media

This weekend is National Lemonade Day! Hundreds of thousands of kids will all open for business across the country*. These aren’t your average lemonade stands. These kids have made business plans, secured investors, gone beyond the driveway for their location, learned about capital expenses and consumables, and have big goals to spend, save and share their profits.

We sat down with our business pitch video contest winner, Amaia to get some advice and learn what makes a successful lemonade business. See her winning video here – and if you are in the College Station area Sunday, go find her stand and buy a cup of her award winning lemonade!

Amaia is 10 years old and owner of Amaia J’s Lemonade Stand. She in4th grade at Bowen Elementary in Bryan, TX. Last year was her first time participating in Lemonade Day and she won the local Best Tasting Lemonade contest with her watermelon lemonade recipe. Amaia has taken what she learned from Lemonade Day and ran with it! She has sold her lemonade to help her school buy a kiln, earn her own money, and even help het family adopt a miniature schnauzer. She is an amazing and determined 10 year old!

How many years have you participated in Lemonade Day?

This is my 2nd year. I want a drive-thru this year.

How have you changed your business over the years?

I sell lemonade all the time now. People send me their orders on Facebook or my friends knock on the door and ask to buy some.

How has your business grown?

I have an email list. My mom helped me make up a Facebook page and Twitter. She keeps up with most of it though. I sell lemonade, watermelon lemonade, or strawberry lemonade popsicles sometimes but not too many because they take too long to freeze. I’ve set up my stand with Chef Tai’s Food Truck (winner of Food Network’s Great American Food Truck for 2011). And what’s awesome is that I can take credit cards now! Oh and I have my own t-shirts that I sell too.

What do you want to be when you grow up?

Well I want to play basketball for A&M for sure! I haven’t decided if I want to be a teacher yet. Maybe.

Have you bought anything for yourself with your Lemonade Day profit?

I mostly go to Ollie’s (a store around the corner from our house) and buy chips, candy, and cokes for me and my sisters. I get lottery tickets too but my mom has to buy those for me. Sometimes I put some of the money in my lunch account to get snacks and extras at school. Right now I’m helping save up to adopt a dog (miniature schnauzer) for $350.

What’s your favorite thing about Lemonade Day & owning your own business?

Making my own money! I get to buy stuff with it for me, my mom, or my sisters. It’s like I have my own job to get stuff for me or give it to other people to help them out.

Have you had any challenges or scary moments while being an entrepreneur?

Bees! I hate bees! Sometimes they fly around because of the sugar in the lemonade.

Do you have any advice for first year Lemonade Day participants?

Find a busy place where you can sell a bunch of lemonade.

What is your financial goal for this year’s Lemonade Day? How are you going to spend some, save some and share some of that money?

I hope to make $350 for our dog and I’m giving some of my money to my school’s art program. (Bowen Elementary, Bryan, TX)

We also talked to Amaia’s mom. Every participant in Lemonade Day needs a Caring Adult to mentor them. We figured it must be a big challenge with such an amazingly creative and outgoing entrepreneur like Amaia.

Have you noticed any changes in Amaia’s academics since she began participating in Lemonade Day?

She has certainly gotten better at counting money!

As a parent, what’s the best part about watching your child do Lemonade Day?

It’s really funny to see her delegate and assign jobs to her employees (myself and big sister Jordan). She is so serious when it comes to running her stand and she wants to be as efficient as possible. I love to see Amaia’s little mind work and dream up a ton of ideas as to what she can do to bring in more business.

What are your hopes for Amaia’s business?

Amaia has an actual investor that would like to help her open up a sno-cone and drink stand here locally. I would like to see that idea come to fruition for her because she talks about it so often and has so many ideas. It will be some time before it happens though because she does have to put a business plan together.

What’s the best advice you can give a parent who is going through this program for the first time with their child[ren]?

Be involved and if you have other children, get them involved as well and make it a family project. This can be a good bonding and teaching experience with your child(ren) and they have so much fun. It is so neat to see their little minds work and the creative and outrageous ideas they come up with. Amaia has had some crazy ideas and I try not to brush them off but instead help her look into them further. I mean who would’ve thought that a 10 year old would be taking credit cards at a lemonade stand?!?! What started out as a “crazy idea” became a reality for her.

What’s your favorite story or memory of Amaia’s participation in Lemonade Day?

I have so many favorite and funny stories about Amaia and her lemonade but the one I am most proud of is her helping her school raiser money to purchase a kiln for their art class. She reached out to people on her email list, facebook, and twitter to let as many people know what she was trying to do. In a few months, she was able to help raise over $3000 in lemonade sales and donations to buy the kiln!