enterpriseforkids.com

Inspiring kids to be entrepreneurial.

A Fishy Enterprise!

June 30th, 2012

As a kid I loved keeping pets. In fact many people referred to our suburban home as being the local zoo. Kids from all over the neighborhood would come by to see the goings-on in our back yard.

I had a huge fish pond which, during the summer, would be teaming with little colourful fish. The fish first started out in my aquarium and as they multiplied they ended up in the pond. By the end of the summer there would be so many

Breeding poultry to sell is easy. Remember to only use quality birds.

that if I didn’t find homes for them they would over populate the pond and wipe themselves out. So I would catch them by the hundred, put them into big buckets and take them off to the local aquarium shops. The shop owners were happy to get my fish and paid me 50 cents each. Thirty five years ago this amounted to a lot of money.

One time though, I remember delivering a bucket full of sword tails, which are renowned for jumping. The

Swordtails love to jump! They are a low maintenance fish that can be bred in ponds.

aquarium shop owner left the bucket on the ground without a lid whilst he went about his shop business. He returned later in the day to find nearly all the fish on the ground!

I’d also divide up the water lilies and pull out huge amounts of water plants that were thriving in the summer heat in the pond and sell them at the same aquarium shops. All up my hobby pet breeding enterprise well and truly paid for itself!

Our aquarium.

Today I still keep aquarium fish and breed them in ponds during the summer. Some of my children have taken an interest in them and keep fish as well.

A close friend of the family, Brayden, stopped by our place and showed an interest in my fish. I told him what I was doing and the story of how I would sell them to the aquarium shops.

Fifteen year old Brayden also kept

Guppies are also easy to breed and sell.

fish. He had an aquarium full of guppies. As a result of our conversation he took all his guppies down to the local pet shop and sold them for $2.50 each. He was so pleased with his fish sale that he began playing with figures as to whether or not it would be worth trying to farm aquarium fish as an enterprise. His figures stacked up and he told me that he had acquired several large fish tanks. He had done his research on fish and worked out which were easy to breed and which were sort after by the aquarium shops.

His aquaculture enterprise is just beginning and has the potential to do very well. I’ll keep you posted with how he goes.

Baby rats sell for $5 each and a mother rat will have babies every five weeks.

Here are some helpful tips if you are considering breeding animals or plants to sell. Choose quality stock to breed from, from the start. Look for animals or plants that have a higher price tag. It is just as easy to breed a $2 guppy as it is to breed an exotic $30 guppy. So why not choose the latter.

Also don’t be afraid to cull inferior fish based on colour, shape and size. Keep your very best stock for breeding as these will produce the best offspring. Feed them well and only sell young quality animals. It is important to develop a good reputation with the pet shops. Maintain pure strains. These will always look the best and demand the best price.

Breed white peacocks. They are much more valuable than standard peacocks!

Make sure you do your research before breeding pets. Some animals can prove to be very difficult to keep and breed and may require expensive equipment and services to keep them in top breeding condition. Ask the pet shops what animals they are regularly looking for. Become the expert on the pet you’re planning to breed.

Lastly, consider selling your pets on Facebook, ebay, or one of the internet buy and sell sites. These are free to advertise on and have huge followings of prospective customers.

Brayden has an interest in a "Fishy Enterprise"

Maybe you too can develop a pet enterprise, or at least have your pets pay for themselves! Here are a few ebooks that could help you to develop your expertise with a pet breeding enterprise… Aquarium Fish, Guinea Pigs, Pet Rats, and Chickens.

Our next blog will take us back to the Enterprises our children have been running. Find out how they are going and the lessons they are learning along the way…

Money… We All want it, but at what Cost?

June 25th, 2012

In the last blog we spoke about “who it is that teaches our kids about money”. We’d like to delve a little deeper with this topic in this blog. Our intention is to build an understanding of why most of us have settled into the role of being a “worker” rather than following the “entrepreneurial” path. You will also learn a little more about what we are endeavoring to achieve as a family.

Our kids, like all kids, want to have their own money so that they can have a little independence and buy the things that they want. In our family our children sometimes receive money when it is their birthday and they also get a little pocket money.

Kaitlin, our eldest, has a part time job working at a local Brewery serving lunches and doing the kitchen work. She works hard and it pays pretty well. However, to take on a job, she loses some of her weekends and time to do her school work and have a social life. She also commits time to regular baby sitting work for some of the families in the area.

At present the money mindset of my children is much the same as ours, which is likely to be the same as most other people, and that is to earn money, spend and borrow money!

Generally most of us either have a job where we give time for a salary or we have a business where we give our time for a monetary return. Whatever the case, we are tied down and limited with what money we earn and we sacrifice our time for it. Sound familiar?

The funny thing is, that right from an early age we are conditioned to accept this to be the norm and often our minds are generally closed off to entrepreneurial ideas and opportunities. Our schools train us and prepare us for the workforce. Our parents will do the same by pointing us towards a vocation.

Adding to this, media advertising, TV, politicians, universities and our peers all guide us towards getting a job. It is all around us, well intentioned people and institutions all keeping us on the “straight and narrow” pathway of getting a job (earn!), then spending our money on things (spend!) and then borrowing money to spend on more things (borrow!).

Finance companies advertising loans

Look at the people around you and you will see this pattern repeated everywhere. People with expensive things like houses, TVs, holidays, cars, boats and caravans. Most are servicing mortgages to pay for it all. The more things they acquire during their lives the harder and longer they have to work to pay for the things. Most people can see no way out of their situation and accept that this is what is supposed to happen. The average Australian spends about $1.15 out of every dollar they earn!

The Rat Race!

In fact most of us have been conditioned to accept this money mindset which locks us into the“Rat Race!”

Now you may challenge us by saying, what’s wrong with our kids entering the workforce, what’s wrong with spending what they earn and borrowing some more! Honestly, there is nothing wrong or right about it at all. It is just what it is.

For us though, we’re looking for a new direction where we have the time to follow our passions and to be able to give freely to our family, community and world without worrying how to pay for it. Our goal is to break out of the “worker” mindset.

We seek to know how the relatively few, “financially and time free” people managed to rise above the Rat Race. We want to know what they do that is different. How do they think and what is their conditioning around money mindset!

What’s more, we wish for our kids to grow up with the mindset of an entrepreneur! It is important to us that they get a “financial education”.

A Financial Education won't come from the teacher.

From what we’ve discovered so far, is that kids need to start very early to develop their entrepreneur mindset and the skills needed to manage money and build enterprise. They need role models who can foster a different thinking and parents who encourage and look for opportunities that foster enterprise. Open discussions about money and business will help to develop a financial education for kids.

We desire for our seven children to grow up having choices. We want their pathways to be wide with opportunity! We encourage them to follow their passion and not be conditioned into the “earn, spend and borrow” mindset. We hope that they will think differently, have belief in themselves and develop the habits of people who have achieved personal and financial freedom.

We know we have a challenge ahead of us, as our kids have already been conditioned from an early age. Using Kaitlin as an example; she earns money, spends freely and already has a debt. She is studying hard to go to university with all her friends and then ultimately to get a good paying job. Once again I’ll point out that there is no right or wrong about this, only that we would like her to see that there are other ways.

It is always going to be a challenge whilst we have that same conditioning and mindset. Although striving to change our thinking, we recognise that it will take time and persistence to learn new habits and shift old belief systems. However, we are very confident that this year, is the year that we will have a break through. We have enlisted the help of a Money Mindset personal mentor, who is helping us develop a new thinking. He is there to help us transform in our thinking through our actions…. and as we do so, so will our children.

With our up coming blogs we will share his education with you.

Who Teaches Your Kids About Money?

June 20th, 2012

If you don’t teach your kids about money, then there are plenty of people out there who will! And not all of them will teach your children what they really need to know.

Kids are conditioned by media and celebrities.

Our kids are educated financially from many sources whether we like it or not. Everywhere they go and everything they look at is conditioning our kids around money.

Teenage kids, for example, are very influenced by their peers, TV and social media. They are pressured to want to have all the latest and greatest of everything! AND…they have to have it now! If you have a teenager in your house (or even a preteen!), you will understand this very well. They will tell you that they are the “only” ones in the “whole world” who doesn’t have one! And if you try to compromise with a cheaper version from Target,… well, forget it! Brand name or nothing!

Many parents fall into the trap of giving into their kids’ persistent demands. We have…..more times than we should have!… and the older a kid gets, the better they are at arguing their point. Some parents may lend their child the money with the view of having them pay it back when they can afford it, or some simply pay for the item fully and don’t expect their child to pay anything back.

But what is this teaching children?

Our son Flynn was preparing to go on a camp with his school. He claimed that ALL the kids would have iPods and that he wanted to buy one to take on camp.

He counted up his money and found that he was short about $100. He was very persistent in his request and we decided to sit down and have a conversation with him around the value of money.

Our dilemma was this – If we were to say an outright “NO, we can’t afford it” then we would be conditioning him with a mindset around “lack of money.”

If we said “YES”, then we would be conditioning him with the mindset to “borrow, then spend!”….and probably not appreciate it too much.

So……………we came up with a solution we had been taught in our mentoring course.

We said “YES”. He could buy an Ipod……however, we weren’t able to pay for it. We brainstormed ideas with Flynn on how he could raise $100. Time was of the essence as he was going on camp in three days.

We came up with ideas such as increasing the marketing of his honey that he was selling through his Honey Enterprise; sell some of his unwanted things such as his surf board; or do a deal with his sister and buy the items she had lined up to sell as part of her “New from Old” enterprise and then resell them with mark up.

The discussion gave him motivation, and we took the punt that if he was really keen for the iPod, then he would make it happen.

The point of all this is that we didn’t automatically say “No, we can’t afford it”…… and we didn’t say “Yes, and we will pay for it”. Rather, we put the onus on Flynn to work out a way to achieve his goal without getting himself into debt. We used this opportunity to teach Flynn about money.

Our Money Mindset Mentor, Paul Counsel, says that in our society, kids are conditioned to “earn, spend and borrow” from a very early age. This conditioning carries through to adulthood and ties people to a job. They need this job to pay for the interest payments on their “things”.

Sporting heros are used to condition people.

It is hard for our kids to avoid this type of conditioning. Their sporting idols appear on TV advertisements telling them what a great investment they are making if they buy x,y or z……and finish with a trusting wink!

Celebrities promote all sorts of things from insurance and jewellery to holidays. Retailers offer low cost, easy monthly payments for expensive items that people really can’t afford. There goes the “earn, spend and borrow” cycle again. Even airlines offer credit these days!

The education faculties don’t teach your kids about money either. In fact they will also put young people into tremendous debt by financing their higher education courses. Young people who spent five years working hard for a qualification, come out at the end with a massive debt!

Locked into debt before you can even begin!

Here is a hard fact… this year the total amount of student loan debt in the US hit the $1 trillion mark. Back in 2010, the amount of U.S. student loan debt surpassed the total amount of credit card debt, and it continues to grow. The trend in Australia is following that of the US.

We can look at life as being a game full of experiences! We are here on earth to play the game. Yet from an early age the odds are stacked against us to achieve personal and financial freedom when we are “conditioned” to earn, spend and borrow for unproductive things.

Can this change? Absolutely.

And who is the best person to teach this change to your children?

Well, if you have already achieved financial and personal freedom, then the best teacher is YOU!

And if you haven’t, then find someone who has achieved the type of financial or personal success you would like for your kids. You may even learn something in the process. 🙂

Portrait Artist in the Making!

June 17th, 2012

Kait with that winning smile!

Before we revisit Kaitlin and her Portrait Artist Enterprise, we wanted to share about the idea of manifesting what you desire into reality. We believe having a little understanding about this will make all the difference to achieving goals, dreams and enterprise for kids.

If you have ever watched the movie “The Secret”, which is all about understanding the Laws of Attraction, then you would have some understanding of Quantum Physics. The Secret explains how to manifest things that you desire into reality. It explains that you must firstly see and believe whatever it is that you want, then you evoke it (or emote it) into existence. If all goes well, the thing you desire will at some stage certainly materialise.

Kaitlin procrastinating!

The more we have been learning about Quantum Physics through the studies that we are doing at the moment with our Mentor, Paul Counsel, the more we have come to understand and believe that what the Secret portrays is all real and true, however, the movie doesn’t go into a lot of depth with one very important point (actually there’s another point as well, but that can wait for a later blog!).

For all of the above to actually happen a person needs to make what they want to manifest, their “highest value”. That means they need to put it ahead of all other things, making it their focus. With determination, will and focus, then and only then, will you be able to manifest what you want.

Now that sounds pretty easy, but I will be frank, it is easier said than done! If you are anything like us, you will have very busy, complicated lives and are over-run with distractions. Work, family, social life, worries etc. Your highest value, quite likely is one of these other things and as a result you would be having troubles pin pointing your focus on what you really desire.

Kaitlin’s enterprise plan that she shared in her home video is a very good one, but one that requires time management, focus and diligence. Once the article about her enterprise was posted on “Enterprise for Kids,” Kaitlin received two customers requesting her to do portrait drawings of their families. Kaitlin was delighted that people had actually appreciated her talents and were willing to pay for her service. This was a real opportunity for Kaitlin to follow a passion of hers and she was motivated to get started.

Kaitlin Sliding into Action.

She had bought half a dozen quality timber and glass frames from a garage sale, which would beautifully show the portraits… if her customers wanted them framed that is! She also had the $100 loan from me to buy the art materials required for her to run her enterprise.

So what has happened so far?……….

Distractions, distractions and more distractions!

Distractions!

Kaitlin, being a popular teenager has many demands put upon her and she certainly doesn’t have her focus set on attending to portrait drawings…..yet! It has not become her highest value to develop an enterprise, despite the fact that she really does want to have her own enterprise doing something that she has passion for.

Kaitlin on the Bali Green Supercamp

The list of distractions could amost fill a blog on their own! Kaitlin has been on the Country Week Camp, had sleepovers, caught up with friends, and is currently on the Bali Supercamp. She has had work commitments, baby sitting, sporting commitments, school, boyfriends, homework, modelling classes and family commitments that have all stolen her focus away.

To do portrait drawings, it requires a lot of concentration, patience and most importantly, a “distraction free” amount of time where she can get her head around it. Kaitlin understands that she needs to establish a time management plan where she can devote her focus to what she wants to achieve. Admittedly, Kaitlin doesn’t need to complete the drawings straight away. She has a few months…….but you could see how easily those “few months” could whittle away to nothing without a plan of attack, then taking action to bring that plan to fruition.

That being said, we all must do the same with our dreams and desires in life. Without making what we want, our highest value, with a written plan and then finally focusing all our energy upon it, then it is unlikely that those dreams will come about very easily.

We will keep you in the loop with Kaitlin in coming Enterprise for Kids blog articles. For my next post or two we will have a break from following our kids’ journeys and discuss understandings about developing a mindset for success. We’ll be looking at how we (and 98% of people) are conditioned to think in a certain way about money and how this conditioning may prevent us and our children from achieving success (and we are not just talking about the financial kind either :)………… Until then……………….

Being An App Developer is No Easy Feat!

June 13th, 2012

Jai was super motivated and was like a bull at a gate with his new enterprising idea, which was to design, make and sell an app. For those of you who are not Geeks and are unfamiliar with the terminology, an App basically means Application Software for a devise such as an iPhone, Ipad or computer.

Jai contemplating a good idea.

He bought an Apple App developers license under his Mum’s name and downloaded all the software onto his school’s apple computer (a computer that he gets to loan on a permanent basis until he leaves his school… lucky boy!). He then poured through the various emails and instructions and did whatever was required to get himself underway.

There are ups... and downs!

The process proved to be very challenging and it wasn’t long before Jai was faced with a huge roadblock! He was stumped! The information and requirements were very complicated and technical and Jai really needed professional help to get him through it. I could see his spirits dropping fast, so we sat down for a chat about roadblocks.

To know about apps, you have to play the games!!

When you are “building up” an enterprise idea, it is important not to get bogged down by all the “What ifs”. If we all did that we wouldn’t get past first base. Whatever enterprise you choose to do will have its roadblocks and you will need to troubleshoot a way to get around them. Firstly it is important to come up with an idea and build it up, and then the next step is to work out a general plan for developing the idea into an enterprise. This would mean identifying each of the development stages. From there you think about all the detail and consider the roadblocks for Stage One.

So Jai and I considered his Stage One Plan. The plan was to become registered as an App developer, download the software, then become familiar with the software. Jai’s roadblocks were:

•   The software was not loading correctly onto his computer
•   The software was difficult to understand
•   He didn’t know how to get started with using it

So we planned a simple strategy to deal with these roadblocks.

We were to be in Geraldton for a holiday in a few days. Jai strategy was to pay a visit to our successful App developer friend and ask him to help him get started.

It's exciting to climb to new heights...

That he did, and when I saw Jai next I could see the spring back in his step. He now had new understanding and some direction, plus he had opened a line of communication with an expert, who could possibly become a mentor down the track. Having a mentor is one of the proven best ways to a successful business.

What Jai learnt was that for the software to work properly he needed to download another program onto his Apple computer. So when he arrived back to Burekup, he downloaded the program, which seemed to sort the software issues and it was looking like he was now finally ready to get going with it all.

He headed off to school that Monday, only to arrive home later that day without his computer and looking very frustrated!

Apparently when he went about his online school work, he found that all the school programs that he used were no longer compatible to his computer. He paid a visit to the school’s computer tech, who identified what had caused the problem… Jai downloading this new program! He wasn’t very happy with Jai. He said that the computer would need to be wiped clean and completely reconfigured, then reloaded up with all the school’s programs again. To top it off, he was told that it may take him a few days to get it sorted.

Not good news at all! More roadblocks!

What will Jai's next move be?

What will Jai do next with his enterprising idea? We will revisit his journey as an App Developer in a later blog. It will make interesting reading with some hard lessons learnt!

Next up we will touch base with Kaitlin and see how she is progressing with her enterprising idea.

The Dog Whisperer!

June 9th, 2012

Our kids are becoming Enterprising Children!

In this post we revisit Kit and his enterprising Dog Walking business. He was now ready implement his carefully thought out plan.

It was the school holidays and we were all staying with Kit’s Gran and Grandad in Geraldton.

His first client was a family friend, Pam, who owned a small scruffy dog called Elly. Pam had been prepped with a phone call that Kit would be arriving with his Grandad to ask if she would be interested in hiring his services. She was delighted to support Kit with his new enterprise and awaited their arrival.

Kit with Pam's dog, Elly.

Kit preparing for his walk with Elly.

Kit explained to Pam what his business entailed and the benefits that she and her dog would get if she hired his services. Pam agreed that his service looked to be very good and then she asked what his rate was. Kit said five dollars. Pam negotiated with him and they agreed on four dollars for the half hour walk.

A beautiful afternoon for a walk.

All dogs need a pit stop

Kit was pleased, but not sure how he was going to handle Pam’s little energetic dog. Grandad was an excellent coach and helped him with attaching the lead, offering the dog a treat and instructed on giving commands to the dog.

The walk went very well with no dramas and Kit arrived back at his Gran and Grandad’s house after returning Pam’s dog very keen to tell his family all about his business.

Ending the walk.

Kit being paid for a job well done.

Kit continued his dog walking enterprise for the next two days whilst we were on holidays in Geraldton. He managed to make twelve dollars! Kit is now on his way to attaining his goal.

We, as parents, felt that more important than attaining his goal was the fact that Kit got “started” on his idea. What holds many people back from achieving their dreams is the inability to actually start! And of course, there will always be a myriad of reasons why not to – the time isn’t right, there isn’t enough money, there isn’t enough time, my family won’t approve, not ALL conditions are right yet…..the list goes on. These are the BUTS that stop people attaining their goals all the time, so it was refreshing to see one so young as Kit just “do it!”

Our enterprising children are now all busy with their individual kid’s enterprises. It will be time to check in with Jai and see whether his enterprise plan eventuated.

Until then……….

Green SuperCamp

June 6th, 2012

It’s amazing how life works sometimes. As you know, we have been sharing our kids’ experiences and jouney as they follow their enterprise ideas through to fruition. Certainly, as our learning and that of our children has accelerated over the past 6 months, other opportunities have landed in our laps.

One such opportunity came in the form of a friend and a simple email. She attended one of the workshops we have been doing with our mentor, Paul Counsel. She sent us an email with a link to something (in her words) pretty special.

Being school teachers and always being open to hearing about things that inspire children to think outside the square and follow enterprising ideas, the link our friend sent us truly was “special”.

Below is a snapshot of a concept that really had us super excited and super motivated.

The Green school

Amazing bamboo structure

The Green SuperCamp is indeed a very unique and inspiring concept.

The school, located in the tropical paradise island of Bali, runs very forward thinking, engaging leadership camps that have attained massive results in the transformation of kids over a very short time. The SuperCamp uses a state of the art Quantum Learning System that delivers the very best in life and learning skills. We’ve seen no other camp or school use such forward thinking technologies that tap into a child’s mind and rapidly advance their abilities to read, and process and memorize information.

Trust activities and...

....working in groups

The staff ratio to kids is 1:4 and they are all highly trained. In fact they go through 300 hours of extensive training in Quantum Learning methodologies and 290 specialized learning techniques that lead to outstanding results that they seem to get consistently get for the kids who attend their camps.

Lots of learning...

...loved by all

Listening to some of the videos posted on their website, we viewed teenagers who have gone from reading 200 words per minute to 1000 words per minute in just seven days. We have both worked in many schools and seen no one that can claim anything like that! Kids from all over the world attend the SuperCamps. They are particularly popular for American kids who travel to Bali during their summer vacation.

A bird's eye view

Looking up into the ceiling

The SuperCamps are held at the world renowned Green School campus. The founders of the school, John and Cynthia Hardy, built the new Green School almost entirely of bamboo. They wanted to set up a school that is at the cutting edge of environmental education, and also takes on a holistic view for the future of the Earth. Their school was never to be built in a city, but in the very heart of nature itself.

Solar panels in a natural environment

Hut accommodation for the camp

It is designed to have the smallest carbon footprint by having compost toilets, to open walless rooms with natural lighting. The kids interact with animals that produce the methane gas for power. The flowing river that passes though the grounds also powers the school. To top it all off, the kids grow their own food to eat!

Green School’s mission is to “empower global citizens and green innovators who are inspired to take responsibility for the sustainability of the world”.

“The school has attained international attention for its revolutionary approach to education, with its focus on transformational education in a spectacular setting. It has built a reputation for its focus on nurturing our young leaders of tomorrow on sustainable living with a deep respect for our planet and each other.” (Quoted by CNN TV.)

The school bases much of its philosophy on the Steiner System. The early Austrian educator, Rudolf Steiner, believed in the philosophy of balancing education with social learning.

Social interactions....

...and just hanging about!

As we viewed the short movies of teens who share their experiences after attending a Green SuperCamp, we were astounded by their personal insights. They all go through a journey of self discovery where they get to build strong relationships with future leaders from all over the world. Many claim that Green SuperCamp is a life changing experience!

Leaping for joy!

Kite building skills

They learn to live in the moment and be fully self expressed. They develop a responsibility for themselves and each other and they do things way outside their comfort zone. Activities such as rope climbing, Balinese dancing, mud wrestling, flying fox, and physically breaking wood, all contribute to building self confidence and leadership. Many kids manage to have massive break throughs in overcoming obstacles in their lives and their parents are astounded by their transformation.

Fun in the mud!

Fun as a group

We are completely amazed that Green SuperCamp manages to have such a huge positive impact on kids in only a matter of days. If all schools could learn from this innovative school, then we would have a generation of kids who are very equipped to provide the leadership required for our future world. They have a camp designed especially for developing entrepreneurial teenagers. Now that is a first!. When has a school ever tried to foster in kids an Entrepreneurial mindset?

We have been so inspired by Green SuperCamp that our three oldest kids are attending the camp this year.

We will let you know in future blogs, how they go….although we think we already know the answer to that one! 🙂

The Candy Man Entrepreneur!

June 3rd, 2012

Enterprise for Children can be a lot of fun, especially if it involves a four year old and a mountain of lollies! After you read this blog you’ll understand why Hansel and Gretal gave in to temptation to eat the witch’s candy house.

The Candy Man with his $50

... outside the supermarket!

"Let's eat!"

Chayse and I headed off to the supermarket with his $50 just as he had planned. We walked the Candy aisle and Chayse picked out the lollies he thought would be the yummiest. He bought everything from snakes, milk bottles to musks, liquorish and lollipops. Next he added to the shopping trolley 50 plastic sandwich bags and some packets of brightly coloured balloons. His whole investment of $50 was spent in no time. The check out lady asked him if was his birthday! Chayse nodded.

The production line!

Chayse’s brothers and sisters were at the car ready and waiting to escort him into the house and feast their eyes on all his lollies. Chayse was really enjoying all the attention! He bossed his brothers and sisters around as they bugged him for a lolly and offered to carry his bags.

It was all hands on deck. Jaxon and Mitchy from next door came over to help out and a production line was organised around the kitchen table. The lollies and balloons were placed into fifty piles and bagged up.

Chayse’s intention was to sell each bag for $2. So if all goes to plan he should make a 100% on his investment.

The production line team!

Cathy and I helped him with a sturdy box to display his product. We attached a strap to the box to help him hold it up and then made up a sign.

Mitchy and Jackson ran off home and immediately returned with money to buy a bag each. Chayse’s first customers! 98 candy bags to go!

Chayse’s brothers and sisters also wanted to buy a bag each with their pocket money. We had to put a halt to that as it was going to create troubles, especially as Chayse wanted to buy his own lollies too! So the compromise was that they were able to polish off the left over lollies… and of course Chayse was in charge of sharing them out to his drooling family.

Chayse's first customer, Mitchy.

Chayse’s enterprise for children business was now all set to go. His next job is to market and sell his product. We will share that story in a later blog.

Next up we’ll tune in with Kit the Dog Whisperer and see whether his enterprising idea has evolved!

Flynn’s Honey Investment Continued……

June 1st, 2012

You may remember from a previous blog that Flynn’s Enterprise for Kids plan was to buy honey at wholesale and sell at retail. All he needed was a good source of cheap quality honey that he could buy in bulk.

Flynn’s Grandad has kept bees for over twenty years and had a number of hives which he regularly harvested honey from. The honey produced from his bees is very light in colour and tasty as the bees forage over the Mid West fields of Paterson’s Curse and coastal gums. Flynn knew that he had a good quality product.

His plan was to pay a visit and strike up a deal with his Grandad!

Flynn’s Grandad saw that Flynn had thought through his plan. He was more than willing to support Flynn with his new honey enterprise. Flynn negotiated a good price per kg, however, the deal included Flynn having to help his Grandad rob the honey from the hives. Listen to Flynn explaining the deal he has made with his Grandad by clicking this link!

Flynn donning his gear.

Flynn with Grandad

Flynn was up for the challenge! He donned a pair of overalls, gloves, boots and bee veil. Then he and his Grandad disappeared for the morning, returning later in the day with a heavy load of honey supers in the back of the ute. They were carted around to the rear of the house and quickly stacked in the garage. Already the local bees were honing in on the honey, hoping to pinch it for their own hives. The garage door was closed to keep the bees out.

Flynn slotting the honey combs into the honey extractor.

Extracting the honey from the honey combs.

Grandad sliced the caps off the honey combs with a hot special purpose electric knife and Flynn slotted them into a honey extractor. The extractor uses centrifugal force to extract the honey from the combs. It was Flynn’s job to spin the extractor, which proved to be a lot of fun. Although everything nearby became sticky with escaping honey, including Flynn!

Checking the temperature of the honey

Yummy raw honey - a great enterprise venture

Flynn’s brother Jai, and a family friend Jack, stopped by to lend a hand. Many hands made light work and before long, after warming and sieving the honey, it was sealed into 10kg buckets.

Angry bees don’t take too kindly to people robbing their hives. It was pretty amazing that Flynn managed to do all this work without getting stung! His Grandad and Dad weren’t so fortunate though!

Enterprising Flynn paid cash for 80kgs of honey from his Grandad. He loaded it all up in our car to take it back to his home. It was a large investment for a twelve year old and Flynn, knowing its value, took great care to ensure that the honey was well sealed and cushioned for the long trip home. He didn’t want it spilling, nor did he want any ants finding their way into his containers.

Pouring the honey into tubs.

Filling tubs with Grandad

Flynn wanted to sell his honey at retail. He had done his research and found that honey generally sold in shops for around $12 or $13 a kg. He had a unique product. It was tasty, raw and full of enzymes, which are generally destroyed during commercial pasteurization processes.

He had also searched online for plastic honey pots. We discussed with him that people would pay a premium for his product if it looked professionally bottled and not sold in recycled jam jars. New plastic honey pots weren’t cheap! The larger the order, the better the price.

Flynn made his order over the phone and bought five hundred 500ml pots. These were delivered by mail within a few days, arriving in a massive cardboard box.

Flynn ordered honey jars and lids...

....ready to be filled

So now he was all set to go with his enterprise for kids project. He had his honey and honey pots and had spent every cent that he had. It was a huge investment and Flynn had no choice, but to make it work. He had overcome fear and had taken a calculated risk with his business. All he had to do now was bottle, market and sell his honey. … and this will all be revealed in a later blog!

In our next Enterprise for Kids blog we check back with Candy Man Chayse and see how his enterprise has been progressing.