A Youthful Attitude = Moneymaking?

How many times have you seen those lemonade stands as you're driving down a backroad on a hot, sunny day? Perhaps you even stopped out of admiration for the kid's entrepreneurial spirit and spent a buck or two just to make them feel richer (or you really were thirsty). Maybe you even had your own stand when you were a kid and made a few bucks and felt like King of the World from it. Or maybe you had other business ventures as a kid such as snow shoveling or mowing your neighbors' lawns. The Monetizer recalls having his parents buy candy in bulk from those wholesale warehouse places and then selling it to sweet-tooth kids on the school bus. I was making money, based on the resale and the fact I never bought the candy in the first place :) It's that sort of young, entrepreneurial mindset that can really take your places though. Some have even found income-producing and easy ways for kids to make money for themselves.

How about the kid who earned $20 an hour from a lemonade stand? Yes it's true, Tyler Dikman was able to do that, and now he runs a few multi-million dollar companies, including CoolTronics a company that helps deliver and setup computers. He bought a Rolex and Infiniti J30 using cash, and hired a maid to clean his room while he was just a teenager in high school. What makes him so impressive is that he went above and beyond the typical lemonade stand, using techniques such as dressing up the stand itself to make it even more attractive, offering other items for sale such as Cracker Jacks and a Gumball machine, and offering diet/low cal varities of lemonade for sale. He had the mindset to go with new ideas and expand upon something simple. You can see just how smart kids are some times.

Monetizer mentioned a few good books to read by younger business minds back from the Monetizer's Recommended Reading List. One is Cameron Johnson and the other is Farrah Gray. Two more examples of young moneymaking prodigies. Cameron was setting up his own stationary business and selling Beanie Babies in bulk out of his parents' home. Farrah was selling painted rocks as doorstops door to door in his neighborhood, then developed a business group for kids, followed by speaking engagements. These kids knew the art of business and networking and had a creative passion that drove them to succeed. These stories always interest the Monetizer and you can definitely take valuable lessons away from them. Most importantly is the notion that kids tend to have a more carefree, creative energy than most adults do. To expand on that, a child will put creative ideas into practice that maybe us adults are too serious and wound up to come up with or even try. It speaks a lot to the idea of "being a kid at heart".

This post was written based on seeing the Donny Deutsch "Big Idea" video over on John Chow's post. There's more than just a few of these type stories though and we can all take a page from these kids' books to set our own moneymaking ideas into full gear. Don't abandon your own creative ideas, even if they seem preposterous, because we're all really kids at heart. It's that creative energy and passion that can really provide the basis for some fun-filled and great moneymaking ventures.