A smoothie at Erewhon costs $19.

Nineteen dollars. For fruit in a cup.

And there's a line out the door every single day.

I used to think it was just rich people being dumb. But then I looked at the numbers.

Erewhon does ~$130M a year. Across 10 stores. In one city.

That's $13M per location. A typical Whole Foods does $40-50M with way more space and way more products.

So what's going on?

They're selling status. The $19 price is a feature, not a bug. It filters out people who think $19 for a smoothie is insane (which, fair). What's left? A room full of people who either have money or want to look like they do.

That's the product. Access to that room.

Hailey Bieber has her own smoothie there. So does Bella Hadid. These aren't normal sponsorships — they co-create the recipe and get a cut of every sale.

Hailey's Strawberry Glaze smoothie made over $1M in its first month.

She's not getting paid to post about it. She's getting paid every time YOU buy it. That's a completely different business model.

It's also a content studio.

Think about it. Erewhon is one of the most filmed locations in LA. Influencers go there specifically to be seen. Paparazzi hang outside because they know celebrities actually shop there.

Every person who posts their Erewhon haul is doing free marketing. The store is designed to be Instagrammable — clean lighting, aesthetic packaging, earth tones everywhere.

They didn't build a grocery store. They built a set. And every customer is an unpaid extra.

The real play:

Erewhon figured out that people will pay anything if you make them feel like they're buying identity, not ingredients.

You're not paying $19 for strawberries and almond butter. You're paying $19 to be the kind of person who shops at Erewhon.

And honestly? That's not even a criticism. That's just smart business.

The numbers are stupid.

Most grocery stores run on like 1.6% margins. One bad quarter and you're cooked.

Erewhon made $170 million in profit last year. With 10 stores. Ten.

They do around $2,500 in sales per square foot — that's 4x the industry average. And the Hailey Bieber smoothie? It sells 48,000 units a month at $20 each. That's almost $900K monthly. From one drink.

But here's the part that broke my brain: they charge brands an "inclusion fee" just to have their ingredients featured in the smoothies. So Erewhon gets paid by you when you buy it AND by the companies supplying the stuff inside it.

They're making money on both ends. That's not a grocery store. That's a media company that happens to sell fruit.

The takeaway for us:

Everyone's fighting over who can be cheapest. Erewhon said nah — what if we just charged more and made it a flex?

And it worked. Because they're not competing with Whole Foods. They're not even competing with grocery stores. They built something people want to be seen at.

If you ever start anything — freelance, side hustle, whatever — you can either race to the bottom on price or build something that feels like a club. One makes you stressed. The other makes you rich.

Erewhon chose club. $170 million later, I think they were onto something.