FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
1. I noticed you don't use any tree nuts in your donuts. If I wanted some nutty donuts, can you use them?
Unfortunately, due to many tree nut- and peanut-related allergies that people have, we can't use any nuts in our donuts, not as a batter ingredient, not as a flour, and not as a topping. If you love seeds, we use flax and chia in our donuts and a few special flavors we offer every three month period we may use other seeds as a topping. For some of the vegan flavors that require milk in batter and in few glazes, we use unsweetened flax seed milk.
2. Are your donuts vegan and cruelty-free?
Since we are a 100% vegan company since June 2017, all of our donut flavors are vegan and free of animal ingredients, including dairy, eggs, honey, bone-char sugar, and other animal by-products. If you're allergic to dairy and eggs, our donuts are fitting to your dairy-free and egg-free lifestyles. For some of the vegan flavors that require milk in batter and in few glazes, we use unsweetened flax seed milk instead of dairy milk. Other flavors, we use different 100% fruit juices.
3. Do you make your donut flavors in gluten-free version and do you make them separately?
All of Raphael's Donuts's donut and donut ballz flavors, upon your choices when ordering them for home delivery, pick-up and nationwide shipping, and for wholesale and also when we have scheduled vendor events, are baked gluten-free. As of June 14, 2021, we are no longer using whole wheat flour to make whole wheat versions! We are once again a gluten free vegan brand! We use chickpea flour, like we have since we first offer gluten free donut products in August 2014!
4. What are your sweeteners for Raphael's Donuts, since you don't use any refined sugars, artificial sweeteners, or animal-based sweeteners?
We use organic agave nectar in all of the batters of our donut flavors and in the glazes of some of our flavors. We use stevia in some of the other donut flavors except for Blueberry Cake which has no glaze. All of our donut sweeteners are fitting for those in low glycemic diabetic diets and lifestyles and sugar-free lifestyles. They're also plant-based sweeteners and are fitting to vegans. Apple Cinnamon Spiced, Pumpkin Spiced, Vanilla Passion, Green Lemon, and Peach Mango Explosion are the flavors which contain stevia in their respective glazes. As of November 2019, we no longer use xylitol.
5. I noticed you only oven-bake your donuts and also make gourmet modern flavor combinations. Do you also make traditional flavors that we grew up with or is it your style of flavors?
Yes, we do oven-bake our donuts instead of deep-frying them for it's the healthiest modern way of cooking them, but it's our way of cooking them. The flavors we have are our style of flavors. Our style is gourmet modern cake-style donut flavors, which are created from our wildest and exciting-est imaginations, which add an unique style that's different from our opposite competition. Even our three-month special flavors are done in our style. We don't make the typical old-fashioned style of donuts, such as cream-filled or yeast-raised, since there's also a high volume of yeast allergies.
6. What is the nutritional info for all of your donut flavors and what is the glycemic load for them?
All of our nutritional info is found in the nutritional info tab under our home delivery menu tab on our website. What we can tell you: All of our donuts ranges in calories from 85 to 155 calories per donut, in glycemic load from 3-14, in total fat grams from 2-5, and in net carbs from 4-20. There is no cholesterol grams because they are all vegan and typically you would have to get your cholesterol from animal based food ingredients and we only use all-natural, non-gmo plant-based ingredients.
7. Where are your baking operations based out of and am I in your delivery radius?
The baking operations of Raphael's Donuts are based out of Pontiac, Michigan (recently moved from Flint Michigan where our company was founded). As of June 14th, we are now baking in our new rental commercial kitchen at Pontiac's New Mount Moriah International Church!! Yeah, Yeah, Yeah!! That means last year we exceeded our fundraiser goal for our wholesale expansion and that means that you, wholesale customers, can order our always-famous, always-loved vegan gluten free Raphael's Donuts products for your retail spaces to sell to your customers!!! The location of our new baking operation is also where our individual customers can pick up their online orders when they order for pick-up! Pick up times: Monday thru Saturday thru 8am to 9pm and Sundays from 2pm to 8pm.
For concerns about whether or not your address is in our 70-mile delivery radius, we encourage you to type our address on the directions section of Google Maps. We do deliver within 70 miles from Pontiac, which covers Wayne, Macomb, Oakland, Genesee, Lapeer, Ingham, Saginaw, Shiawassee, Livingston, Washtenaw, St. Clair and Monroe counties! If your address, whether it's for home or work, is in our delivery radius, you're in luck. If it's not, we can't car-deliver your orders. Your order will have to be shipped out if your home is more than 70 miles far. If your home happens to be near or within a hour's walking distance from the nearest bus stop in Macomb, Oakland, Wayne and Genesee counties, your order will be bus-delivered to you as we use DDOT, SMART and MTA Flint.
GOOD NEWS: For those outside our 70-mile delivery radius, as of February 5 2018, we are now mailing our donuts nationwide. Order for nationwide mail order.
8. What is the shelf life for Raphael's Donuts's donut flavors?
All of Raphael's Donuts's donut flavors have a room-temperature shelf life of 5-7 days depending of weather temperature also. They also have a refrigerated shelf life of 7-10 days. We highly recommend if you don't plan to eat all of your orders to freeze them, for the donuts are good for 3-5 months and the next time you eat them, when thawed they're as tasty and moist as they were freshly baked.
​9a. What is your minimum order requirement and what is the delivery turnaround and what are the delivery fees?
The minimum order requirements for home delivery are: 1/2 dozen, up to 2 flavors for Oakland County residents and 2 dozen up to 8 flavors for all other counties in our 70 mile car delivery radius. The delivery fees are $6 for Oakland County residents and $10 for all other counties in our radius. The delivery turnaround time is 2-10 days after order is placed. As well as the deliveries, we have a team of delivery drivers that handle short and long distance drives. When it gets to the delivery day of your orders, you'll be notified who'll be delivering your order.
9b. What is your minimum order requirement for mailed donut orders and what mailing service do you use for nationwide shipping?
We have a minimum order for nationwide mail order of 1/2 dozen with choice of up to two flavors. That's for regular-priced editions. For sample pack mail orders, the minimum order is 1 dozen, up to three flavors. If you're a home delivery customer living in counties inour 70 mile delivery radius outside Oakland County but only need fewer than 2 dozen regular-priced edition or just a sampler pack, you are best off ordering for nationwide mail order as it's uneconomical for us to car-deliver any order smaller than an two-dozen regular-priced pack. We use FedEx as our mailing partner. We mail donut orders Mondays thru Friday and since we use priority mail, depends where you live in the US, it takes 1-3 days for your orders to get to your mailing address. We highly recommend you use your home or work address, not P.O. Box addresses. We'll give you your tracking number via email address/cell phone number after we mail them.
10. How do I pay for my online order?
Whether you pay for home delivery, nationwide shipping, pick up or for wholesale, you pay with card at checkout.
​11. If I don't care for any of the flavors I just ordered --- enjoyed them --- but didn't care them, do I get a refund or a credit towards my next order?
If you didn't love the flavors you choose, unfortunately we can't refund your payment, but we'll give you our 25% unsatisfied credit towards your next order. Only your credit can be used for your next order and can't be combined with other discounts. We want you all to not just enjoy our donuts but to LOVE, LOVE, LOVE THEM as if it's your favorite treat!!! People think because they're eating diabetic friendly vegan donuts, they're not going to love the taste. We are different, of course, since we are the first ever diabetic friendly vegan donut company in the history of the world and history of the donut industry which is 174 years old. But we are different from our vegan donut competitors and greater and healthier than any existing donut company that makes the opposite of what we do, and you don't have to be a diabetic, a vegan, or a ceilac to enjoy Raphael's Donuts. You just have a health-minded desire to enjoy Raphael's Donuts! We have a mix of non-diabetics, ommivores, and non-gluten-free people that are obsessed with us, especially over our almost four-year existence!! We welcome you to not just enjoy our donuts but fall in love with them!
​12. If I change my mind and want to cancel my order or if none of your delivery drivers are able to deliver my order, do I get a full refund?
If you decide to cancel your order for whatever reason, you let us know in the channels: email form, facebook, even by phone by voice or text at least three hours prior to us car-delivering. If you pay by credit card, we will refund your payment to your card. If you intend to pay by cash and you cancel your order, you won't be required to pay. If you are a mail order customer, please make sure you are in complete confidence that you have decided on your order before ordering for mail order. If you were to cancel your order, there is a greater chance your order will have been mailed. We can't refund your money if they're mailed.
​13. I want to order some Raphael's Donuts, but am hesitating because I don't know how I am going to love them or I just don't want to break the budget paying a discounted price or a full regular price for a dozen donuts?
We do have sampler packs of our donuts --- they're donut ballz! They're $13 per gluten free 16-count sampler. The prices are half of the regular-prices; the main difference is you get to choose up to four flavors in a 16-count sampler and our sample packs are NOW donut ballz. So if you can afford a sample pack and can handle one, that's smiles to both you and our faces. Sample packs are available on our online store on the RD website for nationwide shipping, home delivery and pick up. If you only need two or three or five donuts, we also sell at our scheduled vendor events which include craft shows, farmers markets, and festivals that may be indoors or outdoors, in different locations.
We sell them in doubles and triples. We do them in much of every year with most of them being in the summer months. When we sell them at a vendor event, we sell our donuts in doubles and triples. Our scheduled events when booked are always posted on the events section of our Raphael's Donuts facebook page and on the Raphael's Donuts vendor events tab. You can RSVP to let us know you intend to coming to try our donuts.
​Our triples (3 packs) and 1/2 dozen packs are also sold at our retailers that sell them. We post the retailers that sell our donuts on the Find Our Donuts tab of our website. But either you order a sample pack or a regular-priced edition of our donuts, paying full regular price or discounted priced with volume discounts and email discounts, or come to our vendor events for smaller packs, we guarantee you'll fall in love with our donuts and brand! ​​
14. I have an EBT Bridge card. When you do vendor events, do you take EBT cards or tokens?
We only take EBT tokens when we sell at a farmers market event, depending on the farmers market we sell at. We don't take any EBT cards or tokens when we do craft shows or festivals.
15. FOR WHOLESALE CUSTOMERS (retail stores, restaurants, cafes, etc.): I want your Raphael's Donuts in my store! How do I go about the process of carrying your donuts for my customers?
If you are looking to carry Raphael's Donuts, contact us by filling out our form by clicking here and we will assist you in anything you need from us to get our donuts in your retailers for your customers to try our products. You can also place your wholesale order on our online store, following directions.