Financial-ade: Rock Falls student squeezes lemons for college costs

ROCK FALLS – Paying for college really can put a squeeze on a person’s finances. It can be tough trying to come up with the cash for a higher education. People can get discouraged.

But not Madison Wescott of Rock Falls. She made the best of a challenging situation. She took lemons and made lemonade.

To help pay for college at Northern Illinois University, where she’s studying law and earned a spot as an honors student, Wescott rolled up her sleeves and started her own business – and this is on top of working full time at the Candlelight Inn in Sterling.

Talk about making a winning case for determination.

The 2021 Rock Falls High School graduate mans the lemon juicer at Main Squeeze, a trailer she pulls in to special events and regular spots throughout the area.

“It was something that I hadn’t seen around the area,” Wescott said. “We have a lot of cool food trucks in the area, but not many do drinks and travel.”

Wescott was inspired by a girl in Kentucky who used Instagram to promote a similar drink trailer, also to help pay for college.

“I was like, ‘I can do that,’ ” Wescott said. “We bought a trailer last May, had it renovated inside, and got it fully functional and up to the health department codes, and last fall we opened. It’s been pretty awesome. It was more learning by trial-and-error, and it came together like that.”

This isn’t her first time offering lemonade to thirsty customers. Like other kids growing up, Wescott had a lemonade stand. Back then, it was just some Solo cups and a pitcher of pre-made lemonade. These days, the cups are bigger – 32 ounces – and the lemonade is made from fresh-squeezed lemons, with some lemon pieces tossed in for added flavor.

“I’ll see little kids hold it, and it’s as big as their face,” Wescott said. “That’s one of the best sights, seeing them carrying it.”

Straight lemonade is Plain Jane – “nothin’ more, nothin’ less,” as the menu reads. But if customers want more, Main Squeeze has it: Popular combinations include Ocean Water, which is a mix of lemonade and blue raspberry with a splash of coconut flavoring; and Tropical Paradise, a combination of lemonade, mango and peach.

Golf lovers will recognize The Arnold, which is a lemonade and tea mix – the drink favored by legendary golfer Arnold Palmer.

Other flavors can be combined for a make-your-own concoction – blackberry, blue raspberry, coconut, hibiscus, lavender, mango, peach, pineapple, pomegranate, raspberry, strawberry and watermelon.

I’ll see little kids hold it, and it’s as big as their face. That’s one of the best sights, seeing them carrying it.”

—  Madison Wescott

If you need a pick-me-up, Main Squeeze also offers 24-ounce energy drinks with a boost of Coconut, Raspberry, Blackberry or Strawberry Energy mixed in. Five are on the menu – Blue Hawaiian, Just Peachy, Sweet Summer, Smash Berry and Flower Power – but customers also can mix and match their favorite flavors to come up with one of their own.

Sugar-free drinks also are available in blue raspberry, coconut and strawberry.

Wescott hopes that once you have one, you’ll be back for more. Punch cards are available – buy 10, and the 11th one is on her.

Wescott began putting together her plan for Main Squeeze in April, bought the trailer in May and set up for her first event on Sept. 24 at the Bugsy’s Arcade Parking Lot Party at Northland Mall in Sterling.

She’s also taken the trailer to Morrison, Milledgeville and Lanark, and has stops lined up for this week’s Petunia Festival in Dixon and Mendota’s yearly Sweet Corn Festival in August.

“With every event we go to, returning faces are always excited to see us, and then the new faces are, too,” Wescott said. “It’s super awesome.”

Cranking out cups and cups of drinks, buying supplies, doing the books and planning events isn’t a one-person endeavor, however, and when Wescott was looking for help, she didn’t have to go far. Her parents, Brian and Nicol, grandmother Linda Webb, and younger brother Dylan all lend a hand.

The family also lends their taste buds. When Madison comes up with new flavors, she tries them out at home.

“She’ll make things at home, and we’ll tell her whether we like them or not,” Nicol said. “There was one day we all kind of stuck our noses up in the air and were like, ‘ew,’ and that made her find a couple of more that were pretty good. I can be really honest with her, and she knows that.”

“They’re always there when I need them,” Madison said. “I definitely couldn’t have done it without all of their help, from taking midnight trips to go get ice and water, and driving out of town to get bags of sugar. There’s a lot of behind-the-scenes work that many people don’t know, and it’s a very heavy job, too. With sugar, you may not think about how heavy it is, or even the lemons or the five-gallon jugs of water. It can be labor-intensive.”

With family to help her and satisfied customers to support her, though, the hard work is paying off.

“The last couple of weeks of school was pretty stressful with finals and everything,” Wescott said. “Now that school is kind of out of the way, it’s a lot easier. My manager at Candlelight is awesome and gives me whatever time off I need, and focusing on this is the big thing right now.”

As for the next big thing in her life, time will tell. But whatever the challenge, Wescott will be on the case.