The Power of Child Entrepreneurship

Leah Ellis believes the only thing standing in the way of kids achieving extraordinary success is limitations placed on them by adults. 

Ellis is the founder of the Society of Child Entrepreneurs, which provides hands-on learning, business experiences and community spaces for kids ages 6–17. Her work encouraging kids to start businesses builds confidence, independence and real-world skills.

An entrepreneur herself, Ellis is a published author and runs a wedding officiant business. Her never-take-no attitude results in innovation wherever she goes. 

In this episode of Let's Get Personal, Leah shares why kids are capable of more than we think and what results are possible when we let them lead.

Learn more about the Society of Child Entrepreneurs at https://societyofchildentrepreneurs.org/.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:03

Hi, I'm Livia, and I'm Christine. Through hardwork at Learning Lab, which is how we get a front road speed to innovation and personalized kindergarten through 12th grade learning. On this podcast, we share stories of how educators and parents are helping kids discover their passions. So you can do the same for a child you love.

SPEAKER_00 0:20

Time to dive in. Let's get it personal.

SPEAKER_01 0:26

Hi everyone, and welcome to Let's Get Personal Real Talk about Reimagining Education. Today in the Learning Lab studio, we are so thrilled to have Leah Ellis, who is the founder and executive director of the Society of Child Entrepreneurs, also affectionately called Sochi. So if we say that, that's what we're talking about. Um but we're so excited that you're here. I'm so excited to be here. Thank you.

unknown 0:50

Let's get closer.

SPEAKER_00 0:51

So what we're most excited about is that you're gonna be here a lot next year.

SPEAKER_02 0:56

I am. I'm so excited. I'm already decorating the classroom in my head. There you go. Yeah, that's right.

SPEAKER_01 1:01

That's right. Uh well, why don't you start by just sharing a little bit about you and about the Society of Child Entrepreneurs?

SPEAKER_02 1:09

So I am mother of four. I was the owner of a daycare. I ran my own small business. And then somehow my four-year-old decided she was gonna start a business, and I started teaching entrepreneurship to a four-year-old. And that branched into now the Society of Child Entrepreneurs, where we teach lots of kids between the ages of six and seventeen how to run their own businesses, which means they're learning financial literacy, leadership, entrepreneurship, and they're making money, so they actually care what I have to say.

SPEAKER_01 1:38

That's right. I think we've talked about this, but I used to teach youth entrepreneurs in Kansas City as a program. And so yes, there's something about being able to empower them to be like, yes, this is important, but also if you do it well, you get some money out of it. And that was always a good, always an easy hook for them to be like, okay, I'm in. I'm listening.

SPEAKER_02 1:58

Absolutely. Every time you're like, well, this could be your money. And they're like, what do I need to do? Yeah, yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_01 2:05

Exactly. I loved having them like have like a goal amount or like something what they wanted to buy, right? To be like, no, like you have an incentive here. Don't so, anyways.

SPEAKER_00 2:14

I I bet that works really well. Um, I'm just curious about the story behind like how in the world did you get to the place where you were founding this organization for kids?

SPEAKER_02 2:28

So, as I mentioned, my daughter started her first business at four um when we were in Southern California. And then when we moved back to Kansas, I was like, well, she needs to sell some of this inventory that she's made because I'm tired of moving it. And she had fun doing a children's business fair. It's a good way for us to meet our community. Let's just host a children's business fair. So we hosted a children's business fair, $15 for your booth. We had no sponsors because we were like this teeny tiny little thing, and nobody in town even knew me because we had only lived in town for like six months. Um, we did it in Co-Fellow Coffee Parlor. We had a ton of fun. But then when we were done, everybody went home. And I'm an educator. And I was like, wait a second. We had all of these kids in this room who wanted to learn something. And I sent them home without teaching them anything. I think I just like lost my teacher card. Like they're gonna go revoke everything they've ever told me I'm allowed to do now. What do you mean you didn't teach the eager to learn children? Uh so I convinced some friends of mine that they should help me start it as a nonprofit so that we could get sponsorships for our children's business fair, so that I could teach more kids, and we could really write a program to create peers for my daughter. Like I joked that I really just needed her to have friends to talk business about, so it wasn't always just me. How old was she again? She started her first business at four and a half. She was eight when we founded the Society of Child Entrepreneurs, and she's 10 now.

SPEAKER_01 3:46

Okay. All right. So this is what she knows. Like, this is like her child, like a core fundamental building block of her childhood is this business and entrepreneurship.

SPEAKER_02 3:56

Oh, yeah, she's so entrepreneurial. It's crazy. Every time I talk to her, she's like, So I have this business idea. We had to have rules in our house on how old you have to be before you're started allowed to start a business, how many businesses you're allowed to have at one time. And I'm like, I don't feel like a lot of other families are having discussions on no, you can't rebrand that business right now. You have to close one of them. You have too many.

SPEAKER_01 4:21

I love the passion of it though.

SPEAKER_00 4:23

Hold on. That mic is okay. Oh my god.

SPEAKER_01 4:30

Not that Mike, the little baby Mike, the temperamental.

SPEAKER_02 4:38

No, let's leave it at. Sometimes teaching is learning to adapt and overcome. That's right. It is a solid blue dot. I can see it.

SPEAKER_00 4:47

All right, okay. What do you think it is that is different about your kid or you that you instilled in her that she was wanting to start business as that young?

SPEAKER_02 5:01

So we started homeschooling when she was like four, and it was COVID, and we were at home. And I never shut her down as these are grown-up conversations and these are kids' conversations. So I was watching like business training videos on our living room TV, which meant she was watching them with me. And she never, it was never like, no, no, only grown-ups can do this. It was just like this is a thing that we can do. And so when she wanted to start her own business, I tell people all the time my initial reaction was no way. Uh but she was four and she asked me why. And I didn't have a good answer for why she couldn't, other than the fact that it made me uncomfortable. And so I had to, you know, be the grown-up and say, let's do something that makes me uncomfortable because it's better for her.

SPEAKER_01 5:41

Why did it make you uncomfortable?

SPEAKER_02 5:44

Because it hadn't been done before, because I didn't know if I was gonna be doing it wrong, and because like she was four.

unknown 5:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 5:49

Like four-year-olds don't usually start businesses. What if like, how do we even do this? And it was a lot of problem solving that we had to go through. So, I mean, obviously at first I was like, this is all gonna be a lot of work, this is gonna be uh just too much.

SPEAKER_01 6:01

But then I was like, Well, we're not doing anything else. It's COVID. I just think there's something magical about teaching kids entrepreneurship. I I was an entrepreneur at four. I sold cups of zinnias at the farmer's market with my family. We had vegetables, and but I remember my dad and my mom, both of them were like, no, Lydia, you have to plant the seeds, you have to water them, you have to cut them, you have to arrange them. I would like decorate the sidewalk with chalk around our booth, talk to people. I mean, I just think there's something really special about having that. Like, I can create something that other people want enough that they're gonna give me something I value, which is a four-year-old, like money isn't it. But I think there's like something about that emotional exchange, even like the pride it gives to be like, no, somebody wants something that I made. I had a hand in.

SPEAKER_02 6:53

Melody spoke at our first birthday party and she was like, when the first time a stranger bought my art, like not my grandma, but the first time a stranger bought my art, I thought my heart was gonna explode. Oh, because a stranger wanted something that I made. Yeah. Like they wanted it in their house. And that's exactly it. The other thing I think we don't give enough credit for is that kids are already entrepreneurial. 100%. Like, go talk to any seven-year-old about what they want. They're already entrepreneurial. And then we just decondition them of entrepreneurship because we're trying to teach them all the other skills that they need to go out and join join the workforce. So, my job really at the Society of Child Entrepreneurs is less teaching them how to be an entrepreneur and more teaching them how to manage entrepreneurship and protecting that belief so that they don't lose it while they're growing up. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:43

So talk a little bit about how your business operates. What does it look like? What do the kids engage in? What's the cadence? Those kinds of details.

SPEAKER_02 7:51

So we have two main programs. One of them is the one we do here, which is our Ignite Empower Lead program, which is a 36 or 18-week program where we start with like, what is an entrepreneur? And we finish with the kids are getting ready to sell. So actually, I'm signing the lease today. The kids are gonna have a space at Generations. So they're actually gonna be able to put their stuff in a permanent storefront. How far is that store? Generation. I'm I think it's Tyler and Kellogg. Okay. West, but not super far west. Okay behind Mr. Good Sense. Oh, I know where that is.

SPEAKER_00 8:24

That is Kellogg and Tyler.

SPEAKER_02 8:26

Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, we're gonna have an actual booth there for the kids, and all of the stuff in that booth will be made and sold by the kids.

SPEAKER_05 8:33

I love that.

SPEAKER_02 8:34

So the four kids that I was just teaching a little bit ago, like they're preparing for what's gonna go on their shelves in the next two to three weeks.

SPEAKER_01 8:41

Yeah, so let's pause there for a second. So Leah's classes are part of Learning Labs Fun Friday series of programming. So on Fridays, right, the families get to choose. This is the second quarter. When did you start when did you start with these kids?

SPEAKER_02 8:55

So this it's an 18-week program, but since we broke it into two quarters, there's five kids. Two of them have been here since January, and the other three started in March. Uh-huh. But all five of them will be able to be at the booth at generations. Cool. And so it's really also really fun to see like the ones who have been here for the whole year versus the ones who have only done half. Yeah. How much different their plans around their business are because they have a little bit more stability from the beginning. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. Um, so those kids will have that booth. And so that's one of the ways that people can get involved is coming and joining us at the learning lab for those classes. And then our actual membership program that I run independently from the learning lab is an annual membership. We do a once-a-month meeting where we talk, we call it a member mastermind, and we do a Sochi Circle, which is like a Socratic circle where I teach for about 15 minutes on some business philosophy or behavior. And then the kids get an hour and a half of open discussion where we really dig in deep into how does it apply to their businesses? What are they doing with it? And then four to six times a year, we do children's business fairs. When we do a children's business fair, it's literally the kid is setting up their table, their tablecloth, their payment methods, all of their materials, doing all of their own merchandising. And then they're selling to the customers. And I'm really mean because I don't allow the parents in the booth if the kid is over the age of seven. Oh, nice. So I have a parent corner and I'm like, parents have to go in the parent corner. And so the kids are talking to their own customers, they're counting the back of the own change. The only way they're allowed to call the parents into the booth is if they have a technical problem, like Square logs out or the credit card reader won't work. And the parents are allowed to fix the tech issue, but they're not allowed to talk to the customers.

SPEAKER_01 10:37

How does that go? Tell me, like I feel like we'd have some feelings about that.

SPEAKER_02 10:42

Yes, there are definitely some feelings about that. Um, so a lot of times I'll have a parent who it's their first event and they're like, well, but she, and I'm like, I know you'll be close, you'll be able to see her. If something's really wrong and you need to get to your kid, you're gonna be able to get to your kid. But we all know that their confidence comes from doing it themselves.

SPEAKER_04 11:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:01

And your kiddo is not gonna be able to run her booth when she's waiting for you to talk for her. So you have to let her have this space. And so the parents, like the first time they sit in the parent corner and they face their chair towards their kid's booth and they just watch. And it's like I'm sometimes concerned if they're even blinking because they're just watching their take their heart rate. Yeah, just to just to watch.

SPEAKER_01 11:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:24

But then by the second, third, fourth one, we have one mom who she brings her own lawn chair and a book and earplugs, and she sits in the very delightful time. Yep. She sits in the very back of the parent corner, she plops down her lawn chair, she grabs her book, and she does not even look up at her kids. She's like, if they need me, they'll come get me. Yeah. And she knows they're completely fine and safe. And I mean, we have volunteers, we have judges, we have adults in the space making sure the kids are safe. So the parents know that they're good. And it's really cool to watch the confidence grow in the kids when they realize, like, I can do this by myself. That's right.

SPEAKER_00 12:00

So what are the judges for?

SPEAKER_02 12:02

So we give out three awards per each age group at our children's business fairs. So our judges go around and they interview all the kids and they fill out rubrics and they decide based in each group on most business potential, which is which one of these businesses are they running now that they could still be running when they're in college? Like which of these businesses has staying power? So what's the most business potential? And then we do most creative business. Like, what is this that we've we never would have thought about this? This is just absolutely something that is one of a kind. And then we do best presentation. And so breast presentation is a combination of both the best merchandising and the best ability to talk about their business.

SPEAKER_01 12:44

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 12:44

So those are the kids who like really have to be able to answer the questions, give a good pitch, have a nice layout. Um, and each of those comes with a cash award.

SPEAKER_01 12:53

Are the children's business fairs, are they open to anybody to like could any family sign up their kids? Right.

SPEAKER_02 13:01

So our children's business fairs are open to the public. Um, anybody who wants to sign up their kids signs up their kids on our website. It's a $15 booth fee. They pay their booth fee. They come in, um, I review all the applications. If there's something I'm concerned about, they get an email before I approve or decline it, letting them know, like, hey, this is what I need to know is cleared up before you can come in. Um, and then they set up their events. Uh, we're actually gonna be at Riverfest in a couple weeks. That's exciting.

SPEAKER_00 13:24

Is that your biggest event that you've been at?

SPEAKER_02 13:26

It is the biggest event I've ever done ever. How many will you have? So right now we're at 37 kids. Wow, that's a lot. Where on the Riverfest footprint will you be? So we're gonna be at the corner of Douglas in Maine.

SPEAKER_01 13:42

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 13:42

Go so we'll be right outside uh on family day, which means kids can come with no button. Oh you can come shop without having to have buttons for everybody. Um, and we're gonna be right outside the official fencing, which means people will be able to shop here without having a button, and then they just need a button to go past us. That's nice. I like that. That's nice. Everybody will be able to shop the children's business fair. Um, it's gonna be fabulous. My minimum goal was 30 kids. So we've officially met our minimum. I would like to get to 45. I feel like that's possible. But if we spread out a lot, I can make space for a hundred kids.

SPEAKER_01 14:20

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_00 14:21

Like we could get really a kid that has a product apply. Yep. Okay, so like if somebody's listening.

SPEAKER_01 14:28

Yeah. Okay.

unknown 14:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 14:29

When is your deadline? The event is on the 31st, so our deadline will be the 22nd May of May. Yep. And the link is on our Facebook page, which is Society of Child Entrepreneurs, and they can apply. And then all of the kids who are members of the Society of Child Entrepreneurs or kids who have gone through the Ignite Empower lead curriculum here at Learning Lab will have a little badge on their tent that says like this is a Sochi collective member. And then the kids who are just outside vendors who are applying won't have those badges. I'm excited to see where the Sochi kiddos rank on some of our judgments. That's okay. Good experiment for you. Yes. I'm so excited about the data.

SPEAKER_00 15:15

I'm curious. Let's rewind a little bit. So when you first had that business fair and you didn't know anyone in Wichita, like, where did you get these kids? Like, how did you get kids to show up and sell things?

SPEAKER_02 15:27

Uh we had 10 kids at that one. It was still impressive. Yeah, that's we had we had 10 kids and I literally put flyers. So we were in Goddard and we were doing it at CoFelo on Main Street in Goddard. So I put flyers on in the library at the um hair salon inside CoFellow. I talked to the lady who at the time I didn't even know Becky Cole, but I knew that there was a snow cone place. So I talked to the snow cone lady and had her put up a sign. And then I just put it in all the Facebook groups for Goddard. And I was like, I just need 10 kids. We just need 10 kids to make this happen. And so it was small. Um, some of them, and I bribed a friend of mine to put her kids in it to get us to the tent. I was like, can you please just put her in? Please, please, please. Yeah. Um, but we made it. It was super fun. We ended up having so much community support. If the fire marshal had shown up, we would have paid a lot of fines. That's really cool.

SPEAKER_00 16:20

That is so fun. Yeah. And so interesting that it's like almost like the fact that you did that one then kind of spurred this whole thing. It's almost like a movement.

SPEAKER_02 16:32

That's what our flyers say. Join the movement. We love movements. We do. I'm all about a good movement.

SPEAKER_00 16:38

Yes, we are. Um you're part of it. You're part of the education revolution. That's right.

SPEAKER_02 16:44

I'm gonna be an Ed Collab. I really am a part of an Ed Collab. We're so excited about that. And I'm going to South by Southwest Ed year. Are we good next year? Yeah, that'll be fun. Good. That's exciting. Excited for you. It's really tricky. Yes. So we'll see.

SPEAKER_00 16:57

But I will be there. That's exciting. We should talk about that later. Yeah. Um, I want to rewind. So, did you say you were a teacher? Sort of. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 17:10

So I always wanted to grow up and be a teacher. But when I was in high school, I applied to two different, three different teaching colleges. I got accepted to all of them. Where are you from? Are you from here? Sort of. Yes, I haven't really not good at direct answers today. I was born in Wichita, but my stepdad joined the army. I spent a few years in Germany. I graduated in Junction City, but don't tell anybody.

SPEAKER_01 17:35

This is a public podcast.

SPEAKER_02 17:38

So I graduated in Junction City. Um, and then I so I was gonna go to K-State or an Emporia State, which are fabulous teaching colleges. And now Wichita State is also an amazing teaching college. Um, I did not have a very great stepdad, and so things at home didn't go the way I had wanted them to, and I ended up not going to college. Um, that's interesting. Because uh it was just a choice I had to make and I wasn't comfortable with what I was put in the position of, so I didn't go to college. Uh, but I studied to get my CEA. Um, I do professional development for teachers for fun, and my senior year, I was a teacher's assistant. Oh, okay. I'm a substitute teacher now. I've done Girl Scouts and I owned a daycare and I wrote curriculum. I taught on out school. So I teach in all the places that teachers teach. I just go to college via teacher. That's right.

SPEAKER_00 18:28

We also, I don't know if you're familiar with our philosophy at learning that, but we we kind of believe in all different kinds of uh education. You know, we're not only supportive of people who go through the team, et cetera.

SPEAKER_01 18:42

So you're very welcome here.

SPEAKER_02 18:44

So I'm I'm very much a teacher. I'm very much in classrooms and I'm very much leading children. Just don't have a degree that says I'm a teacher.

SPEAKER_01 18:50

That's okay. I think that's all right. I mean, so I didn't either, and I was a teacher.

SPEAKER_00 18:54

That's true. Yeah, I tacked mine on at the end. So it's it's all fine. You're in good company, all that to say, Leah. Yeah. Um, so and you moved here. What what were you doing before you ran a nonprofit?

SPEAKER_02 19:10

So when we were in Southern California, my husband had a really good job. He deployed very frequently. So I stayed home with our kids and I ran a financial coaching company. So I taught originally it was supposed to be just teaching people how to do budgets and get out of debt. And then I discovered that that wasn't really helping. We really needed to be talking about their mindsets and behaviors behind money. And then I started learning about subconscious beliefs around money. And so then I wrote a curriculum. The first curriculum I ever wrote was 13 to 17 year olds on money management. And I taught like how to open a bank account, how to write a check, how to save for college, what the NCUA and the FDIC are, everything. Um, and so that was my first like when I was combining my professional life and my teaching life into one place instead of being two separate places.

SPEAKER_04 19:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:58

Um, and it was a ton of fun, but that was pre-COVID. And then once COVID hit, the online teaching market just became so flooded that I I wasn't willing to fight the noise. Sure. So I shut down. I was like, I just don't want to, yeah, I don't want to have to fight everybody who's new, new, new all the time. Yeah. So I shut that down and I just stayed home with my kids. And I got a job working at Profit First Professionals Home Base. So Profit First Professionals is a service that teaches accountants and bookkeepers and business coaches how to apply Profit First to their clients' businesses. And Profit First is kind of an upside-down financial program for business owners so that they are actually paying themselves and they have financially healthy companies instead of just really lovely businesses that they love and aren't making any money at. And I learned a ton from the people who run that organization. Mike McAllowitz, who wrote the book Profit First, is the most prolific business author of our time and has like nine different business books. I learned a ton working with him. I have pictures of him holding my son. Um, and so then now I at that point I have my financial literacy experience, I have my business experience, and I have my teaching experience. So I'm just at home with the kids. And when we decided we were ready to come back to Kansas, I was pregnant with our fourth kid. And I was like, I just need to be in the same time zone as my mom. It's time. I didn't even know you had four kids. I do, I do. I have four kids. Um so we were coming back, and so I stayed home for a little while that first year we were back home. But we moved here in May of 2023, and April of 2024 is when we hosted the very first children's business fair ever. And July of 2024 is when we got our 501c3 and we were like officially a thing. Yeah. So we're almost to our second birthday. We love second birthday.

SPEAKER_00 21:46

So you had to do all of the things you have to do when you start a nonprofit. You had to build a board and do all that paperwork. Becoming a 501c3 is not super simple. No.

SPEAKER_02 21:59

It was not. So I was really fortunate. Um, I found a really good um attorney who specializes only in starting 501c3s because her whole job is just forming nonprofits and providing materials to help you start your nonprofit. So we paid, I made my husband take a lot of money take a lot of money from the proceeds of our house in Southern California, and we used that to start it. Um but we paid her to do it, which made things a lot easier. Sure. Um our original board uh was very tiny. It was the president of the Chamber of Commerce in Goddard, uh, one of my friends, and then another one of my friends' neighbor. I was literally like, I just need three humans with heartbeats. Please, please, please be on my board.

SPEAKER_01 22:42

Please say yes.

SPEAKER_02 22:43

Yeah. Um, and now we have a much more substantial board. We have nine members on our board of directors. Okay. Um they're super, they're all pretty active. Um, they're all really engaged in what we're doing, and they're all amazing advocates for the program.

SPEAKER_01 22:56

And I love it. That's awesome. I love that. Um okay, but we haven't talked about another part of the many things that you do, which is the fact that you wrote a book and you're an author. Talk about that.

SPEAKER_02 23:08

Right. So I always have been a writer my whole life. I published my first book when I was 14. Okay. Um, exactly one copy of it exists in print. I gave it to my high school English teacher. And if we're lucky, she burned it when she retired. It wasn't great. It was formatted terribly, but it was my first experience like seeing my own work bound in the pride of being like, this is mine. Yeah. Um, and then two years ago, I wrote another anthology of poetry and I published that. I actually won the 21st Century Emily Dickinson Award. You did? Um, I wrote, yeah, I wrote 21 poems in 20 in 21 days and published them, and they were bound and published in like two months. Wow, that's cool. Yeah, and then when we started the Society of Child Entrepreneurs, our mascots at the time and our logo are Artemis and Hermes. But I wanted a way for it to feel more connected to kids because you and I all know children get really tired of listening to grown-ups tell them what to do all the time. So I wanted something that they wanted to listen to. So I decided to create mascots. So I created our mascots. I hired an artist to create them, just literally the illustration of what they looked like. And then I was looking at the illustrations and I was like, they need more. Like, this is not enough just to have the mascots. They need to go do something. So we wrote the first Astra and Zeke book, Sparks to Stars, The Story of Astra and Zeke, which is the book that's out now and published. Um, and of there are 20 books written, but they're not published yet. They have to get illustrated.

SPEAKER_00 24:52

How'd you get 20 ahead, girl?

SPEAKER_02 24:57

I told you I'm really ADHD, which means I hyperfocus. And so when I hyperfocus, I'm like, oh, they're gonna do this and they're gonna do this and they're gonna do this, and this is how that's what's gonna work. And so then I just get them out. That's amazing. Um, so the books are all written, and it the other part of it is they go with the ignite and power lead curriculum. So when the full curriculum is completely done, every week we'll have an Astra and Zeke story, and then the lesson, and then a hands-on activity. So the kids will be really practicing it. Uh and then I also every Monday release a miniature Astra and Zeke story on the Sochi Circle website where it's like a tiny lesson that they've learned and then how you can do it at home so that your kids can learn those tiny lessons too. Uh, so now we have Astra and Zeke as actual parts of our philosophy and our programming. And I love them. But it was really exciting to have like an actual book launch and not kind of like in just an oh, I I published this book and I didn't tell anybody about it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:53

No, that's very cool. It's very, very cool. You're a busy gal. Yeah. Yes. You sleep.

SPEAKER_02 25:59

Yes, I do sleep. I have a two-year-old, so I don't sleep as great as I would like to. But I do sleep.

SPEAKER_01 26:05

Listen, I get that.

SPEAKER_00 26:07

Oh, that's so interesting. I feel like being an author is entrepreneurial. Do you so you have the nonprofit? Do you do your own businesses? Is that like a part of your deal, or is it just encouraging kids to do that?

SPEAKER_02 26:21

I own a wedding company. Oh. So like you're a wedding planner, or what? I am a wedding efficient. So I'm the one who reads the script and then tells you to kiss. Yeah. Um, but I was getting too busy. So I actually also have five staff underneath me who do weddings, and I'm interviewing two more within the next month.

SPEAKER_00 26:44

Well, do people just Google like wedding efficient and then they find you? Is that how that works?

SPEAKER_02 26:50

It's one way that it works. Um, people can just Google wedding efficient. A lot of times people get on Facebook and they'll say, like, we need a wedding officiant. Who do you know? And people will tag my company because I've done a lot of weddings. Uh, so we have our Facebook page, we get a lot of leads from we're also on the not in wedding wire. So we have that social proof that like you can go find us and see that we've really been doing it. But the biggest thing is here in Wichita, we have the Wichita Bridal Expo. It just changed the name of it. And I'm the only officiant who goes.

SPEAKER_01 27:17

Oh, so yes. I mean, it makes kind of sense. Like when you look at those as um as a target market, like, what's the background? Are they living in an area? Like there's the couple like not from here, they don't have family or friends nearby. Is it like faith bait? Like they're not part of a religion, like what is it?

SPEAKER_02 27:37

So a lot of times, like a priest can only do a church inside a Catholic church. Uh-huh. Right. Or a wedding inside a Catholic church. So if you want to get married anywhere outside of that, the priest can't go. Your pastor may or may not. Venues don't provide an efficient. Yeah. So you have to find your own. Uh so that's what my company does. And we are just there.

SPEAKER_00 27:59

How did you get into that? You're like the most interesting person.

SPEAKER_02 28:05

It was a prank. It was a prank. It was a prank. Yes. So I found out that you can buy a Jedi knightship. And you can go get a certificate that says you're a member of the Jedi Knighthood. So I was doing that for my husband. Um, so I was buying him a Jedi knightship. And while I was on the website, I was like, Do you want to get ordained? And I at the time owned a travel agency. And I was like, well, I guess I could do like, I'll officiate your wedding if you let me plan your honeymoon. Oh, and then like I could use it as a lead generator. So I decided I'll just become an officiant so I can use it as a lead generator for my travel agency while I'm buying a Jedi nighthood for my husband. That is fun. So it was not completely intentional. That is so funny. And then when I started trying to book officiating so that I could use it as a lead generator for travel agency, I ended up getting so busy that I shut down the travel agency because I didn't have time because we were doing so many weddings. So in 2025, we did 25 weddings. Uh in 2024 is when I founded it. And we did eight weddings just between July and November. And then this year, I have at least 20 already on the books. And the big bridal show is gonna come up in July. So we'll probably book another 15 to 20. Um do you enjoy it? It's so funny. It's yes, it's so much fun because it's literally the happiest moment in people's lives. Like I'm literally the person who tells them to kiss when they become husband and wife. Yeah. Uh-huh. Like it's so sweet. Uh, and then it's three hours of work. Yeah. And then I'm done. And then you're done.

SPEAKER_00 29:42

Yeah, you don't have to like take it home with you. You're absolutely finished with your whole thing.

SPEAKER_02 29:47

Yeah. Yeah. And we uh write a custom script for every couple that we do a wedding for. That's nice. So every couple helps me write the script that's their love story and what they want it to do. Uh, we do same-sex marriages, we do non-denominational weddings, we do hand fastings. So people who don't have a lot of other options, yeah, we cover them. Yeah. And then I always tell people, it's really cool if your uncle wants to do your wedding. Like that's cute. Yeah. But our goal at a wedding is to have a really personalized ceremony, not an overly personal ceremony. And you don't want your uncle telling that story about when you ran through his living room naked when you're standing at the altar. Sure. That's true. So it's a good way to make sure that it is personalized without being embarrassing. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:30

That's true. That's a really good, really good point.

SPEAKER_02 30:32

Yeah. So yeah, that's my I run the wedding company, I run the Society of Child Entrepreneurs, and then I help my kids manage all their businesses.

SPEAKER_01 30:40

Talk about your kids' businesses. What are they, what are they busy doing?

SPEAKER_02 30:43

So my oldest has her original business was called Melody Paints, and she sold Jackson Pollock style drip art. Uh, she rebranded that company last fall to Melody Creates. Now she also does graphic designs and purse bags or purse charms and things like that. My second daughter started out painting rocks and selling them as paperweights with picture frames attached to them. Oh, cute. And her business was called Serenity Rocks. Last spring, two springs ago, they had COVID and they were both home at the same time. So they created a lemonade company together called Lemon Time Lemonade, and they sell the most beautiful lemonade you will ever see in your life with like edible glitter and flavorings in there. Yeah, gorgeous and delicious. And then Serenity wanted to do something new, so she started doing face painting. So now Serenity does one dollar face paint. She literally likes takes the little stencil, dabs the color on, and sends you on your way. But it's a dollar to get your face painted by a seven-year-old.

SPEAKER_01 31:47

Yeah, people love that. Yeah. Right. That's easy.

SPEAKER_02 31:49

Um, and then Melody launched um the Mott Foundation and the Young Entrepreneurs Institute were doing a million-dollar pitch contest. Oh, yes. It was I remember that. It was a really big deal. But one of the rules was that it needed to be some type of sustainable business. And she was like, none of my businesses are sustainable. So she created a birthday party rental supply company for your pets. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. And so that's her newest business. How's that going? She had her first client this week. Oh. It was me. Oh. It's okay. But she knew we needed promo pictures. Oh. Okay. And it was our cat's birthday. So I was like, you know what? Let's buy it. Like I will pay for the rental. Let's do it for our cat and get the promo pictures. So now she has some actual promo pictures with animals instead of just like stuffed animals like she had before. But people have started to like talk about it and ask about it. So I think next year, like within the next six months, it'll take off. The other thing is it's not really something that does well at a children's business fair. Yeah. Because you can't walk away with it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 32:52

Yeah, that's true.

SPEAKER_02 32:53

So she it's also an interesting thing for her now to learn the differences between a service business and a product business. Because the marketing is different, the behavior is different, and the clients come slower.

SPEAKER_00 33:08

Do you have a bunch of kids doing service businesses or do most kids just want to sell something?

SPEAKER_02 33:13

Most kids just sell something. Um I have one kid who's toying with the idea of coming and that does lawn mowing. Uh he hasn't committed yet. Um and then Melody's business is the first service that we've had at a children's business fair.

SPEAKER_01 33:30

That's fun.

SPEAKER_02 33:30

Yeah. So I'm I'm interested to see how it expands.

SPEAKER_01 33:34

I think it's very fun. I just okay. So so it's just Melody and Serenity that have the businesses. Your other two are are little.

SPEAKER_02 33:42

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 33:42

Little, but someday I'm sure they're percolating on it.

SPEAKER_02 33:44

Right. So that's I told the kids when they were young that they weren't allowed to start a business until they were four, because that's how old Melody was when she started hers. Uh so Melody was four and a half when she started her business. Serenity was three months or three years and 11 months when she started hers. So close. She, yeah, I get I let her have a free pass. Nicholas is four and a half, but he's just like he's excited about Sochi. He's not excited about having his own business. That's okay. He loves talking about the Society of Child Entrepreneurs, but he's not ready to like sell something on his own. Sure. And since we don't teach programming until he's six, he wouldn't be allowed to come to our Sochi meetings yet.

SPEAKER_04 34:20

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_02 34:21

So I'm like, you're not, I'm not in a hurry. And then the baby's only two. Yeah. So she has some time. She does tell me all about the things she's gonna sell. Oh, it's kind of funny. Sometimes she tries to sell me my stuff, and I'm like, it's already mine.

SPEAKER_01 34:38

Yeah. So when you like look at all these kids that you've engaged. So yeah, what are your what's the number of kids that you've worked with? So I've tried.

SPEAKER_02 34:47

I'm sure it's tricky. Yeah, I was trying to count it, and I think that we're at like 80-ish kids who have interacted with the Society of Child Entrepreneurs in some way, whether that's a workshop or a summer camp or a class here at Learning Lab, uh, children's business fair, it's somewhere between 80 and 100. Actual members that come every month to our member nights is about 10. Okay. Yeah. Um, and we have 14 members, but there are four of them that part of the benefits of our membership is that you get your children's business fair booth for free. Oh, sure. So I think they joined because they wanted the free booth. Yeah. Yeah. Um and some of the opportunities where our members are allowed to sell that the public isn't allowed to sell.

SPEAKER_00 35:29

Yeah. Okay. Got it. So you have monthly meetings for your members. We do. Do you I'm sure you tell your learning lab kids about that?

SPEAKER_02 35:37

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 35:38

Yeah, they all know that they're invited. That's fine.

SPEAKER_01 35:41

Yep. All of them are invited. That's okay.

unknown 35:44

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 35:44

Um, so when you think about all these kids, your own kids or other people's kids, or you know, you've worked with a lot of kids now. What do you think? Um what are like the those important nuggets that they're taking away from entrepreneurship and all these experiences. I know we've talked about them a little bit, but when you just think about that specifically, what comes to mind?

SPEAKER_02 36:03

So every time I finish a class, I ask the kids to give me feedback because so many of our programs are pilot programs or like second run programs. And I'm like, so tell me everything you thought about it so that I can redevelop these to be better. And one of my favorite quotes that I ever got was, You made me think I can be creative. Like this was a 16-year-old who had already decided they weren't creative. And they were like, You made me believe I'm sure that's common. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And sadly, you you made me believe that I can be creative. And so being able to build their confidence and their creativity and help them understand like how to reiterate, how to maybe pivot a little bit, um, testing boundaries and understanding that entrepreneurship is a safe place to experiment. Yeah. You really can't entrepreneurship wrong. Right. Like you just test. Yeah. Um, and then today I had a kiddo who was like, Um, you really expanded my mind about creativity and what I'm good at. And one of the students that's in my class here at the learning lab in our very first week in January told me that child entrepreneurship was dumb because she was a kid and she couldn't do anything. She was like, I can't run a business, I'm a kid. Wow. Yeah. Uh she was very much like did not want to be in my class the first, the first day. The first day she was like, No, this is ridiculous. Well, by the end of that day, we had talked about what do you, what do you want to be when you're an adult? How does that apply to things that you could do when you're a child? And from January to now, she's on her third business idea.

SPEAKER_04 37:34

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_02 37:35

Yeah.

unknown 37:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 37:36

Yeah. That's right.

SPEAKER_01 37:37

She's adorable. We recently had a conversation with Jason Bosch from Kansas Leadership Center. I feel like with Shane Carter, we had this from the African American Museum. We had the same, the same theme of like kids are leaders at their entire life. Like, we don't need to wait until you're an adult to do things. Like you have so much power as a kid that you can use. Right.

SPEAKER_02 38:00

So actually, uh, my full curriculum, the big fat one that I'm working on that we're testing here at the Learning Lab is KLC aligned. Oh, nice. I can't officially say it's KLC programming because they haven't done it, but I've gone through KLC and I used adaptive leadership language and things like that in the programming. So the kids kind of know those words and know like how to be a leader in their community. We talked about social entrepreneurship and how, like, if you have a business and you see a problem, you can use your business to solve the problem in your community and make it a better place. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. Um, but we I'm also part of the National Youth Leadership Society uh Center. And they are doing a really big um youth as solutions program on September 11th of next year. And so I had a cohort put in an application for that yesterday. Cool. Very, very cool. We can be a part of that. But no, I firmly believe that the only thing stopping children from being leaders is adults. So if we just be quiet and back up, that's a great.

SPEAKER_01 39:00

No, it's very true. It's very true. Well, and I think there's some like I love that you have the parents' corner at the booth. Like there's so many moments where, yeah, if the grown-ups would just give them space and you don't have to, it's the control factor, right? And I think that's really hard. In fear. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 39:15

Like as parents, we're so afraid to see our kids fail and have and be sad. Like, sad is the worst thing that could ever happen to our kids. And I'm like, but actually, like, is sad the worst thing that ever happened to your kid? Because like they can recover from that. They can try again, and when they bounce back from sad, they're more happy and more confident. Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_00 39:39

That really learned, they realize that they can overcome hard things.

unknown 39:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 39:45

Yeah, that's interesting. I would say that might be where we're most aligned of like giving agency to kids. Um learning lab. But I mean, much more so than a traditional school type environment, kids walking around making decisions, doing things on their own.

SPEAKER_01 40:02

Yeah. And sometimes those are bad decisions, but you know, but that's how we learn from them and then we do better next time. Right. Yeah. I think about yeah, I wrote it down. I was like, it's that, it's that failure, that failure loop, safe, you know, a testing zone, productive struggle, like all those things are inherent in entrepreneurship.

SPEAKER_03 40:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 40:22

Um, so I love that you give them that as a space. I always like to ask people, so you, Leah, with the work that you do, what are your non-negotiables?

SPEAKER_02 40:33

Uh, did we listen to the kids? Uh I don't know if you guys have seen it, but we actually have a junior board of directors at the Society of Child School. Oh fun. So I have my regular board of directors that's nine adults plus me who run our organization, and they meet once a month. But before that board meets every month, our junior board of directors meets, and that's five of our members, our junior executive director and four other um officers, and they meet and they tell us what are the non-negotiables that the members want in the program, what are the ideas of things that they would like to see us expand on or not do anymore. And what are their ideas for fundraising, for community involvement, for outreach. And then they tell me those things and I take them to the grown-up board and we implement them. So I really feel like having that nothing about us without us and letting the children be in charge of the society of child entrepreneurs and giving them the space to do it. And not just saying, like, our idea is that you guys can be leaders someday. It's like our philosophy is you're leaders right now. That's right. So go do it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 41:36

I love it. I love that. That was you answered that question so fast. Normally people need more time. So I love that.

SPEAKER_00 41:43

You had an immediate answer.

SPEAKER_01 41:45

Um, maybe like the last question I have, and then yeah, anything else you would want to share. But like, so you're one of our residents for next year. We're very excited that you're gonna be here. I am too. Um, so when you think about being a resident at Learning Lab, what are you, what are you excited about? What are you, what are you looking forward to?

SPEAKER_02 42:02

Um, I am super excited about the opportunities that our child entrepreneurs are gonna have in this building and with the resources that are available here that aren't available anywhere else in Wichita. The space and autonomy that they're gonna have when they're here to practice and experiment on things. Um that would be fun for us. I'm very excited for them to realize that they can use that video lab to make commercials. Yeah, yeah, too. Like so cool. Like, I cannot wait for one of my students to be like, can I make a little commercial? Because I have a platform that I can use that I can put commercials on streaming um websites for like $45. Yeah. Like if you film a commercial, I'll go get it put on Disney Plus. That's right.

SPEAKER_01 42:40

Like yeah, yeah. They can they can use a digital studio to make graphic designs with our Adobe software. They've got the print lab where they can design and produce things. Yeah, no, it's gonna be fun. I'm so excited about the resources the kids have are gonna have here.

SPEAKER_02 42:54

And then I'm really excited to be able to connect with other educators because so much of my program is I'll teach all the kids. I teach homeschool kids, I teach public school kids, I teach private school kids. Like, give me a group of kids and I will teach them. So now there's a whole bunch of groups of kids that I can teach here. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, it's gonna be so fun.

SPEAKER_01 43:12

I'm so excited. Kristen, what other questions do you have for today?

SPEAKER_00 43:16

Leah, is there anything else that you want folks to know about the Society of Child Entrepreneurship?

SPEAKER_02 43:21

Uh just to come get involved. I mean, like, there are so many ways for kids to test the waters in entrepreneurship, but it all starts with bringing them to one of our workshops or letting them try a children's business fair. Even if they pay $15 for their booth and they don't sell anything, that will be the best spent $15 you make for the their exposure to entrepreneurship.

SPEAKER_01 43:40

Yeah. Yeah. I I agree with that. Yes. So just to refresh everybody, May the event is May 31st at Riverfest. If you're not familiar with Riverfest, if you're listening, it's like our down, it's like our Wichita festival. Um, I don't know how much scale events large scale event. It's a the concert.

SPEAKER_02 44:00

Outdoor event in Kansas.

SPEAKER_01 44:01

Yeah. Concerts, it's food.

SPEAKER_02 44:03

It is, it always feels yeah that's it's 10 days of just absolute everything downtown.

SPEAKER_01 44:09

Yeah. Yep. So it's a big, it's a big deal. So that the the market, the business fair is going to be on May 31st. Any kid can sign up. They have until May 22nd. They can go on your Facebook page to learn more. Um so we would love to see more faces there.

SPEAKER_00 44:26

Also, you need shoppers. So if you don't have a kid wanting to start a business, come come to the event and support. And I'm excited. We'll do a staff field trip down there. Yeah, heck yeah, we will.

SPEAKER_02 44:38

Absolutely come shopping. And I promise you, you will be blown away by something a child made. And you'll say, You made this, and they'll be like, Yeah, on Tuesday when I was bored.

SPEAKER_00 44:48

Kids, it's true. We don't give kids enough credit for their perspective or their talents. So it's right. It's a great way to do it. We are excited to go to that, and we're excited to have you here next year. We can't wait to see all the things that kids create next year. It's gonna be so much fun. So much fun. All right.

SPEAKER_02 45:06

Well, thanks for being on today, Leah. Thank you so much for having me.