These kids are usually accompanied by a group of toothy pals who help hold up makeshift signs to draw curbside attention.
But this season, I’ve met a group of business-minded middle school and elementary students who have taken the concept of running a lemonade stand to a whole other level.
Business savvy Frisco tween Kendal Webb, along with her partners Alexis and Alyssa Rollings, developed their own deliciously organic lemonade blend and launched a mobile storefront called Lemon-A-Peel.
The girls got their start at the National Lemonade Day, which was held at NorthPark Center early May.
As part of this entrepreneurial experience, the Lemon-A-Peel team learned how to start, own and operate their own business a lemonade stand.
During the local Lemonade Day event, the girls competed with kids from across North Texas and put their business skills they learned into practice.
Kendal, Alexis and Alyssa learned the ins-and-outs of business operations ranging from buying supplies, to marketing, to picking their perfect selling location.
The girls also enlisted their parents to help sort out some of the details, like the cost of supplies right down to the number of cups they needed to help maximize profit.
Lemonade work is tough business
The dads lent a hand with some of the heavy lifting, design and construction of the glammed-out mobile storefront unit. Wright Foundation; Clint Bruce, former Navy SEAL and founder of the national charity Carry the Load; Carl Dorvil, founder of Dallas-based tutoring company Group Excellence and 10-year-old Mikaila Ulmer, whose Lemonade Day experience led her to launch her own BeeSweet lemonade brand and subsequently net a $60,000 investment from appearing on the TV show Shark Tank.
After winning the People’s Choice Award title at the competition, I recently caught up with the Lemon-A-Peel team hard at work in front of the Kroger at the Legacy Ranch Retail Center in Frisco.
The girls told me that they learned a lot about not only what it takes to make a profit. It also plants community vegetable gardens to offer food security and income for families, as well as to provide school lunches.
That’s a pretty impressive goal for these fledgling entrepreneurs.
So next time you pass an overly enthusiastic group of kids waving signs to get you to stop and buy their lemonade, just remember that’s not just a cup of flavored water.
It could be a “cup of hope” that might make a lasting impact on a child.
Running a lemonade stand, no matter how big or small, can teach kids like the Lemon-A-Peel team, business skills and principles which follow them into adulthood.
Whether they become entrepreneurs or not, the life skills learned from this perennial summer pastime today, can help develop strong community leaders tomorrow.
To learn Lemon-A-Peel or to support their lemonade stand to benefit the Rollings Foundation, email Lemonapeel2015@gmail.com.
Carla Meadows is a Far North Dallas wife and mother of two tween girls.
