I have been thinking about Lemonade Day over the past week for two reasons. First, I must admit this year was my first time hearing about it and I waited too late to get involved. Secondly, I wanted to blog about the missed opportunity and how I planned to make up for it. I didn't get around to it until now...after being "reinspired."
I am very active on Facebook and keep up with status updates quite regularly. I just read an update by one of my Facebook friends that her 8 year old son asked for his own business for his birthday, but instead she bought him a game. My response, "Encourage his dreams. It's never too early to start."
My husband and I are huge advocates of youth entrepreneurship. We encourage our children to focus on their talents whenever they talk about wanting a job. Our three youngest children are 14, 12, and 8. Their collective talents include art, dance, acting, mime, and computer graphics. We've created a Facebook page for our daughter's art and are in the process of building websites for her and for our son's business, YoungMAC (Young Minds are Creative).
So, you can see why I was a little upset about missing Lemonade Day. It was not just an opportunity for kids throughout the city to have fun selling lemonade. It was an opportunity to teach business planning, marketing and promotion, management, negotiating, merchandising and sales skills. It was an opportunity to teach them nuts and bolts of running a business. It was reported that 50,000 children across the country partipated in this year's Lemonade Day. In my mind, that equates to endless opportunities to create the next generation of business owners.
How do I plan to make up for it? For us "Lemonade Day" doesn't have to come once a year. We're already planning for our kids' summer business ventures. I think we can squeeze at least one lemonade day in (pun intended). Since our daughter is an artist, why not sell lemonade stand themed art work? Or, why not have our son sell lemonade themed t-shirts to promote YoungMAC? Our youngest daughter could don a lemon costume and be the dancing mascot...making up her own "Lemonade" dance.
While I plan to be prepared next year, we won't let a missed opportunity keep us from turning lemons into lemonade. Our children may not grow up to be real estate professionals, but we will prepare them with the skills needed to succeed in business..their own or someone else's. Lemonade Day is not just about lemonade. It's about our future and building the next generation of business leaders.
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