I almost missed it.
Last week on September 11th at 9pm I was putting my daughter to bed when I realized it was A Better Lemonade Stand’s birthday.
12 years.
9/11 is actually the anniversary of many major events in my life, both good and bad.
It was exactly one year ago, on September 11th, 2011, that I was fired from my first career out of college, and that set off a chain of events that has dictated my life ever since.
Dismissal
I was in Vancouver, Canada and worked for a local chain of entertainment complexes (similar to Dave & Busters) and golf and country clubs for 5 years.
I moved up the chain fairly quickly, managing marketing and operations at several locations with several hundred employees.
However, in the years I was there, we faced increasing financial pressures.
The owner was a reclusive rich man who bought up rich people’s things (country clubs) and overworked himself.
In 2010, the financial pressure on his purchases became too great. The owner tasked the company’s vice president with significant cost reductions, and it was decided that most of these cost reductions would come from layoffs.
The vice president asked me to help with the layoffs.
Mind you, I was incredibly young at the time and had no idea what I was really doing, but the VP was also a mentor to me and this was his way of throwing me into the fire and giving me real business experience. Normally I would probably never experience this.
And so it began – the slaughterhouse.
We began laying off dozens of employees, starting in junior positions and quickly escalating to senior departments—management, operations, accounting, and marketing.
I couldn’t tell who would get the cut, but here I was as a 25-year-old kid telling people twice my age that they were getting fired.
Fear and guilt consumed me with every conversation.
The process wasn’t fast either. As the owner faced increasing financial pressure, the cuts continued for months.
As you walked around the grounds, you wondered what everyone thought of you. Were they just being extra nice when they talked to you because they were worried about their jobs?
Spoiler alert, they were.
At one point the VP and I were questioning whether we should even eat in our own dining establishments for fear of being poisoned.
As we slowly got to the bottom of all the cuts we could make without completely closing businesses, I started to feel uncomfortable and mostly defeated by the experience. We were a company with barbaric staff, nervous employees, a limited brand and product, and ongoing financial pressure.
A turning point
Then one evening I got a message from the vice president that I knew immediately would change my life: “Richard, can we meet tomorrow?
It was my turn.
The next day, September 11, 2011, I met with the Vice President to taste the same medicine I had helped distribute to over 100 other people in the previous months.
While I can’t say I was happy, it felt like a definitive end to a very interesting chapter and exhausting few months in my life.
A new path
In the weeks following my release, I bought The Four Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss, which started the next chapter of my life.
I read the book cover to cover in a few nights and I remember thinking so clearly that this was my future.
I wanted to build my own business and be in charge of my own destiny.
Inspired by the book, I spent the next year building small e-commerce businesses—learning how to select winning products, negotiate with suppliers in China, import products to Canada, set up an online store, and online marketing.
The birth of a better lemonade stand
Ironically, it was exactly one year later, on September 11, 2012, that I registered abetterlemonadestand.com – mostly as a space to distill my thoughts, ideas and experience in e-commerce.
It’s wild that a single decision to start writing about my thoughts and experiences would change the course of the rest of my life.
Just a year and a half after I started blogging, A Better Lemonade Stand caught the attention of Shopify and I joined the Growth team and helped them grow Shopify’s blog from 200,000 to 2 million visitors during my tenure and it was a once in a lifetime experience . an opportunity to participate in a technology IPO.
As much as I loved Shopify, the product, and the people I worked with, I left Shopify just a year and a half later to pursue my business full-time and continue charting my own path.
From defeat to determination
9/11 has always been a symbolic day for me – a day of great loss and even greater beginnings. From losing my job and questioning my purpose to starting a better soda stand and rediscovering my passion, every 9/11 has moved me closer to who I am meant to be.
It’s a reminder that success doesn’t come without failures. In fact, these failures are what give heights their meaning.
For me, it’s never just been about building businesses—it’s about building myself through the businesses I create, the risks I take, the lessons I learn, and who I become along the way.
Over the past ten years, I’ve weathered storms that tested my resilience and experienced highs I never imagined. But the one constant through it all? My commitment to growth. Whether I’m helping someone launch their first product, navigating a new digital landscape, or creating a space where fellow entrepreneurs can thrive, I’ve always been driven by the desire to create something bigger than myself.
And that’s why I’m still here after all this time. I’m still creating. I’m still learning. And I still show up for that next chapter 12 years later.