Juicero facts for kids
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|
| Private | |
| Fate | Closed |
| Founded | 2013 |
| Founder | Doug Evans |
| Defunct | December 1, 2017 |
| Headquarters | San Francisco, California |
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Area served
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United States |
|
Key people
|
Jeff Dunn, CEO 2016 - 2017 |
| Products | Juicer, juice packs |
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Number of employees
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232 (June 2017) |
Juicero was an American company that created a special machine called the Juicero Press. This machine was designed to make juice from fruits and vegetables. It connected to the internet using Wi-Fi.
The Juicero Press used unique, single-serving packs of pre-cut fruits and veggies. You could only buy these packs from Juicero through a special subscription. Between 2014 and 2017, the company, based in San Francisco, received about $120 million from investors.
However, Juicero became famous for the wrong reasons. People and journalists found out that you could squeeze the juice out of the company's special packs just by hand. You didn't even need the expensive Juicero machine!
On September 1, 2017, Juicero announced it would stop selling its juicer and juice packs. They offered to buy back the machines from customers. The company also looked for someone to buy their business ideas. After it closed, many people saw Juicero as an example of problems in the Silicon Valley tech world. The Guardian newspaper said Juicero showed how some tech startups get a lot of money for solving problems that don't really exist.
Juicero's Story
Juicero was started in 2013 by a person named Doug Evans. He was the company's CEO until October 2016. Then, Jeff Dunn, who used to work at Coca-Cola, became the new CEO.
When the Juicero Press first came out in March 2016, it cost $699. But the company didn't sell many machines. So, in January 2017, they lowered the price to $399. This happened much sooner than they had planned.
In April 2017, Juicero took another company, Froothie Juisir, to court. Juicero claimed that Froothie's juicing machine copied their design and broke their patent rules.
The special juice packs for the Juicero machine cost between $5 and $7 each. They only stayed fresh for about eight days. Each pack had a QR code on it. The Juicero machine would scan this code and check it online before you could use the pack.
CEO Jeff Dunn said this was a safety feature. It was meant to stop people from using old packs. It also helped if the company needed to recall any food. But some people thought it was a way to make sure you could only use Juicero's own packs. This meant you couldn't use any other fruit or vegetable packs with the machine.
The design for the Juicero Press was created by a company called Fuseproject. It was led by a designer named Yves Béhar.
Finally, on September 1, 2017, Juicero announced its closure. They stopped selling the juicer and the juice packs. They also offered to buy back the machines from their customers. The company then tried to find a buyer for its ideas and technology.
