On April 9, Adam Ogden, the founder and CEO of JuiceBlendz, a national smoothie and juice bar franchise based in South Florida, visited NSU to launch his College Road Tour and speak at the H. Wayne Huizenga School of Business and Entrepreneurship.
A state-of-the-art JuiceBlendz Mobile Blending Unit was parked outside of the Don Taft University Center providing students with free samples of JuiceBlendz smoothies. Students were also able to pick up free T-shirts after following JuiceBlendz on Twitter and liking them on Facebook.
Nekisha Louis, graduate student in criminal justice, said she is grateful JuiceBlendz gave out free samples because she didn’t want to spend her money on a smoothie without trying it first.
“I am a lot more likely to buy [JuiceBlendz products] now,” she said. “I followed them on Twitter to get a free shirt, too. It’s a pretty good incentive.”
Ogden said that he thinks the partnership between NSU and JuiceBlendz has been successful and the brand has been received well by students because JuiceBlendz promotes a healthy choice for college students.
“I love health and making healthy food choices. If I want to skip a meal, I can just grab one on the run. It really comes down to making good nutrition habits with your smoothies. We use a lot of fresh fruits and juices in our products,” he said.
Preston Luce, sophomore marine biology major, said, “[JuiceBlendz] is very expensive, and since I don’t have a [declining balance] I don’t get to have it often. But it was nice of them to have a free [sampling]. Their smoothies are great, especially their Peanut Butter and Jelly one.”
During his visit, Ogden also spoke to the Graduate Business Student Association and the Franchise Management undergraduate class about his experiences as an entrepreneur in the franchise industry.
Ogden said, “I’m excited to connect with students firsthand and lend some real-world advice as they prepare to enter the workforce. I want to show that it is possible to do a lot with a little – my story is a clear example of that – and I think [students] relate well to a younger entrepreneur who was in their shoes not long ago.”
Ogden started JuiceBlendz about six and half years ago when he was in his mid-twenties after he dropped out of college. Though he doesn’t recommend that choice to students, he is very grateful for how well the business is doing.
“We have two brands now—JuiceBlendz and YoBlenz. Between both brands, we have about 30 stores and 120 in development nationwide. We recently started our new brand YoBlendz, which is a self-serve yogurt business. You may see one on campus soon,” he said.
JuiceBlendz is also re-doing their menu to add café foods to it, including salads and sandwiches. Ogden said he’s not sure if the café-styled JuiceBlendz may be in NSU’s future.
He said, “Maybe I’ll propose that to the university. I think it would be really neat to expand the menu [here] to incorporate more healthy eating options. That’s the reason we brought JuiceBlendz here — to give students a healthy choice.”
