With a newly opened storefront downtown, [Re]Fresh Juice Co. offers Guelph a glimpse into the world of cold-pressed juicing. Childhood friends, Whitney Douglas and Amanda Woodhouse, always dreamed of starting a business together, and with their backgrounds in food, health, and marketing, the idea behind [Re]Fresh seemed like a natural fit—they just had to discover it first.
Though cold-pressed juicing is relatively new in the Canadian market, Douglas explained that, “the juice industry in the U.S. represents about four and a half billion dollars and has been steadily growing every year for the last 10 to 15 years.” After discovering this kind of juicing at a show in Toronto a couple years back, she knew it would be a hit back home. “It tastes beautiful, it looks beautiful, and when I tried it, I fell in love with it,” she said while sampling a bottle of their in-house beet red juice.
Although Douglas and Woodhouse have been developing their business through wholesale and farmer’s markets for the last year and a half, they recently celebrated the grand opening of their storefront location, which offers healthy grab-and-go food options, as well as a fully-stocked fridge of fresh cold-pressed juices—something quite new to the downtown core. “From a nutritional standpoint, there’s nothing like it down here. What’s cool about it is that you can bottle it, you can take it with you, and you can have it on hand. It’s a convenience and accessibility thing for people,” said Douglas.
Having fresh and nutritious options on-the-go has become more and more in demand for today’s busy, health-crazed world. Being able to pack as many nutrients as possible into a quick juice fix is a major selling point. “The most popular juice is our Savoury Green,” revealed Woodhouse, “once you’ve tried that one, it makes you feel so great that you’re just hooked on it.” Containing about five pounds of green per bottle, “pound for pound, that’s the juice that’s going to get the job done.”
While cold-pressed juice seems to be the hot new trend on the market, Douglas and Woodhouse feel that, in the long run, people will feel the benefits and continue to integrate it into their daily routine. “You start it because it’s a fad and it’s fun, but you’re refutable to feel better, so its one of those fads that will then turn into a lifestyle, just because you can’t imagine going back to feeling the way you felt before introducing [it] into your life.”
A proud member of the local community, [Re]Fresh caters heavily to commuters, local business owners, and the growing number of downtown Guelph residents, but also aims to reach out to the student population. “The products that we have [give] energy in a really quick, easy way… I would imagine that would be a huge benefit to students to know that it’s out there,” explained Woodhouse. By offering delivery services, along with a 10 per cent discount for students, [Re]Fresh wants to make their healthy options as accessible as possible for everyone in the community.
By opening this independent, locally-grown business, Douglas and Woodhouse have already felt a wave of support from the Guelph community at large. As recent recipients of the Rhyze Award for emerging entrepreneurial women, the owners of [Re]Fresh were able to build and improve their business idea much quicker than they had imagined. Though this award definitely helped the business financially and promotionally, Woodhouse acknowledged how “it just felt really nice to feel recognized and supported, and that’s always a good thing.”