Retail. A Harsh Lesson

I was walking down the streets of Nashville last night when something caught my eye—a gutted storefront with a sign that read “Clean Juice.”

I had somewhere to be, but curiosity pulled me in. Clean Juice, I discovered, was a franchise founded by a husband and wife in Charlotte, NC, about eight years ago.

They proudly claimed to be the first USDA-certified organic juice and food bar franchise.

As a business owner myself, I felt a pit in my stomach.

This wasn’t just a failed store. Someone’s dream was demolished. Maybe the owner imagined being their own boss, improving their life, or making a positive impact on their community. Perhaps they pictured customers coming in stressed and leaving satisfied, knowing they’d made a healthy choice.

I couldn’t help but wonder—what had they risked? Their savings? A loan from family or friends? Did they quit stable jobs to do this?

As someone who works with companies and teams on achieving their business goals, my mind started to explore why this business, tapping into the booming health trend and located in a growing city, didn’t make it.

The market seemed to be there: Clean Juice was capitalizing on the health-conscious lifestyle. The city was booming. The foot traffic had to be good. They had scale, with a couple hundred stores across the country. So why did this one fail?

Apparently, this wasn’t an isolated case. Clean Juice sold the company to BRIX Holdings just this year, only two years after an aggressive expansion into its 31st state. So, was this just a business growing too fast? Did the market change? Was it poor operations, or simply capitalism’s relentless pace?

As I looked through the rubble, I thought about the deeper story behind the failure. How many people just walked by without noticing? Did anyone pause to think about the journey these owners went on, or how they felt closing their doors for the last time?

I hope they took something positive from it. I hope, even if their journey was short, they felt like their work mattered, that they learned valuable lessons, and that their risk was calculated just enough to encourage them to try again.

Maybe they’ll take another shot. Organic. Clean. Fresh.