Squish Juicery’s Port Coquitlam location has been squashed by a terminating lease.
The award-winning cold-pressed juice bar announced on social media that it’s closing its original location at 180B-2099 Lougheed Hwy. on Friday, Dec. 22.
The juicery, that was recognized by the Tri-Cities Chamber of Commerce as one of its businesses of the year in 2022 and whose co-founder, Jessica Morrison, was the Chamber’s young professional of the year in 2020, recently opened a second location in the Coquitlam Centre mall.
But Morrison, who started the business in 2019 with her husband, Callan, said the expiring lease of its Port Coquitlam shop combined with a challenging economy have necessitated they retrench to just the mall.
“Even though Instagram makes everything look beautiful and wonderful, things are really hard,” she said. “It’s been a really tough year.”
Morrison said the location in Port Coquitlam also presented several challenges the mall doesn’t have, like limited parking.
The Morrisons started Squish as a consequence of Jessica’s own struggles with an eating disorder when she was younger. She started drinking fresh-squeezed juices as an easy way to ensure she got the nutrients her body needed.
After the couple visited a juicery while on holiday in San Diego, they started researching recipes that combine fresh fruits and vegetables, pressing the results out of a countertop juicer at home.
“There’s more to it than just throwing things in the juicer,” said Callan Morrison, who was elected to Port Moody council last year.
He said they tried 20 different variations before they got a combination they were able to launch as a test at Port Moody’s car-free day in 2017
It was a hit, and motivated the Morrisons to migrate their juicing from the kitchen to a commercial presser they installed in a custom shower stall at the back of their Port Coquitlam shop.
In 2022, Squish teamed up with Port Moody’s Rocky Point Ice Cream to create a new sorbet called Vacation, based on one of its favourite juices that includes pineapple, apple, pear, lemon and a touch of mint.
The expansion to Coquitlam Centre was a homecoming of sorts for the Morrisons,
“We both had our first jobs at Coquitlam Centre,” said Jessica.
- with a file from Diane Strandberg, Tri-City News
