I have a confession to make: I spent the day yesterday on Yahoo! Answers. I was having a bit of writer’s block for the blog here, so I headed over the the Business & Finance section to see if any of the questions there would spark an idea for me. And boy, did it ever.
I see one question asked over and over again in that section. In fact, from what I’ve seen, it’s the most asked question. It goes something like this:
I’m a kid/teenager (somewhere between 11-17) and I want to make money, but I’m too young to be hired, or I can’t find a job for whatever reason. What can I do besides baby-sitting/lemonade stand/mowing lawns?
I love this question. I see myself in it, except I never asked this question as a kid. I already had the answer. I’d started my own business when I was 6 years old, writing and selling my own newspaper in my town. And I continued that business up until I was 13 years old.
So here’s my answer to everyone one of those young business-persons-in-the-making: You can start your own business. And you can do just about anything you want for your business.
But where to start? The library or bookstore. Head out and get your hands on one or both of these books:
Fast Cash for Kids by Bonnie and Noel Drew
and
Better Than A Lemonade Stand: Small Business Ideas For Kids by Daryl Bernstein.
I read these two books when I was a kid, and they helped so much with developing my idea into a real business. And they both come with tons and tons of ideas for businesses to start, if you haven’t thought of one already. I’m talking hundreds of businesses that you could start!
And teenagers, do not be put off by the fact that these books are targeted toward kids. Think of it this way – if a kid can do it, so can you, and you can probably do it bigger and better!
I would love to hear some stories of kids who’ve started their own businesses – please let me know if you’ve ever known or been a kid entrepreneur!
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37 responses to “Kid Business: Making Money at a Young Age” 
Raking leaves and/or shoveling snow. Unlike mowing lawns, these are chores that NO homeowner really wants to do. My best friend and I started a leaf-raking business when we were about 12 and 10, respectively. We kept expanding it until I was about 14, at which point I started hiring some other neighboorhood kids to help. I branched out to snow shoveling when I realized I needed more winter exercise in highschool. I tried a lot of other things, too, but I never really made money doing anything else. Besides, what other job lets you jump into big piles of leaves you’ve made?
I know college groups who do raking and/or shoveling as fundraisers, and make a lot of money doing it every year. The best part is that it doesn’t require any motorized equipment like mowing a lawn does, and the more people you have working, the faster it goes!
Anitra,
It’s ideas like those that make me love these two books. They’re full of ideas like that and how to execute them and how much equipment and money a kid will need and everything. Some of the ideas are really quite great (I wish I could remember more of tham, but off the top of my head: computer lessons/repair, flyer design, sign painting, mural painter, grocery shopping and delivery, checking in on younger latchkey kids, dessert catering, event organizing, gift basket making… the lists just went on and on!).
I have strated my own business in NC and so far i have made 25000 dollars every year. I am very pleased thanks for the advice
I about to start my own business with a couple of my friends and this site will really help.
@Jennie -
That’s fantastic! Best of luck, and I hope the books here help you out – I know they sure helped me!
ok so im 14, im not very smart, im about a level 5 if you knw what that means. i live whith my brother and my mum, my mum is a single perant, and we are living on benefit so the money aint to good lol.
can someone please explain it in a simpler form? thankyou 
:D it would be much apretiated
i meet my gf alot, and i always need t save up for stuff but cant cause i need to spend it with my girlfriend and special occasions.
SSSSSSooo i relli need to find some way to make money online seems how im online in my spare time. but its sounds relli complicated
I know a sad story. One kid was doing a website. Then he decided to sell it. He sold it for $5,000(it was bringing some revenue).
The buyer made it to $2,500/month adsense website.
Then parents of that kid sues the buyer, that he had no right(the kid) to sell website, because he was underaged.
They won the case and got website back.
So this is a very thin and really sharp line. You should be really careful doing business with teens.
There is are a number of dated expression that “there is no such thing as a free lunch” ,
“nothing is for nothing” and that of “easy money” as well as “everyone wants something for nothing”
These terms also apply to what might be considered easy money on the internet
It takes time , proper preparation , and as well proper funding , for the mistakes along the way , and I guess a measure of good luck and timing
For the most part everything worthwhile takes effort and consistency. If you are the type who likes flash in the pan and you find it in internet sales and ./ or marketing you may well ( almost always ) lose it at your next trip to the gambline table. Proper results require proper effort and preparations.
How do u start to sell a newspaper, or like a comic strip?
@George:
For my newspaper, I made change jars and bought little plastic flyer displays from an office supply store, and then took copies of my paper and the change jars around to businesses in my town. I asked them if they wouldn’t mind if I put the newspapers and the change jars on the counter, so that people could buy them. If you do this, make sure you put a label with the name of the newspaper and the price on the jar, so that people know to pay into the jar.
Then, when you put out a new issue next month, you can collect all the money in the jars and put out the new issue. Make sure you tape a piece of paper in the back of the display holder, with a phone number or something to contact you, so that if any of the businesses run out of copies, they can let you know that they need more.
For a comic strip, the best thing to do would probably start putting it online. I actually used to be really big into the web-comic community – I still have quite a few friends there, if you’re looking for a mentor.
Feel free to email me if you want any more tips! Just click the “Contact Me” link in the sidebar on this page (up near the top).
Hi,I am 11 years old and I need some money. My parents said They would not let me have an allowance. I am good at making comics and I saved a lot of popcorn (with butter) and I like to write. Can you give me some suggestions for a kid business?
Hi Mark – do your parents have a scanner you can use? If so, you can make a weekly comic and put it up online. You can get a free site that you can update weekly at http://www.blogger.com With a little bit of trying, you can easily figure out how to scan in your comics and put them online. It’s best not to worry about making money right away, and more about making good comics and finding ways to get people to read them. Once you have some readers, you can start to figure out how you want to make money. Talk to your parents about setting up ads on your comic site, or a donate button so that people can give you money or buy printed versions of your comics. Some people will even pay you to make custom drawings or to add a drawing of them in as a character in your comic strip. If you’re really serious about this, just let me know – I have a lot of friends who have been putting comics online for years (I used to be a big fan of online comics, so I made a lot of friends with the artists). I have more tips for you if you want them, or different ideas about how to put your talents into use in ways that can make you money.
The thing I like about this post (and site) is that there seems to be a lot of ambition here. I firmly believe in that you make your own luck. Sounds like these kids are going after it and I like to see that. ~Larry
i FOUND sOMTHING REALLY INTERESTING ON THIS SITE… im GOING TO DO IT!
http://mailbusiness.aimoo.com/General-Discussion/Make-money-quick-while-still-y-1-1032669.html
@ALEX – Thanks for coming by the site, but I’m afraid I have to tell you that the link you posted is a scam, and is actually illegal. You can check out the story on snopes:
http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/scams/chain.asp
Just remember that if something seems too good to be true, it probably is.
I am 14 yrs old and I’ve earned US$2700 myself throughout my life. My mom always gave me money since elementary schoool whenever I get good scores in tests and exams. It is a business, isn’t it??
@Synyster – not really. That’s more of an allowance, or a reward from your parents. A business has to have a plan to make money from people outside of your home.
whant to know some succesful names of children who are in the busniess or businessman who started when they where children
A successful businessman I know of, who started as a kid, is Warren Buffet – the world’s richest investor. He started a business collecting used golf balls and selling them as a kid. Then, he took that money and, as a teenager, started a pinball machine business. Now he’s worth more than Bill Gates! (Who also started a business at a very young age.)
Hi my name is Katie.
I am 14, i am planning on starting my own business. The thing is i have no idea on where to start. I made my first bar of soap today and that`s what i want to do. I love playing around with smells and finding things that are gentle but good quality to work on sensative skin or children`s skin. I have sensative skin myself and lots of nieces who love the smell of soap i made today. I have no idea how to go about getting started. Do I just sell them? Is that illegal? How do i get a store? Is there a way to get a loan so i can own and start my business? will i have to get a lawyer?
please let me know what i need to do.
I want a store up town and i want it to be nice. I would need it to have a kitchen so i can make my bathbombs soaps , masks etc.
thanks ! xxxxoooo
Hi Katie,
There’s lots to do to work your way up to your dream of owning a store uptown to sell your soaps in. You probably won’t be able to get a loan right away, but it is possible for a kid to get a business loan, especially if you have the help of your parents. First of all, I would recommend you check out the books recommended in the article, especially Fast Cash For Kids, which does a better job of explaining the legal side of things than I could do right here in this small space.
My recommendation would be this: First of all, come up with a name for your soap-making business! It should be something fun, and probably something that reflects either cleanliness, or pretty smells. Also, it should reflect your personality, since it’s your business! Then, I would make some soaps and sell them to friends and family, to start with. Make sure you set the price high enough to make up for your costs – this is actually harder to do than it sounds, and some grown-ups don’t even do this right, and end up losing money! Once you have some money built up from selling to friends and family, you can expand. From there, I would see about renting a booth at a local festival or flea market. Again, you may need your parents’ help for this. Before you move from selling to friends and family to selling from a booth, you’ll want to go to your town hall or town council and find out about the local laws involved with starting a business. They can help you out the most!
Good luck! And if you ever get to selling your soap online (etsy.com is a good website for this!), come back here and let me know, and I’ll check them out!
Im 12 and i want to start a cookie making buisness with my friend. Is this legal or….
Thanks Stephanie for your info on Warren who started business as Kid, can you help me further i want to collect the stories of children who are in business and businessmen and businesswomen who started as kids from any part of the world, need guid line how could i have maximum stories…
Investing money while in college is an intelligent decision, but can be hard to do based on financial constraints. Most young people have heard there elders tell them to invest money at a young age, but this seems to be a double edged sword.
I am a mother and teaching my kids how to handle money is very important to me for this is something they’re not likely to learn in school. If you teach your children smart ways to manage money, it will help to ensure they get the right start and don’t wind up with bad habits.
Hi, every one. My name is Dan and I am 14, nearly 15. Just recently, I bought a small welder, for some metal working projects at home. I then decided to start selling these peices of work. The materials are very cheap to buy(£3-5, per piece), and after some research on the web, similar pieces sell for around £30. Can anyone suggest how or where I can really start selling these pieces. They do take a while to make (1-3 hours) but I don’t mind that as they are fun to make. Any advice on starting a small business would be great.
Many Thanks Dan,- danjwant@hotmail.co.uk
thanks u inspried me im doing a raking thing. check out my website sometime. bi
kate
Whats your website. I’ll cheak it out. Need some tips on getting the business really up and running
Entrepreneurs are getting younger and younger, eh?
I think the biggest road block for teenage entrepreneurs are their own parents. I think most of the time parents just don’t understand, they want their kids to be kids and have fun instead of “working” all the time.
Nice post, keep it up.
Cheers,
Cody
Hi Stephanie, thanks for the advice. But what should I do with the popcorn?
That’s a good question… why do you have popcorn saved up in the first place? What kind of popcorn is it?
I’m 12 and want to sell codes and logic puzzles(made by me).
I’ve already made some codes.
How do I go about this?
Hi Zeke – I’d be glad to offer you some ideas, but I don’t know much about what you want to sell. Could you tell me a bit more about what you mean by codes and logic puzzles?
The first step to being able to sell something is to be able to explain why someone would want to buy it. So if you can tell me why I might want to buy your product, I can help you better and you’ve also conquered your first step in being able to sell something!
Well, I’ve got a variety of different codes, from enigma style to simple mono-alphabetic ciphers. The enigmas are fairly hard to crack, but someone who does this sort of thing would find the mono-alphabetics pretty simple. The logic puzzles are pretty simple.
Also the only real place to sell stuff I’ve got is school.
i am saving up for a fish tank for my fish and it cost $164.99 and im only 11 what business could i do
One thing to note about the raking leaves business, it is sooo easy to under price. MY friend and I did it in gr.6 once. It took us 4 hours (in like -5 Celsius) to rake this persons yard. We got paid 20 dollars, but originally we were going for $5 a yard, which is insanely under priced. I am now starting a lawn care/ landscaping company (I am now in gr.9). Last summer I had aspirations to do it but I never got going with it. Since grass isn’t growing quite yet (I live in Alberta, Canada), I am raking up the dead grass for people and I’m going to charge around $12 a bag, which pays me about $12 an hour. Less money than I make with my dad, but more money than I’d make working for say McDonalds. Pricing for raking leaves is insanely hard, especially if your just starting out. Here is a good site for all you landscaping hopefuls out there:http://www.startalawncarebusiness.com/ . I plan on buying this product as I think it will help a lot with my pricing.
Concerning advertising offer people something that nobody else is offering. I am offering my customers free cookies. So it will take up a few hours of my Sunday, but I will get more work and be able to expand faster. Do not spend alot of money on advertising, especially when your first starting out.
I find the only problem with the landscaping business is that I wont have a car to drive me places until I’m 16. So I will be restricted to doing things close to home.
Another good thing to do is not limit yourself to raking leaves. Do gardening, mow lawns, shovel walks, fertilize grass, water grass. These things can all get you money, and some you can make more money faster than others, but the more broad you are the more potential for customers you have. once you are successful enough you can hire people which will make your business thrive
Two books I reccomend on success are 1.) The Success Principles For Teens By: Jack Canfield and someone else (I can’t remember his name).
And 2.) you Call the Shots By: Cameron Johnson. Hope this helps
Remember, you need to convince people that they need your services, and that you are better than whoever else is offering them. But don’t be pushy.
i am going to start up a website that is a primark just for horses but betters qualaty stuff thanx so much this is a great website