Event has youth set up shop for a day
Entrepreneurial spirit encouraged as part of program
Young entrepreneurs gathered in Hudson and Vaudreuil-Dorion on Saturday to sell lemonade, crafts, candy and pies as part of a provincewide event encouraging children to give entrepreneurship a try.
La grande journée des petits entrepreneurs encourages children aged five to 12 to create and run their own businesses for a day. The event was initiated by a group of experienced entrepreneurs in Quebec City five years ago and participation has expanded every year since.
Co-founder Isabelle Genest said the first year of the event drew about 300 participants, well above the 100 she had hoped for. By the second and third year, the event was drawing thousands of kids. This year was the event’s fifth, and more than 5,555 kids signed up to participate throughout Quebec.
In Vaudreuil-Dorion, about 115 elementary schoolchildren created 72 “companies” for the day, setting up shop in a mini-market in a mall parking lot.
Tanya Daoust, who helped organize the gathering on behalf of the parent participation organization for École Brind’Amour, said it was the largest group of young entrepreneurs to participate in all of Quebec.
One group of kids set up a booth offering games of skill, with prizes of homemade slime. Another group of three siblings baked 22 pies and sold every one. One participant dressed up as Super Mario to sell Nintendo-themed crafts. Other children sold homemade surfboards, camping kits, lip balm, comic books, bath bombs, baby bibs, dog treats, herb plants and more. Daoust said more than half a dozen kindergarten children set up their own little businesses this year, creating a candy store, a sushi shop, a bakery, a lemonade stand and more.
“It’s the kids who run the show and the parents are there as backup,” she said. “The kids had their ideas. We were there to help and guide them. But it’s the kids who did the work.”
Brind’Amour school is designated as an entrepreneurial school, where students are involved in various entrepreneurial projects along with the typical school curriculum, so Daoust said it seemed natural to encourage kids to participate in the event.
While the majority of the children at the Vaudreuil-Dorion gathering were from Brind’Amour, Daoust said invitations were sent out to all area schools to encourage participation, drawing kids from as far as Rivière-Beaudette, Rigaud and St.-Zotique to join in the fun.
In Hudson, a smaller group of children set up shop in front of Mikko Espresso and Boutique to sell cookies, used books and lip balms with the encouragement of owner Elizabeth Glazier.
“I thought it was a fabulous way to initiate kids into entrepreneurship and use their creativity and figure out the basics of running their own little stall, their own small business,” she said.
Both Glazier and Daoust say they intend to participate in hosting the children’s markets again next year, and already have some new little entrepreneurs interested in signing up.