Startup Journal:
When 15-year-old Jasmine Lawrence comes home from school, she throws down her books, contemplates her homework, and then heads to the basement - her corporate headquarters.
Ms. Lawrence is chief executive officer of Eden Bodyworks LLC, a maker of all-natural beauty supplies. She founded the company at age 13. Now halfway through high school, she is turning a profit and is close to a distribution deal with Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the ultimate goal of entrepreneurs everywhere.
She is in the vanguard of a rising new class of kid entrepreneurs whose business acumen far surpasses that of an ordinary lemonade-stand operator. The most gifted among them, while few in number, are driven leaders armed with sophisticated business plans, corporate attorneys and financial advisers. They skip school to attend business meetings; they don spiffy suits; and they’re fluent in the language of commerce.
‘When I’m explaining [the business] to my friends, and I’m using all this business lingo, they’re like, Huh, what?, says Ms. Lawrence, of Williamstown, N.J. ‘I think it’s pretty cool to be a CEO at age 15.’
In Training
Young entrepreneurs, some of whom can count their age on two hands, are multiplying partly because of the arrival of programs that teach kids M.B.A.-like concepts. CampCEO, for example, is a summer getaway in Carbondale, Ill., that teaches children about negotiations, sales, customer service and leadership. After 1 week at the camp, which is sponsored by the state-run Southern Illinois Entrepreneurship Center, kids walk away with a briefcase, a business plan and business cards. For African-American youths, Black Enterprise Magazine holds an annual Kidpreneur/Teenpreneur Konference that teaches kids 7 to 17 about entrepreneurship, investing money and developing a business plan.
On a broader scale, there is the National Foundation for Teaching Entrepreneurship, or NFTE, a nationwide nonprofit based in New York that teaches kids in schools and community-based organizations how to breathe life into a business idea. Last month, the NFTE and investment bank Smith Barney sponsored a competition in which kids vied for the coveted title of best business plan. The grand prize: $10,000 to help launch the winning idea.
The thought of becoming a real entrepreneur can be thrilling for kids accustomed to play money and only mimicking the ways of entrepreneurial parents. When it comes to actually launching their business or licensing their product, however, kids are forced to confront and master a whole set of obstacles, rules and responsibilities, including buying insurance and, yes, paying taxes.
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