17-year-old saves the last grocery store in Truman, by buying it (2007) 

The video is from 2007. He went on to sell the business a few years later, but then got back into the grocery business in other rural towns. Recent article from 2020 shows it has been a challenging road as he was liquidating the business he was running and was on verge of bankruptcy....video in article shows he was still a very nice pleasant person.

​@@ldlink3935thanks for the update. I saw this video and was rooting for him. I hope he is doing well.

Very proud

Yeah, the town was very passively proud of him.

@@ldlink3935 Yep, the kid lacked vision. There is a reason why the former owner shut down. Nice kid, but though.

i figured it didnt last long, he was smart enough to build it up and cause a competitor to buy him out. Smart Kid!!

@@oklarocks Unfortunately, he went on to buy other small grocery stores and businesses when he moved to another small town. To make a long story short, currently, he's $1M in debt and working for a large grocery store.

@@theotheleo6830 yep hes one of thsoe guy that F everyting up because he does thing on a whim vs actual research and overhead cost

@@deesmith8576 uh no he was just trying to save a store

@@deesmith8576 he was still in high school. give him a break

Ain’t gonna happen with a Walmart super centre just 12 miles away!

They do.. All 40 of them.

@@price-singspuccini6124 That's what's up.

This. If people are still going to drive 15mins to the WalMart, the kid just wasted his money and time.

Actually if they keep price is affordable, carry what people want most, and they are able to keep prices affordable, people will shop local. Stubborn pride is often the killer of small businesses. There are some things that are staples that people don’t want to drive 12 miles to get, bread, bananas, milk, cereal, oatmeal, half-and-half, eggs, cheese, ready whip, ice cream, frozen pizza, even tomatos, salsa, chips, potatoes and sour cream. And elderly people are often looking for things like high-fiber cereal, prune juice, v-8, garlic/magnesium pills and parents are looking for diapers, applesauce and other baby foods, baby wipes and formula. But if the town only has one baby you don’t buy that in high bulk or push brands they don’t want. You humble and let people request what you should carry. Post 2020 he needs to make sure he has some sort of a delivery service as part of this. What a smart man. Even if this fails he will always succeed. 💕

He sold it a year after he opened, and the guy he sold it to closed it in 2012.

@@PapagenoMF oh 😭🥺 I hope he’s out there living his best life, he deserves more than a small town. Did he fix the drugstore!?

@@MsTinkerbelle87 no he probably didn’t. Walmart is what took him out and they probably came in with a drugstore as well.

@@MsTinkerbelle87 he’s a little over a million in debt and working at a grocery store.

@@PapagenoMF This isn't necessarily true, there's a lot of conflicting articles. A deleted article that said they sold in 2008. An article said that they were still up & running by the same owner in 2016. And an article that includes some call recordings (so likely the most credible) saying they sold in 2013 and closed in 2018.

Well he's the only grocery store in town so he could be exploiting them.

Honestly seems like he's just a rich kid making more money. There's no way he was trying to buy restaurants at 15 unless that's the case. It's impossible to have the money any other way

​@@mathgasm8484 Exploit them? What a way to look at that.

Well if you paid attention he worked from an early age of his grandparents farm. May have gotten something from his dad when he died. Saved every penny. Believe it or not there ARE people in the world that care about such things. That are willing to sacrifice for others. Well look at the time. Seems Mr.Mathgasm and Mr.JACpotatos it's time for you to get back to cleaning the toilets at McDonalds. Always has to be some asshat that wants to piss all over things and watch the world burn.

@@mathgasm8484 well haters got to hate. He's doing something that's risky and he could also loose money.

Ha, I just did research also, some people in the comments don't realize the video is from 2007. Article from 2020 discusses how he was liquidating his new locations and was on verge of bankruptcy, hadn't had a paycheck in two years. I hope he is well in 2023.

Even before I pushed start, I wondered where he is at now in business 2023.

Oh, man. Now all of his businesses are bankrupt and he’s working for a grocery store? I sure hope he’s the general manager or something. Otherwise that’s gonna be pretty sad that he invested all this money and time into businesses that ultimately went nowhere and now he is an entry-level employee, but had he done something differently he could’ve had more. A lot of times it really depends on how you set up your company more than anything. If you just buy it as an individual then you’re on the hook, but if you buy it under company name then you could walk away without being on the hook as an individual. This is not applicable statement, but that’s how Donald Trump was able to make a lot of money even when his business went bankrupt. He literally would not pay some of the employees and a lot of the contractors but he would walk away getting all of his money. It’s all about the paperwork upfront. My grandmother ran a bar for over 30 years but at the end she couldn’t keep up and wasn’t making enough money so she canceled her insurance. And then finally after 30 years somebody fell and hurt themselves and was going to take her entire business (which was completely paid off) and take her home and everything. Thankfully my grandmother owed my mom some money so she was able to put a lien on the property but the lawyer thought it was too convenient so they were gonna claim it was fraud. So ultimately my grandmother got to keep her house and half of the business after she sold it. The problem was you have to have money to get lawyers to fight the other lawyers. But had my grandmother been smart with businesses she probably could’ve owned the business personally or under a company that did nothing but on the business, then lease out the space to another company which would’ve allowed her to have the company that was “running operations“ to file bankruptcy and it would not have cost or anything. And she could’ve also put a lien out against the building or company that owned the building because of all the money that is owed her that she never collected. I hope all that made sense. But she honestly could’ve filed a lien against her own property years before because there were some months she didn’t take any money home in the month she did take money home it wasn’t as much as she used to make. So she could have just been a creditor to the Companies. And had she done what I mentioning then it would’ve cost her virtually nothing to save her business and save 100% of the money. But that’s crap. It’s crap that two people have wildly different outcomes based on how they do their pAPERWORK. Either the guy that sued her should’ve won or she should’ve won. It shouldn’t have depended on how you do paperwork sneakily beforehand. (And by the way the guy that suit her was an old man that leaned way far back on his barstool while he was checking out a woman and then end up losing his balance. So it’s not like there was water on the floor or some other health hazard.)

​@@iMatti00 ever hear of "to make a long story short"? Look it up.

You can only work so hard before the world stops seeing you as a hero, and starts seeing you as a pushover they can take advantage of. Bankruptcy and hardship shows thats the case.

Thanks for the update. I really really wish Nick the very best.

Should have went to college or became an apprentice for a union to get a retirement and pension.

@@beekeepermariadelgado6806 why?

Any idea where this all took place?

@@robertocastro5452 Iowa

He lacked vision and almost went bankrupt because of this venture.

@@snowflakehunter He did it because he had a vision. There's quite a few millionaires that went bankrupt more than once. You are a party pooper.

He's a man.

@@nope24601 your a snowflake.

​@@nope24601 Not a bright one.

In no way does he meet the definition of a hero.

@@PeugeotRocket Uplifting a dying community isn't enough to be considered a hero? Ok, buddy, go back to watching your sad Simpsons edits.

@@Ilikedagames-rf2fx Simpsons edits? What are you on about? Sorry but no, buying a failed grocery store for a town with like fourty residents doesn't make one a hero. Especially since that store went on to go out of business again anywya. Plus, there is a Walmart fourteen minutes away. So he didn't uplift up anything. He made a bad business decisions and failed. He isn't a hero.

@@PeugeotRocket I think what people are alluding to when calling him a “hero” is the fact that he took initiative in trying to solve a problem in his community. If you believe that good intentions are devoid of meaning or substance, then you are sorely mistaken. Whether this young man failed or not, he still did more than most people would, and for that he could be considered a “hero.” Principle is just as important as substantive results, especially when undertaking a difficult task.

No tenacity. He sold the store a year after he opened it, and it closed permanently in 2012.

He opened it in 2007, and had to sell it in 2008.The guy who bought it closed it in 2012. Now everyone goes to the Walmart fifteen minutes away. He almost went bankrupt. It was a stupid idea.

@@snowflakehunter So we're gonna forget that he tried helping people, and focus on the part that went wrong? No wonder people nowadays are slipping, all focus on themselves, and no respect for others.

@@imselfaware419 I don't believe those were my words.

@@imselfaware419 let me ask you a question. How in the hell did you form the narrative that I am only thinking of myself, when in fact all I did was bring up facts. I never at one time condemned this man for his efforts. His heart was in the right place, but his store was not. There is a Walmart not too far from the store he owned that caused his failure. He should have done more research into why the original owner shut it down. Do the world a favor and stop being a snowflake ❄️❄️❄️.

@@imselfaware419 It was the town that slipped and let one of the only towns in business fail to save a nickel at the Wal-Mart. They only cared about saving a few bucks not the town, this kid or his store. Nowadays? Most of these people are elderly and are the reason the town is dead in the first place. What they really wanted was to not drive through their dead town on the way to the Wal-Mart.

Bro, his community of trash people stopped shopping there and went to the Wal-Mart down the street. He is on hard times now and in a lot of debt.

@@GrandChessboard your thinking of a different town, the featured store he sold a year after this video and he later moved. From what I read the store featured after being sold stayed open for another 4 years and then closed.

Yeah, great story. As long as you don't look at the result. The store failed. Buying things is easy if you have the money. Making a business profitable is harder.

@@MrWaterbugdesign it wasn't the store featured that failed, he sold the store a year after this video and moved to a different town and then started another store and then that business failed. Tho I question how long he had the last store before it failed as that story about his failed store was from 2020 and that leaves about a 12 year gap.

LOL considering it's the only one in town & he has the support of the town & clearly not focused on profit gauging as all other grocery stores let alone chains are. I'm sure he does well enough to keep prices low & still make a good profit himself. Especially if he managed to get a pharmacy back in town. I have to say it's still a bigger town then where my parents were from & I'd visit as a kid.

@@craighanson-rc1md good point but he still had to buy the store with tge already current debt so thats not easy being 17

It closed in 2012, the actual story is from 2007 but has just been on RU-vid for 3 years. He got the store up and running and sold it to another gentleman who had 2 other groceries but closed all of them in 2012. Doesn’t take away from what the young man accomplished, however, which was to being 5 years of life to that grocery.

​@@michaelb9079 Thank you so much for the update, sir. 🌷🌿

@@michaelb9079 What state was it in?

and a story from 16 years ago, wallmart and amazon have crush this as an idea. if you shop at either you are part of the problem

@@krusher74 not really, people shop where their money goes the furthest because thats what they can afford and thats not their fault so they are not to blame, you should be blaming the corporations like amazon and walmart if you want to have your priorities straight, they are the ones who destroy local businesses

@@MrMoralHighground No, the people killed the business off by not shopping there. Thank Reaganomics....

@@GrandChessboard why were they not shopping there?

@@MrMoralHighground Because they are cheap and don't care about their town. They sold out their town and have themselves to blame. They were never going to shop there, they just wanted not to have to look at abandoned building on the way to the Wal-Mart. Unless you support local businesses over big corporations than small town America is doomed. It was their choice to save a few bucks which is why they have a dead town to begin with. Funny, these are the same people that deregulate everything and handed huge tax cuts for the CEOs of those companies to outcompete anyone else. Once again, they only have themselves to blame...

You find lots like him.

He does drugs now

He died

It’s close now he’s in debt

He died from drugs

This is from 2007. He sold it in 2008 and it closed in 2012.

@@PapagenoMF And he almost went bankrupt. It was a stupid idea.

he lost it all 1 mill debt overweight and the townspeople hate his guts google Wake up call closing of grocery reveals two narratives in Manning, residents say lets just say kid didnt bother to look at overhead cost

He sold the store like two years after opening it.

@@josephhodges9819 Source?

​@@maeganlozano7058 google.

@@josephhodges9819 okay thanks

Unfortunetly he bought another store in Manning and has been running since 2015. He had to sell and liquidate it in 2020 hoping to avoid bankruptcy. Sad

He opened it in 2007, sold it in 2008 and the guy who bought it closed it in 2012. Now everyone goes to the Wal Mart fifteen minutes away.

Yes, please give us an update!

Graham sold the store in 2008 to a gentleman who had a grocery in Elysian and Kiester. Brad Gohla figured adding a third store would increase his buying power. Now the Truman store, along with the ones in Elysian and Kiester have closed, the Mankato Free Press reports. 😢

@@queenofthebronx Well that didn’t last long. Everyone was so happy. How depressing.

@@ceciliapetrowsky2572 But there is more, he did get back into the grocery business....and was serving other towns in rural america for another decade, however, most recent story I found from 2020, which includes a short video, discusses how he was liquidating his current grocery stores because he just is not getting enough sales from the community, he has not received a paycheck in 2 years, and has a cumulative $1,000,000 deficit from operating the business....he was on the verge of bankruptcy and he said he just could not keep it going. Kind of sad, but he still had a very pleasant demeanor at almost 30 years old despite the challenges he has gone through.

@@ldlink3935 Thank you. That is very sad. This man is a real go-getter and deserves better.

From Theo: Update: He sold it in 2008 and the new owner, who had two other grocery stores in neighboring towns, closed all three stores four years later. The store has been vacant ever since. The city finally sold the building, which was, by this time, in much needed repairs, a few days ago for a measly sum of $1500.00.

LOL, what in God's name are you talking about? That store went out of business years ago. The building has not been in operation of any type in 10 years. The community did not care about him only to save a few bucks at Wal-Mart. No one is moving there because it is a dead town which this country has 1000s of those due to Reaganomics.

LOL, tell that to the thousands of small town businesses that have been destroyed over the last 50 years of trickle down economics.

He lost the store and now does meth

@@kushking949 your an A@#

a small glimme rof hope like a granule

But he got back in, and started other grocery stores, but then according to a 2020 article it finally seems like he had enough and was liquidating to avoid bankruptcy. Article "wake-up-call-closing-of-grocery-reveals-two-narratives-in-manning-residents-say"

That would be why I seen so many checks in this video, I was about to punch those old people but they are most likely dead now.

Thanks for the update

@@mrsynapse 2007 is in the video title?

@@poa2.0surface77 $10k inheritance 🙄

@@poa2.0surface77 You could do the same thing I did and do a google search. Self discovery can be so rewarding.

He died

Graham sold the store in 2008 to a gentleman who had a grocery in Elysian and Kiester. Brad Gohla figured adding a third store would increase his buying power. Now the Truman store, along with the ones in Elysian and Kiester have closed, the Mankato Free Press reports. 😢

@@queenofthebronx that is so heartbreaking. Thank you.

@@conniewaterman1673 There is more though, he got back into the grocery business, only to seek liquidation in 2020. He stated he was losing too much sales to online shopping and larger establishments further out of town.

I agree. It's been 3 years! Tell us about this success story progress ! Please... 😊

@@agd.6754 Not 3 but 16 years ago 😅

Graham sold the store in 2008 to a gentleman who had a grocery in Elysian and Kiester. Brad Gohla figured adding a third store would increase his buying power. Now the Truman store, along with the ones in Elysian and Kiester have closed, the Mankato Free Press reports. 😢

@@queenofthebronx very sad 😔 What about Graham himself? Does anyone know where's at? Whether he had other ventures?

@@agd.6754 He is the local meth dealer now and lost an arm.

It was $10k he had saved up.

He lost the store and now does drugs lmao

@@kushking949 They got everybody in these comments fooled lol

LOL, they were not. They chose Wal-Mart over him. His is bankrupt now. His community was trash...