The business located right on the curve on Tenney Street is much more than a shop in which customers can purchase healthy energy drinks and food options, it’s the result of its owner’s sheer determination.
“I actually always wanted to move here since high school,” said Janet Silva, proprietor of The Daily Fix Nutrition.
By here, Silva means Kewanee. She first visited with her family as a teenager and small town life left a lasting impression.
“We didn’t move,” she said.
Instead her family stayed in California, where she grew up, but that didn’t stop her from thinking about the midwestern town she had visited, and what it represented to her.
After high school, Silva married and began a family, but she still plotted on how to return to Kewanee. It came more as a decree when she told her husband they were moving.
Once a resident of Kewanee, Silva returned to doing what she knew- nutrition and fitness.
“So I decided we needed to offer something healthy,” she said.
Before she left California, she had helped a friend launch a Daily Fix Nutrition. Silva had owned a gym in California in an effort to help people live healthier lifestyles. Staying healthy is 80% nutrition and 20% exercise, she said, so her first goal was to help Kewanee residents get healthy too. June will mark the two-year anniversary of her opening.
Daily Fix Nutrition offers protein shakes, specialty teas, protein donuts and iced protein coffee. The shakes can act as replacement meals in a pinch. She’s also added high-protein waffles and acai bowls. The selections offer fewer calories and more nutrition. And they taste good, she said. The recipes were devised by her and her friend, but with her newer flavors, she came up with those on her own.
Her most popular options have been Chunky Monkey, and banana chocolate peanut butter. Her customers also enjoy her banana nut bread. Her shakes contain minerals and vitamins and 24 grams of protein.
“The body needs nutrition,” she said, adding that the mistake most people make when trying to lose weight and get healthy is to stop eating.
Returning to her California roots, Silva is currently working on a way to add workout classes and yoga to her shop. Very soon, she hopes to add a “Mommy and Me Yoga and Waffle Class.”
Business has been good over the last few years, but she still thinks that there are future customers out there who don’t know what her shop on the four-lanes sells. Her business opened with no fanfare or official ribbon cutting ceremony.
“There are still a few people that don’t know we’re here and don’t know what we do and so they don’t stop by.”
She has no regrets about making the move to Kewanee, even though her husband remained in California. She and her three children spend part of their time there with him.
“The school system is good,” said Silva. “It’s quiet and my kids are more free and safe. They love it here.”
More information on Silva’s business can be found at the website dailyfixnutritionil.com or you can like and follow them on Facebook at Thedailyfixnutritionil.
