Feb 22 // Activities + Thoughtfulness // Kidpreneurship, Pretend Market, and More!
In yesterday’s newsletter, we talked a lot about having a healthy view of money, teaching our kids to spend their resources wisely, and using a simple balance sheet on your Notes app to keep track of how much money your kids have for their various budgets.
Today’s newsletter is about helping kids find the intersection between their interests and society’s needs.
Here’s what you’ll find in today’s newsletter:
Activity: Pretend Market (with printables!)
Kidpreneur Basics and Worksheet
Kidpreneur Inspiration: Pet Portraits by Summer
Service Jobs Principles and Ideas
Act of Thoughtfulness: Pro Bono
Pretend Market
Later in this newsletter, we included more serious ideas and principles for entrepreneurship, but if you’re not interested in going that route, here is something fun your kids can to do to pretend to have businesses: host a market day!
We made a printable flyer, price list, and even cute little dollar bills for the kids to trade. You can download the PDF’s below ⬇️
Give your kids whatever craft supplies (or cooking ingredients) that you have on hand and encourage them to make something that other people would want.
This is something great to invite friends to do with you! Our kids made fabric wallets, felt sandwich materials for pretend play, rock jewelry, crocheted items, and paper crowns. They were busy for hours and took a lot of pride in their work. Plus, a lot of the stuff they made was actually cool.
Then, let them have fun buying and selling to each other. They can charge in buttons, pennies, acorns…whatever they like. As mentioned above, we made some printable fake cash for you. You can call your currency “[YourLastName] Bucks.” For example: “That’ll be three Johnson Bucks, please!”
Have fun with it! This is an activity they can do again and again.
Kidpreneurship Basics and Worksheet
In preparing for this newsletter, we bought four books on entrepreneurship and money management that were written for kids. Honestly, all four were quite good! If your kid is serious about starting a business or planning for the future financially, invest in some knowledge for them!
The most critical thing to keep in mind when you think about earning money—either as an entrepreneur, an artist, a grocery store employee, or working any other kind of job—is meeting society’s needs.
So any entrepreneurs—young or old—must ask, “What can I do to meet a need (and get paid for it)?”
Next you need to figure out where you’re trying to go and how you’ll get there. See if there’s anyone that your kid can collaborate with that both businesspeople would benefit from.
You know what would be a great big gift to your kid? Convince them that you believe in them. After they’ve written up some kind of business plan, you can be their first investor. Even $20 in the hands of an ambitious kid can go really far.
Also, designing logos used to be really hard, but it’s easy (and free) on Canva because they have all kinds of premade templates. You can also hire someone on Fiverr to do some design work for you.
The sweet spot when planning out a business is finding the intersection between what you like and what people want. We made a worksheet for you to think through this:
Feel free to reply to this email and tell us about what ideas your kids came up with! Maybe there’s even a way that Family Scripts could help them get started.
Kidpreneur Inspiration: Pet Portraits by Summer
Summer F. from Tampa wanted to earn money for camp, and she had a great idea to figure out how to get there. She combined her talent for art and love for animals to meet a need that society has: watercolor pet portraits!
Her mom simply posted some pictures of her work on Facebook and Instagram, and told friends that Summer was selling these for camp. The response was overwhelming, and she had to close submissions after only a couple days because so many people wanted portraits of their pets. She tapped into something that people really want (even if they didn’t realize how much they wanted it until they saw her cute style.)
By the way, Summer is only eleven years old! We live in a time where you can teach yourself how to do almost anything, and Summer has learned how to excel in her craft. And it’s paid off! You are an inspiration, Summer!
Service Jobs
Though this isn’t the most exciting way to earn money, doing hard work that your customers would prefer not to do for themselves is probably going to have the lowest startup costs and the highest profit margins.
Peter, one of the Family Scripts team members, has a really neat story about starting his pressure washing company from nothing and growing it to have over a dozen employees and becoming the #1 highest-rated company in the area. As insiders on the service industry, we know that this kind of work is a great path to entrepreneurship.
Here are some service-related ideas, starting from things that even a 3-year-old could do and moving up in age and complexity.
Kid Spa
This business would probably have to stay within your family, but it’s a great way to help little ones catch the entrepreneurial spirit…and genuinely help you relax. Help them put together a little supply caddy with things like lotions, massage tools, and maybe cuticle oil, a nail buffer, or polish (if they’re at that skill level.)
You can also encourage them to provide their customers (aka, you) with snacks, reading materials, and calming music. You might be surprised by how kids of varying ages can work as a team to help provide luxurious service and help you relax.
This is also an opportunity to teach your kids about how earning tips works. The massage itself might cost 50 cents, but they could earn lots extra by providing exceptional service!
P.S. This idea is a big help if you’re pregnant or sick!
Here’s a little flyer we made for your kids to use.
Laundry Wash-Dry-Fold Pickup and Delivery
If you live in a neighborhood, this is something your kids can do with nothing but a wagon, access to your family’s washer and dryer (which you could charge your child a fee to use), and detergent. Your child can just stop by the doorstep of your neighbors, pick up the dirty laundry in their wagon, weigh it, wash, dry, fold, and sort it, then deliver it back to the neighbors.
Many professional laundry services charge about $1/lb for next-day service, with something like a 10-lb minimum. (That doesn’t sound like a lot of money, but laundry weighs more than you might expect.) You’ll want to find a way to sort the clothes, too, like bags labeled “Girls Clothes.” You’ll also want to develop a policy for if you can’t get a stain out, something shrinks, etc.
All in all, this can be a solid business idea because plenty of people would gladly have someone else do their everyday laundry without having to take it to the dry cleaners’ or pay those fees.
Organizing Service
If one of your kids has a gift for organization, they could transform that talent into a really satisfying and profitable business…starting with the cluttered areas in your own home! (Even a kid whose room is messy might be able to make a masterpiece with someone else’s closet if they know they’re getting paid to do it.)
A great thing about organization is that it can be learned. Your child can get books such as The Home Edit (or watch the show) to learn how to be better organizers.
As with any situation when your kids would be going inside someone else’s home, you need to be careful about what neighbors you really trust. For younger kids, this service can start off in your own home and in the homes of people you already know.
Lawn Work
This is definitely a great way to make money if you live in the suburbs. It’s not flashy or novel, and the weather can be a pain, but it’s satisfying, and people are willing to pay.
A wonderful thing about owning a lawn service business is that it’s a recurring job. In the summer, you get paid to do it every week.
However, it’s also a seasonal job. Even in southern states, lawns don’t need to be mown every week in the winter. This trains kids to learn from the animal kingdom and work according to the seasons. Earn tons of money in the seasons when you can, but save some away for the times when it’s harder to earn.
Slow seasons are chances to rest and recover or to pivot to a different kind of business.
For example, many warm-weather service companies switch gears to hanging/taking down Christmas lights in the winter.
Act of Thoughtfulness: Pro Bono
The Latin phrase “pro bono” means “for the public good.” Usually it’s used in legal settings where lawyers choose to offer one of their expensive services for free because they think it would be a big help toward something they’re passionate about.
Ask your child this: What is one of your business ideas or products that you could offer for free to someone?
If they’re learning art or honing a skill (like Summer’s watercolor portraits mentioned above), tell them that practice isn’t a waste! Many people would love to be surprised with a piece of imperfect art or to receive amateur organizational help for free.
Thank you for reading this issue! There are obviously so many more things we could’ve written about this topic, but hopefully this was a helpful and fun launching point.
Warmly,
Hope from Family Scripts
P.S. I don’t usually drink lemonade, but if some kid set up a stand this summer and they were selling frozen grapes? Um, I would buy everything they have. Can someone please sell frozen grapes as a business? They’re such a yummy snack. Just an idea 😉
Awesome issue, Hope. One thing I'd add to the pretend market is some sort of cash register. We found one at the thrift store for $2 but a cardboard box with Sharpie'd numbers and display would work, too!
In Wisconsin, most kids deal with the seasonality of lawn mowing by switching to snow removal in the winter. So you develop a relationship with one person, or several young persons in one family, and it continues year-round. (My mom hired two neighbor kids when they were in late elementary school to do this for her -- mostly because was trying to support their small kidpreneur business -- and they stayed with her until they each left for college!)