The rise of the gig economy has made it easier than ever to have a side hustle, even if the focus has changed. In years gone by you might have turned your expertise as a seamstress into making bespoke curtains, or leveraged your passion for baking into making custom birthday cakes. These days it's more likely you'll ply the internet, offering your design skills to redo a website or start a Substack rounding up the local music scene. Either way, the hope is that when you get done with your 9 to 5 that your 5 to 9 will offer some extra bucks, validation for what was formerly a hobby, and a deeper dive into something you enjoy doing.
Then there's the situation that kids face, where their 9 to 5 (actually probably more 8 to 330, depending on when the bus gets home) is not a revenue producing venture. None the less, their main occupation is and should be an education. But since the income potential from that vocation only occurs after the fact, they are faced with sourcing walking-around money.
An allowance from mom and/or dad certainly is a start, but others turn to outside pursuits as well. Again, that has changed as decades have accumulated. In the past it might have meant cutting lawns or delivering newspapers, while these days it's just as likely to be, well, plying the internet via YouTube videos or Instagram posts. As digital natives, that means you might wind up competing with them on their home turf. The big difference is the audience: while your natural cohort might be Boomers, Gen X, Y or Z'ers, theirs is their contemporaries, the so-called Alphas born after 2013. You may not understand it or get it, but 12-year old kidfluencers are making change, sometimes more than just pocket.
There is one exception where there is a crossover, where kids market to adults. You see it especially on fall weekends, when folks are out and about in their neighborhoods enjoying the good weather. You can get mighty thirsty from all that leaf watching and bike riding and strolling with friends. And while the first entrepreneurial effort to meet that need dates from shop owners in the 1870's in New York City, it has evolved to become an early entry into the world of capitalism for many a kid in the form of a lemonade stand.
The setup varies though the elements are the same: an old folding table, a pitcher of drink, a stack of disposable cups, a box for cash, and a handmade sign. Appearing randomly on street corners and front lawns, they are usually staffed by a handful of kids, whether siblings or neighbors. Often a parent is hovering nearby to keep an eye on things, biting their knuckles as they try and keep hands off to let the budding entrepreneurs figure it out.
The kids' strong suit is marketing as opposed to execution. Enthusiastically yelling out to anyone going by, they offer a drink at a throw-away price point. Stop to sample their wares, however, and they get all flustered as to how much to put in the cup, what to do with the money and making change. As a side note, the product itself is usually from a store-bought mix, barely drinkable, but that's beside the point. These are not establishments looking to franchise on the basis of positive Yelp reviews. Still, some do sport the trapping of that forementioned gig economy: in a bow to the fact that very few people actually have cash anymore, the most enterprising examples accept Venmo, Zelle or PayPal, complete with QR codes for effortless payment.
Always ready to encourage budding masters of the universe, I stop and praise their efforts, but tell them I'm not allowed to drink the stuff. I offer them a dollar for a cup, but with the caveat that one of them has to consume it for me. Most look at me quizzically, but nod, assent to the deal, pour a serving and quaff it down. And then there are some that agree, pocket the money, then wait till I walk away and keep the inventory in the pitcher, future Sam Bankman-Frieds in the making.
Tomorrow that street corner will be back to normal, as the average life expectancy of these stands is in direct correlation to the attention span of a tween. And while it may be a Norman Rockwell snapshot from a bygone time, it's still a delight to see kids out and engaging with the world as opposed to staring at a screen. So make sure you have a few singles in your pocket when you venture out: Amazon had to start somewhere.
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Marc Wollin of Bedford prefers iced tea over lemonade. His column appears weekly via email and online on Substack and Blogspot as well as Facebook, LinkedIn and X.
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