Équipement Doyon Inc

I have stayed quiet about Doyon for a long time, but it is time to speak up. I hope my experiences will help other American small businesses that may be considering the purchase of this equipment. Doyon bakery equipment will often be one of the lower cost options that you find when comparing brands, and they make a wide variety of bakery equipment; everything from dough sheeters to ovens. The equipment itself is generally safe and it will hold up well to typical commercial use. However, most of their equipment suffers from engineering flaws. A quick example: Doyon’s bread slicer blades are incredibly difficult to replace, located inside a spring loaded cassette that requires two people to manipulate. The system is designed to be cheap to build, with no consideration given to the end user. Parts are difficult to come by and expensive. They typically cost about twice what a US company would charge for a similar item. The electronic control panels on our 2T3 bread oven are over $4,000 each. The motor that drives the rack on our TLOIG rack oven is over $1,000 — we replaced it with a Grainger motor for $500. Even the small metal handle on our dough sheeter was over $200 — I had a friend fabricate one in his metal shop for $50, parts and labor. And I have never encountered a customer service department as unhelpful and unresponsive as Doyon’s. I have emailed about a dozen times over the six years I’ve owned their equipment. I have gotten two or three responses back. A few years ago, they finally offered to have a service tech come look at some of the issues we were having. No one has ever come, of course. This month we are having to replace an original motor, and I requested some wiring information from Doyon. They sent me a picture of the top of the oven. No joke. I wrote back and explained again what I needed – in fact I pleaded with them to please provide with any kind of assistance. It has been over a week, and they have not even given me the courtesy of a return email. I strongly encourage all bakery owners and managers to steer clear of this company; based on my experiences, the low purchase price is far outweighed by the high cost of ownership and terrible customer service. Please contact me if you would like more information or have had a similar experience. I am always looking for fellow Doyon equipment owners in the hopes that we can share some workarounds and solutions — like my Grainger motor replacement on the rack oven. You can find me on Facebook, through our Serious Delights Bakery page. Thanks for reading.
11 years ago (06-04-2015)