This is the story of how two brothers left the US, returned to Nigeria and built Wilson’s Juice into a multi-million naira juice empire.
The Unexpected Beginning
The journey to Wilson’s Juice Company began not with a grand business plan, but with disappointment and necessity. Seyi Abolaji, armed with a Stanford University degree in history and experience as both a professional soccer player and systems analyst at McMaster-Carr, returned to Nigeria in 2007 with high hopes of reviving a family palm kernel oil venture.
What he discovered was far from promising.
“It was a mess but, at the time, I thought I was doing what I had to do to make this work,” Abolaji would tell Jeanette Clark in 2022, of the failed palm kernel business. The machinery lacked proper specifications, and the warehouse in Ota, northwest of Lagos, couldn’t handle the vibrating equipment needed for oil processing. Undeterred, he built a makeshift wood hut at the facility, using plywood to separate his office from his sleeping quarters, refusing to leave the building and equipment unsupervised.
After a year of struggle, Abolaji conceded defeat. “I had to start over. By then, I had used all my money but I did have land and a generator,” he reflects. It was from this low point that the seeds of Wilson’s Juice would be planted.
The Lemonade Revelation
Meanwhile, the other of the two brothers, Seun Abolaji had followed a different path. Born in Nigeria but raised in the United States from age eight, he earned a psychology degree from the University of Colorado before reluctantly entering the pharmaceutical industry to please his parents. After five years with CVS Pharmacy in Manhattan, he too felt the pull to return to Nigeria and join his brother in 2007.
The brothers’ entrepreneurial instincts had shown early. Seun had earned the nickname ‘Candy Man’ in school for his reselling operation. “I was buying candy and reselling it to the kids in school,” he would tell Forbes Africa. He would buy the candies from him for about $1 and he would resell them for $20. “I don’t know why they would not just go down to the store, but I guess I provided them with access.”
After the palm kernel venture failed, the brothers pivoted with remarkable agility. “We thought to ourselves ‘we are both athletes, there are no fresh juices available, so let’s start making fresh juice to sell’,” Seun explains. They bought a bag of oranges and a plastic juicer and began selling fresh juice at Covenant University, renting a kiosk and gradually expanding into smoothies.
The pivotal moment came when they experimented with lemons. “One day we saw lemons, and we were like let’s add lemonade,” Seun recalls. Before long, all their clients wanted only lemonade, and the brothers recognized they had found their niche.
The Bottling Revolution
Initially operating with cups, the brothers faced a crucial challenge: tracking sales and maintaining quality control. Seyi had a breakthrough insight: “One day, I said to my brother, ‘why don’t we put this in a bottle?’. We had about 11 people working for us and you never knew how much sales you were making because they were squeezing the lemons into cups, adding sugar and selling for cash.”
The bottling solution was elegantly simple. “If we put it in bottles, I don’t have to be here to oversee everything. I give you 10 bottles, I know exactly how much money I should get back,” Seyi explained. They began by scavenging used plastic bottles, sanitizing them and filling them with their juice for sale.
In 2010, they officially registered Wilson’s Juice Company with just 2,000 naira, approximately $5. “There are a lot of challenges…but could we have started this company in the United States? I doubt it. We would need $10 million,” Seun told CNN in 2016. “That’s the beauty of Nigeria, you can have a naira and a dream.”
Building the Brand
The company name itself has a heartwarming origin story.
“One of my brother’s friends is called Wilson,” Seun explained. “When we’re doing it in cups, they came all the way from New Zealand, sleeping on concrete floors, just to see what was going on and that was key for us. Also, my last name is Abolaji and we didn’t think anybody would want to drink Abolaji Lemonade.”
After receiving NAFDAC approval in October 2012, the brothers expected immediate success. Instead, they learned a harsh lesson about marketing. “This is where I learnt there is value in marketing,” Seyi muses. “I thought the NAFDAC accreditation would have people hammering at the gates … nobody hammered.”
Breaking into major retail chains proved particularly challenging. “Shoprite took us a year and a half; 18 months of checking in two to three times a month, swallowing humble pie and hearing how bad our product looks and how we should change everything,” Seyi would tell Jeanette Clark.
The brothers refused to compromise on their vision. Their product was more expensive due to natural ingredients and distinctive square bottles with full labels. “We were adamant about not changing that because we wanted to be different,” says Seyi. They segmented their market to target customers who prioritized quality over price, or in their words, “people who would ask about the natural ingredients first and price last.”
Innovative Marketing and Distribution
Wilson’s Juice eschewed traditional advertising in favour of grassroots engagement. They crashed events and parties, and convinced organizers that their lemonade was an excellent mixer. More innovatively, they developed an ambassador program targeting rising influencers with smaller but engaged followings.
“Instead of the guys with 5,000 to 100,000 followers, we built relationships of mutual respect with rising stars with 500 to 2,000 followers,” Seyi explained. “We asked if they were cool and bold enough to be different and if they had a certain amount of swag.”
Distribution presented another significant challenge. After years of struggling with unreliable drivers and uninterested distributors, Wilson’s developed an innovative ‘logistics partners’ model. “We have incentives to keep them to a 48-hour turnaround time and disincentives if they hit below 85% of their deliveries,” Seyi notes. These partners, often people between jobs, earn more working with Wilson’s than in their previous employment.
How Far Wilson’s Juice Has Come and Visions for the Future
From humble beginnings, Wilson’s Juice has achieved impressive scale. The company now produces approximately 24,000 bottles daily in their own factory, employing over 50 people (more than 60% women) and annually supplying 600,000 liters to over 1,200 locations across Lagos and 27 other Nigerian states. They distribute to over 650 locations across 18 states, with the company now valued in the millions.
The brothers have raised nearly $200,000 through family, friends, and personal savings while maintaining their vision of organic growth. They’ve expanded their product line to include Pink Lemonade made from hibiscus and launched Fifun Todos, a lower-cost option designed for broader market penetration.
“We want to own lemonade in Nigeria,” Seyi declared, in reference to how La Casera became synonymous with fizzy apple drinks. Their ultimate goal is ambitious: to position Wilson’s as the premier natural beverage company in Africa over the next decade.
Making Lemonade from Life’s Lemons
The Abolaji brothers’ journey from $5 to millions offers profound lessons about entrepreneurship in emerging markets. Their success stems from identifying market gaps, refusing to compromise on quality, developing innovative distribution solutions and maintaining unwavering persistence despite setbacks.In Seun’s words, “At the end of the day, when life gives you lemons, what are you going to do?” For the Abolaji brothers, the answer was clear: build an empire, one bottle at a time.
