And sure enough, things were going pretty well. A solid customer base continued to support the store, located in the mall at 710 Main Street North, and it was business as usual.
Then something happened in March. And, well, just like happened to everyone else, things took a bit of a downturn.
There is good news, though – as the COVID-19 pandemic started to wane in Saskatchewan and things re-opened, Booster Juice was right there with them. And this past weekend, they celebrated the first year of new ownership in the city.
“We’re still learning a lot, but things are going well,” said Kevin Situ, who manages the Moose Jaw franchise for new owner XingJuan Huang. “The most important thing at this point for us is to treat this business as a local business even as a franchise. We really care about the people here, we’ve joined the Chamber of Commerce, we’ve talked to the city, and we want to do what we can (to have a good connection with the community).”
That level of care extended into their pandemic precautions – the store went through heavy cleaning, social distancing measures were put in place, product was removed from display and they even had moments where they had to have customers wait outside the store if things were too crowded to maintain six feet of separation.
Having things back in order has been more than welcome. Situ reports that business is steady and things have picked up over the summer, but the COVID-19 outbreak took its toll.
“It changed everybody’s life, not just us,” Situ said. “Sometimes you think ‘do I want to go out in public or not’ and the people coming here, are they safe or not. That’s always our biggest concern.”
For now, the plan is to keep things rolling along, maybe even expanding elsewhere in the city if the demand is there. And given how solid nutrition can help fight off disease…
“We want people to stay healthy and eat healthy, and we can help them do that here at Booster Juice,” Situ said with a smile.
