Last year, a long-standing absence was broken, after the first Dunkin Donuts stores in a decade were opened in the Twin Cities, with Rochester being the chosen place to begin once again; now, the company's announcing 24 new locations in the area, including finally one in St. Paul!

Last Wednesday, the company announced a few new franchise agreements that will bring more Dunkin Donuts stores to the area after it'd been mostly neglected by the chain in the past decade, but now everything's changing as potentially there will be at least a few of the new locations open in the next few months.

According to Star Tribune, the new deal to open 24 new Dunkin Donuts stores in the Twin Cities comes months after a previous April announcement, when it was revealed that there were 10 stores planned out by the end of 2015, so in all, there are 34 planned venues of the breakfast chain in the near future.

MPR News reports that this week's first announcement from he VANTive Group, franchise owners in the region, said that there were plans to open 12 Dunkin Donuts stores in "Eastern Minneapolis" between the years 2017 and 2024, prompting speculation on whether this included St. Paul, which was later confirmed by company reps.

According to TwinCities.com, the rest of the new Dunkin Donuts stores will be in charge of franchisee Kod Kod Enterprises, which will open 12 more in the north metro area including St. Cloud; in the meantime, the stores announced last April will come from Legacy Concepts.

It's been a long ride for Dunkin Donuts to reach the Twin Cities, having abandoned a 2008 push after determining there weren't franchisees able to provide the needed logistics to support a grander plan in the area.

"We do think there is more opportunity, and we continue to work with more franchise candidates," said Dunkin' Donuts senior director of business development Steve Rafferty to Star Tribute, speaking specifically about the possibility of adding Dunkin Donuts stores to south metro.