A LETTER FOR PEOPLE WHO LIVE HERE

THU · NOV 5 · 2026

Every Philadelphian of a certain age knows the smell. Warm cookies, midnight, someone's dorm. Insomnia Cookies started in 2003 when Seth Berkowitz began baking and delivering to classmates at Penn, and it never stopped. This month Berkowitz went on Guy Raz's How I Built This and said the quiet part loudly: Insomnia expects to finish the year with roughly 393 bakeries around the world, and the goal is 1,800.

That is not a typo. The company that used to run cookies across campus is planning to be one of the biggest bakery operations on earth, and the number came from a real analysis of United States and international opportunity, not a napkin.

THE PHILLY ORIGIN

In case you somehow missed the lore, the whole thing started in Berkowitz's Penn dorm room, with late-night deliveries to classmates before it grew into a chain that now spans campuses and cities everywhere. Philadelphia's most famous dorm-room startup is not an app. It is cookies, which feels correct for this city.

WHY IT WON'T FRANCHISE

Here is the part of the interview that actually matters to anyone who thinks about businesses. Insomnia owns and operates nearly all of its roughly 390 bakeries itself, with only a handful of licensing deals at an airport and in stadiums. No franchising. Berkowitz's argument is that the business is late-night, delivery-heavy, seasonal and college-rooted, and that owning everything protects quality and makes it easier to test things. The company has even learned the hard lesson in the other direction: open too many stores in one market and you outrun demand. Growth, in his framing, is earned. "Consumer love gives you license."

THE DEEPER CUT

The part we appreciate most, because it is the most Philadelphia part: Insomnia tried other things first, including frozen yogurt and cupcakes, and they failed. What worked was doing less. "Reducing the SKUs down to the core," Berkowitz says, meaning: stop selling everything and sell cookies. A city built on cheesesteaks and one perfect sandwich understands this instinctively.

We recap every big interview like this one over at ListenerReader, where this conversation lives in full. For now, the next time you smell cookies at midnight anywhere on earth, there is a decent chance it started in West Philly.

PHILA.FYI

This story links every claim to where we found it. Corrections welcome.