Last Thursday was a hot day. Unusually hot for mid-April in New England. The temperature was climbing past eighty five degrees. It was a beach day except that the ocean temperature was still in the low 50s. Unfortunately, my office does not have a sunroof and I spent most of the morning looking outside with the longing of a seven year old waiting for recess.
Recess finally came, well it was lunch time which is kinda like adult recess. Lunchtime came and I raced outside to absorb some of the fresh warm air. Windows down, radio on, I was singing Van Halen’s Running with the Devil as I cruised towards the park to enjoy my lunch. “I found simple life wasn’t simple.” Youth was coursing through my veins.
I slowed down for a car to turn in front of me and noticed that there were three young boys, maybe 10-years old, on the street corner selling lemonade. They had a big pitcher and a sign with poor penmanship. The kids were screaming at cars “Lemonade. Cold lemonade.”
The corner they were working on was on a 4-lane business road with no breakdown lane. My first thought was, “these kids are going to get no business on this corner. The location is horrible.” Perhaps I should have been thinking. “Could this be the next teenage millionaire?”
Welcome to Swimming in the Flood; a podcast where we develop the resilient leader’s mindset by navigating difficult currents in business. My name is Trent Theroux.
Lemonade Day is a non-profit organization whose mission is to help prepare youth for life through fun, proactive and experiential programs infused with life skills, character education and entrepreneurship. Essentially, they help youths set up lemonade stands and teach them about going into business. Doesn’t this sound like a cool organization?
Last year, Lemonade Day’s National Youth Entrepreneurs of the Year were the Chapman Brothers from Tallahassee, Florida. Edward Chapman III is eleven and his brother is seven. They started their lemonade stand five years ago. Here is some of what young Edward says about his business. “Some of the things we learned is that in order to run any business, it takes money, so if you don’t have it, you need investors. We learned that sometimes you have to pay back those investors with interest. We also learned that in order to know what your profit is you have to subtract what you made from your expenses. Another thing we learned is that you should save some, share some and spend some. Our parents started our bank account a few years ago, so whatever we make we usually put 70% of that in our bank accounts and the other 30% we divide into sharing and spending. This year we gave money to an organization who was giving supplies to those children who were homeless.”
Are you smiling as brightly as I am? These words come from an eleven-year-old. Saving, calculating profit, repaying investors. This kid shouldn’t be running a lemonade stand. We should send him to congress to work on our national deficit.
I am exceptionally impressed with the entrepreneurial spirit. The courage required to plan out a product, test it, market, sell and reinvest. In many ways, it is the American spirit. We are the most heterogeneous society in the world. Our country’s diversity fosters micro and macro improvements in stations of life.
You are already aware that some of the greatest products were created on the street corner – or in a local garage. Microsoft, Apple, Harley Davidson, Mattel, Disney, Google were all started in a garage. Yankee Candle was started in a garage by a high school student, Michael Kittredge, who wanted to make his mother a unique Christmas present. He gathered items from around the house and made her a scented candle out of melted crayons, a milk carton and a shoe lace. After a neighbor expressed interest in purchasing that candle, Michael made more in his garage. From that point, Michael, or Yankee Candle, sells over 200 million candles per year. That’s a pretty unique gift to give mom as well, a self-made millionaire.
Speaking of self-made millionaires, I am in love with the story about Mikaila Ulmer of Texas. When she was 11, Mikaila signed an $11 million deal with Whole Foods to distribute her lemonade. Yup. An eleven-year-old signed an $11 million deal for lemonade. Right now, ask yourself what your 11-year-old is doing.
Mikaila started a lemonade stand when she was young. Young…like 11 isn’t young. Well, younger. Mikaila started a lemonade stand using a recipe she found in her grandmother’s cookbook for flaxseed lemonade. The only thing she changed was to add honey to make it sweeter. The inspiration came to her after she was stung twice by bees and was left terrified. Her mother showed her a book about the importance of bees in ecology. So, she added honey and would promote bees at the same time. That’s where Me & The Bees Lemonade was born.
I’m doing it again. I’m smiling from ear to ear about this story. A young girl gets a great lesson from her mother, uses her internal drive to develop and create. She works hard and ultimately lands a lucrative contract. And, the best part is that her parent’s won’t have to worry about paying her college tuition bills! Sorry, maybe there was a little jealousy on my part.
I am now going to give you my unscientific, non-peer reviewed, resilient leader theory on young entrepreneurs. Are you ready? Got your pencils out? Here’s it is. Stop For Lemonade. You heard it. Stop For Lemonade.
When my son, Max was nine, he and his two neighborhood buddies decided to start a lemonade stand on a sweltering day. You know how excited I am about entrepreneurs, so I grabbed ingredients from the kitchen and helped him get started. We made a big batch of lemonade, a quick sign and I gave him some coins and $1 bills so he could make change. I suggested that they go to the intersection of the main road and the bike path. All bike riders and runners needed to stop there. He would have a captive audience. The corporate brain trust decided that their business would be better run directly in front of our house. At the end of a dead-end street.
The business faced a worker shortage when lunch time came around because the boys got hungry and didn’t pack anything. Operations resumed after a few chicken nuggets, a juice box and some animal crackers. An hour later, the shop steward was organizing a strike to protest working conditions. Their chairs were in the sun and he thought they should be in our garage where there was shade. Twenty minutes later, the company filed its papers of dissolution, and the workers went to play laser tag.
Later that evening, I asked Max how much money they had made. He told me two dollars and fifty cents. His face changed dramatically when I asked for $7.50 from him to cover the costs of the operation. Max was perplexed. “Sure, you bought supplies from me. Cups, ice, lemonade, large paper, markers. You rented chairs, our buckets, and our lawn.” Max was near tears, and I knew I had to stop. He rushed out of the room screaming, “Mom!” I didn’t have the heart to ask for my $5 in coins and small bills back yet. This might go a long way to explaining why we had to pay for his college rather than getting an $11 million payday from Whole Foods.
The boys on the street corner last week? I turned my car around, parked on a side street and walked to their stand. “You guys busy today?” The answer was more expressive than a shrug. “How much for a glass?” $0.50. I put $5.00 on their table and had a glass. It was better than passable. I’m guessing they did not put honey in their formula. “I’ll have a second glass.” They refilled my cup and I walked away. “Mister, you forgot your change.” “Keep it. You going to make great margins today.”
Friends, stop at a lemonade stand this summer. Help a young entrepreneur start their journey. Who knows, in a couple years you may be buying their products off the shelves.
Folks, thank you for listening to Swimming in the Flood. Resilient leaders face challenging currents, and it is tough navigating, but with one tack or another we can get there together.