Your best get-rich-quick scheme as a kid

My plan in my late teens was something like this:

Learn how to trade stocks + ??? = profit.

Earlier than that then it was more like:

??? + ??? = Porsche at 25.

Alas, there was no Porsche at 25.
 
One summer, a friend and I spent all summer holidays offering car wash services to people by wandering around our neighbourhood with a bucket of sponges and cleaning products.

It all went fine till a pair of obnoxious old coffin dodgers threatened to call the police if we weren't with the Scouts. (This was the first confirmation I had of my life-long cynical theory that some people are so due some real problems in their life, they take great pleasure in creating them for others just to have something to complain about).

Of course, at the time, I was actually in the Scouts so I said, "Of course we are" and they were fine with us washing their car after that :)
 
When I was a kid, I sent a response card into a Florida land company that was selling "vacation lots" really cheap. When the salesman called my home, my Mother explained that I was in school since I was only 10 years old. "Well, would YOU be interested then?" :)
 
I bought a lot of early 90's TOPPS and UpperDeck baseball cards... went to flea markets and bought old marked up cards as well. big plan was to resell a few years later for tons of money.

I have a bunch of boxes of the cardboard shee-ite in my basement right now. :D
 
Squilly said:
[/COLOR]Anyway... Answering OP's question: I never did anything personally but best was when my brother almost won half a million in playing the Powerball. Too bad the machine broke before he submitted his numbers.
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I thought you and your brother were going to get rich purchasing Apple products and ship them overseas. Russia or China was it? Whatever happened with that scam?
 
TheAppleFairy said:
I thought you and your brother were going to get rich purchasing Apple products and ship them overseas. Russia or China was it? Whatever happened with that scam?
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That comes up in any thread here. Poland pulled out, now it's India and Africa. Possibly more. Vodafone is a big customer he's in the midst of a test order with.
 
I started earning money young because I wanted a nintendo and somehow that was the only thing my parents didn't want me to have. I started with mowing lawns and turned that into something that I did regularly for a long time. I had about 8 lawns to mow on a consistent basis.

I would go to Costco and buy the bulk pack of Tootsie Pops and Blow Pops and sell them for 40 cents per. The school didn't sell candy so this worked.

I worked out a deal with a buddy to share his locker and I rented mine. I got three Saturday schools out of it, I don't recommend it. I earned $60 from that though.

I babysat, which is probably why I have no kids. :D

I then cut all of that out and ran a car detailing business. That was the last thing I did. That was a pretty legit setup that made a ton of money. Then I stopped and started working for the man, which I have done since 17 1/2.

I am not rich...so take that as it is. :)
 
Squilly said:
That comes up in any thread here. Poland pulled out, now it's India and Africa. Possibly more. Vodafone is a big customer he's in the midst of a test order with.
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Africa……..well, there is nothing wrong with dreaming big ambitious dreams, dreaming the sort of big ambitious dreams that are on an epic, continental scale, indeed, are often on an epic, often unregulated continental scale…..

And India……well, potentially a rather large market, too…...

TheAppleFairy said:
Situation probably got too hot for Poland, maybe they smelled a rat.
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And of course, the minor little matter of EU trade and other regulations might have come into play there, too….
 
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TheAppleFairy said:
Situation probably got too hot for Poland, maybe they smelled a rat.
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I believe the running theory was that the Poles set up/used Squally as a grey market exporter. If they knew the arrangement wasn't legitimate, they may have only ever intended it to be temporary. Perhaps they're onto their next grey market contact.
 
TheAppleFairy said:
Situation probably got too hot for Poland, maybe they smelled a rat.
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mobilehaathi said:
I believe the running theory was that the Poles set up/used Squally as a grey market exporter. If they knew the arrangement wasn't legitimate, they may have only ever intended it to be temporary. Perhaps they're onto their next grey market contact.
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I don't know much about it, but I will tell you my brother pulled out first, not the Poles.

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Scepticalscribe said:
Africa……..well, there is nothing wrong with dreaming big ambitious dreams, dreaming the sort of big ambitious dreams that are on an epic, continental scale, indeed, are often on an epic, often unregulated continental scale…..

And India……well, potentially a rather large market, too…...



And of course, the minor little matter of EU trade and other regulations might have come into play there, too….
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Apparently Vodafone isn't an authorized Apple distributor/retailer which I find very difficult to believe given they're all over Europe. Vodafone is highest priority, which may be one of the reasons "Squally" pulled out - he did say he wanted to focus on them.
 
Squilly said:
I don't know much about it, but I will tell you my brother pulled out first, not the Poles.

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Apparently Vodafone isn't an authorized Apple distributor/retailer which I find very difficult to believe given they're all over Europe. Vodafone is highest priority, which may be one of the reasons "Squally" pulled out - he did say he wanted to focus on them.
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Hehehe, if I were you man, I'd stay away from all of that.
 
Scepticalscribe said:
When I was a kid, I was the sort of bookish nerd who wondered occasionally about the get-rich-schemes of other entrepreneurially minded kids.

As someone who hasn't an entrepreneurial bone in my body - and who comes from a long one of public service workers - this is a world view that mystifies me. Yes, there kids who hustled as kids (and went on to run businesses as adults). Then, there were kids who bought into and were convinced by their get-rich-quick schemes. (That wasn't me either - even as a kid, marketing hype no matter how expertly spun, rarely persuaded me).

However, if an entrepreneur in short pants was of a mind to dispose of their library (of often brand new and clearly unread children's books), then they would find in me a willing buyer……

Even now, I am a thoughtful and conscientious buyer, insisting on high standards, rather than any sort of a seller. I have never initiated a trade in my life, and, on the rare occasions where I have been involved in the sort of transaction as a seller where cash has changed hands (or, rather, travelled to bank accounts) the initiative has invariably come from the other party (as when I was asked to sell my 11" MBA earlier this year to a colleague, who wished to give it as a gift to his wife).

Fascinating thread, though…...
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As alway beautifully written, as I have come expect and love of your posts.

But enough of this, down to business.

Until I was the age of 9, I thought that everybody in the world or at least in the Netherlands, had enough money to do what they wanted.

I too never have an entrepreneurial thought, to tell the honest truth I never really thought about money at all, both my parents and grandparents had said that it was rather vulgar, to discuss money and how much something cost.

It was at about time that my grandfather and my father explained, as best you can to a child, that I had something waiting in the future called an inheritance, and this fact made me special. I didn’t feel all that special, all I could see were papers with lots of numbers in columns, and maps and various other documents with wax seals.

I still don’t have that entrepreneurial mind set, but as my grandfather said that’s why there are Private bankers. He also said that a business mind might skip a generation, he never got to see his great grand daughter, become a tax accountant/majoring in EU tax laws. She and the bankers can talk for hours and I still don’t really understand it’s like another language. She does have plans, that he would have been proud of her goes with saying, I do know that I am extremly proud.
 
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Squilly said:
This'll sound stupid (most of what I say does), but do you work for Google?
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That doesn’t sound stupid at all. :)

I don’t, though early in my career when I was traveling to the west coast on occasion, I briefly considered an opportunity that had come up through a friend at Google.

Ultimately, I have too much entrepreneurial drive to do a gig like that (even with their pretty progressive working environments), I like doing my own thing, and mostly have over my 25+ years in the tech sector. I also prefer the east coast vibe, especially here at the beach :D
 
roadbloc said:
I smell ********. Vodafone already have iPhones on sale.
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Maybe they currently use another distributor?

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D.T. said:
That doesn’t sound stupid at all. :)

I don’t, though early in my career when I was traveling to the west coast on occasion, I briefly considered an opportunity that had come up through a friend at Google.

Ultimately, I have too much entrepreneurial drive to do a gig like that (even with their pretty progressive working environments), I like doing my own thing, and mostly have over my 25+ years in the tech sector. I also prefer the east coast vibe, especially here at the beach :D
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Thanks! :)

East coast to West coast would be a huge change.
 
Squilly said:
Thanks! :)

East coast to West coast would be a huge change.
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Yeah, it was pretty unlikely I would’ve moved, even with the bonus/relocation/salary being discussed. Basically I was out there doing a little work with a company a previous partner was getting off the ground, and I tracked down a mutual friend who was at Google ramping up an engineering team.

It also would’ve meant bailing on my current company at the time, which I later sold/was acquired, which worked out pretty well. Then I took of a couple of years, surfed, traveled, went to track events, started a new company (still going), a few startups, etc. Work out of the house, blocks off the ocean, love it, wouldn’t change the current situation for twice the money.
 
My scheme was to babysit for a neighbor and charge them a penny a day doubled. 1¢, 2¢, 4¢, 8¢, 16¢, 32¢, 64¢ until it exponentially rose to a crazy amount per day. Never did try that one out :p
 
I used to deliver newspapers. I then sublet my paper round to some kids who were to young to do one.
I used to go door to door washing cars before that.
Delivering catalogue's and taking orders for home cleaning products.
Selling double glazing on the phone until they found out I was only 14.
Finally left school at 15 and started work full time.
 
When I was about 7 or 8, my best friend and I began making "potions" from whatever we could find in our parents bathrooms - shampoo, medications, lotions, etc. - we mixed them together in different variations and began selling them from the end of our driveways as different "cures" for all sorts of random disorders. I suppose I don't have to mention the fact we didn't sell a single one. :eek:
 
This isn't really a get-rich-quick scheme, but when I was about 12 or 13 me and one of my friends found this promotion on the Tip Top website where they'd send you a $20 ice cream voucher on your birthday, that you could spend on any Tip Top ice cream product you wanted at supermarkets. Unfortunately Tip Top never put a limit on how many vouchers could be sent to one address, so we kept on making up fake names, email addresses and birthdays to get as many vouchers as we could. By the time they pulled the plug on that promotion we'd gotten a LOT of free ice cream, although the manager at the local 4Square was getting suspicious as to why we had so many vouchers (I lived in a small town where there was only one supermarket).

Later in high school me and some friends bought soft drinks in bulk for $1 each and sold them at school for $2 (soft drinks were banned at school). It was the middle of winter, but the drinks still sold well. We were only limited by the logistical issue of how many soft drinks can be carried in a school bag (not that many) ;)).
 
kilcher said:
A friend and I sold gum in high school. We'd buy a box of 24 packs of Bazooka at Big Lots for like $5 and then sell them for 50 cents a pack. We'd sell about a box a day. Ended up getting called in by the principal and told to stop.
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I helped my friend back in 5th-8th grades with selling those white winto-green Lifesaver mints (tangent: they were so good) for 5¢ a mint, with each bag costing $3.49 and almost 800 in each bag. It didn't turn the best of profits, but just being kids and doing it for fun, we made enough each week. As with your story, the principle told us to stop or "donate" the profits of our "business" to the school (hell no!). We choose the former.
 
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