a half after launching their custard and doughnut shop Cudos, the Palo Alto family behind it has decided to shut down their operations at Town and Country Village.
The last day of business will be Monday, March 13.
The unique dessert shop started out when Palo Alto resident Hansel Lynn approached his wife, Lisa King-Lynn, and suggested their family start a frozen custard shop, since the chilly dessert was hard to find on the West Coast. They'd never done anything like it: He's founder and CEO of theCoderSchool and previously started School of Rock in Palo Alto, while she worked in software for years, she explained in a recent interview.
His idea was the frozen custard, a dessert he'd grown to like while traveling across the U.S., and she really likes doughnuts. So they decided to fuse their ideas into a double-dessert concept that she hasn't seen replicated anywhere else, King-Lynn explains. The cudo is "??like cake and ice cream but you don’t have to wait for a birthday party to enjoy it," she says.
At the start, the dessert shop hit some of the obstacles that many other pandemic operations did: supply chain delays, equipment challenges and staffing difficulties. It's also expensive to run a business in Palo Alto, she adds. They first opened their shop in Town and Country Village in August 2021, but had to close for a couple of months following equipment problems. They reopened in October 2021 and have been in operation ever since.
To help staff the shop, their three children, in their early to late teens, stepped up to work there when they weren't in school.
"It was a great experience for them," King-Lynn says. "I think they learned a lot, especially in terms of customer service (and) interacting with different people."
The family decided to close the shop to rethink their priorities and hope to bring the Cudos concept back in some capacity, potentially this summer, either at local farmers markets or via catering offerings, she adds. They encourage people to sign up for their mailing list for updates at cudosforyou.com.
"It's been a really fun and new experience for us," she says. "But we have new adventures awaiting our family."
Cudos, 855 El Camino Real #160, Palo Alto; 650-285-3332, Instagram: @cudosforyou.
