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Bob Moon: We’ve been asking you, our listeners, for your stories about childhood and money. What your parents taught you or didn’t. What you’re teaching your kids or not.
This week Jason Priest and his 13-year-old daughter, Kennedy, talk about how they set up a mini-business for Kennedy and her brother at their dad’s new venture.
Jason Priest: I have a music studio. We teach lessons for guitar, bass, drums, voice, piano.
Jason, teaching a student: There you go. Perfect. Picked up tone. Back to G.
Since I’ve started my business, I’ve thought of ways to try to get them engaged in the business. And so I pitched the idea, I bought a gumball machine that can make some money and right off the bat both of them were very excited.
Kennedy Priest: I thought it was going to be really fun. That it was going to be challenge that I could overcome and be able to succeed at.
[Sound of gumball machine cranking and releasing a gumball.]
Jason: The whole concept of credit was that I would purchase the gumball machine for them and then they would pay me back through installments. But what we found with gumball machines, especially with young kids in the studio, they will try to wrestle a gumball out without putting a quarter in. So the first gumball machine actually wore out. So then I had to buy a second gumball machine for them. So I consider the first one paid off and now we’re working on the second one.
Kennedy: Well, it started when he was a smaller business, and it made maybe $3 a week. But when he got to a larger status, it started making about maybe $18. Me and my brother both share half of the money. Most of it goes to our lunch money for school and breakfast money.
Jason: I hope that they will take from this how to start a business and run a business, to anticipate how many gumballs they thought they would move each week, and then how much money they would have put into paying me off for the gumball machine.
Kennedy: I always have money to buy more stock. It’s really hard to run a business if you run out of things to sell. Also, keep money in case something breaks or is worn out. So that way, instead of having to buy a whole new thing, you could be able to buy that certain part that needs to be replaced or fixed.
Jason: It’s a life lesson. You know, you just don’t go out and get something for free and not have to pay it back. When they’re 18 or 19 and going to college and get the offers for credit cards, they know it’s not just free money.
Moon: Jason Priest and his daughter, Kennedy, from Little Rock, Ark.
We want your stories and your questions about kids and money. Go to our special Web page, it’s Marketplace.org/financialfutures. You can learn more about our special show in Portland, Ore. there, as well as get some tips from Beth and Becca Kobliner about things each wishes the other knew about money.
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