Building the Squeeze Club

The Squeeze Club started as a piece of paper. Literally. A small card, printed at a copy shop, with our logo on the front and ten empty circles on the back. Buy ten lemonades, get the eleventh free. That was the whole idea. We thought we were doing a loyalty program. What we accidentally did was build a community.

The first Squeeze Club cards went out on a Saturday in May. We handed them to anyone who looked like a regular and a few people who looked like they might become regulars. By the end of the day, every Squeezer at the stand had handed out at least a dozen. By the end of the week, kids were showing up specifically to get a card.

Then the weird thing happened. People started showing each other their cards. A kid would walk up and say, "I have three stamps." Another kid would say, "I have FIVE stamps." Suddenly there was a friendly competition we had not designed. The card had turned into a status object.

We leaned in. We added a little extra at five stamps — a free sticker. We added a special unlock at ten stamps — a Squeeze Club tee shirt. We started doing a "club only" flavor drop once a month, a tiny limited menu item that only Squeeze Club card holders could order. And we started a private group chat for parents who wanted to know when the next drop would happen.

The lesson we learned was that the card itself did not matter. What mattered was that the card said, "you belong here." It was a small physical object that gave a kid a tiny identity. "I am in the Squeeze Club." That sentence felt good to say out loud. The card was just the excuse to say it.

This is true for almost every community we admire. Skate clubs, reading circles, book clubs, sports teams, online forums — they all give you a tiny identity to wear. The identity is the thing that pulls you back. The lemonade was already good. The card was what made you feel like a person who drinks the lemonade.

Building the Squeeze Club has changed how we think about the whole business. We used to plan around drinks. Now we plan around members. When a new flavor goes into testing, we think about how Squeeze Club members will react first. When we pick events to attend, we think about which ones our members will love. The members are not the audience. They are the co-creators.

If you are starting any kind of small thing — a stand, a shop, a Substack, a band — make a card. Or make a sticker, or a badge, or a tiny membership ritual. Give your earliest fans something to hold. Give them a tiny identity they can wear. Watch what happens.

The Squeeze Club now has hundreds of members. Most of them started with a paper card. A few of them are on their fourth tee shirt. All of them are why we still show up at the stand every weekend, in the sun and in the rain, ready to squeeze.