Ogden FiiZ owner excited to be in the middle of downtown
The Syracuse FiiZ gets extremely busy due to the nearby junior high school. From 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. on weekdays there is hardly room to move around, the line was out the door.
High school girls tend to hang out at the Kaysville FiiZ after school.
FiiZ has all different kinds of flavors, Italian sodas and drink creations. A popular drink is the Elsa or Xanadew.
OGDEN — Brady Humphries has found the business opportunity that fits his entrepreneurial spirit and growing family after searching for two years.
FiiZ.
Brady, 37 and his wife Kailia, 37, are the franchise owners of a new Ogden location, opening in late January.
Brady Humphries plans to teach his five children some really good lessons in life — such as how to manage money — by owning the specialty soda shop.
The location
It took Humphries and FiiZ business manager Jason Anderson a while to find the right location, Humphries said.
“We looked at a couple of other locations but they didn’t quite fit the mold,” Humphries said.
Until they found a spot in The Junction, an open-air lifestyle village complete with a movie theater and apartments in the heart of downtown Ogden.
“The Junction is a happening place and we want to be a part of it,” Humphries said. “We want to be in the middle of downtown Ogden where the magic happens.”
Humphries said the spot, at 2356 Kiesel Ave., also fits the vision his grandfather, Dean Francis Morrin, had for Ogden.
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“He was a visionary man with lots of ties to Ogden city and some of the buildings his company built are still in use today,” Humphries said in an email to the Standard-Examiner. “The 24th Street viaduct bridge that spans over all the railroad tracks was built by his company and I am reminded of him every day I drive over that bridge to head to my soda shop.”
Anderson said finding a spot that could remind Brady of his grandfather was one of the things Humphries talked about extensively when they were looking for a location.
And now that they’ve found a location that honors his grandfather, they’re planning on creating a drink that will too.
“He loved cherry Coke, and we’re going to try … to create a drink in his honor with a cherry Coke base,” Humphries said.
A POPular place
The new Ogden location will be FiiZ’s 12th or 13th — depending on when a Taylorsville location opens, Anderson said.
Last December, FiiZ had only three locations.
“There’s been some pretty good growth and success over the last year, that’s for sure,” Anderson said. “We attribute it to our product offerings and the quality of the ingredients versus some of the competitors out there.”
FiiZ has been known for being a place where teens enjoying working.
“Over 70 percent of our employees are still in high school,” Anderson said.
Feedback from employees shows that the teenagers like the fast-paced, fun work environment of FiiZ. They also enjoy having a place they can come to even when they aren’t working to do homework or hang out with friends.
“A lot of that is attributed to the environment we created with the look,” Anderson said, which he describes as a throwback to vintage soda shops.
Humphries said kids who work at FiiZ have the opportunity to give input and create their own drinks, which often get shared on the company’s Facebook page and put on the menu.
“To say, ‘I’ve helped with this business,’ is good for their self-esteem,” he said.
The Junction location will start hiring around Jan. 1.
What about the ‘soda war’?
FiiZ is similar to two other Utah soda shop companies, Swig and Sodalicious, which are involved in a lawsuit over the word “dirty” when it’s used to refer to flavored drinks.
“We try to remain neutral and we don’t use that kind of marketing,” Anderson said. “We specifically don’t because of their copyrighting — it’s unfortunate to see two small businesses taking time and resources to do that.”
Contact digital producer Sonja Carlson at 801-625-4229 or scarlson@standard.net. Follow her on Twitter @sonjacSE and like her on Facebook at www.facebook.com/SonjaCarlsonSE.
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