Raising Entrepreneurs

Welcome back!

Some of you may have seen the comment left last week about the site bkfk.com.

Well, I have checked it out, and wow! How fantastic!

Here’s the backstory:

Founder and CEO Norm Goldstein based the company on the premise that young people have never been given the opportunity to be innovative and commercial.

Norm saw this first hand when daughter Cassidy over a period of days turned a plastic holder for roses into a simple device to hold the small or broken end of crayons. This useful product resulted in a United States patent being issued for Cassidy’s invention – The Crayon Holder – at 14 years of age.

From this experience Norm set about researching the topic of young inventors and came up with a large list – people like 14 year old inventor of the television Philo Farnsworth or Abbey Fleck, aged 8 when she thought up the Makin’ Bacon holder. In fact, Norm links the relationship to young people and inventing to the way women were treated half a century ago. For example the story of Patsy Sherman whose invention of water repellent (Scotchguard) was almost ignored because of her gender – “let the men take it from here,” she was told in the 1950s at company 3M.

Norm realized this treatment of women in the past was now happening to kids. He then resolved to set up a company for young innovators to take their great ideas to the commercial marketplace in a way that had never been done before. He likes to call it the “Entrepreneurial Finishing Line.”

“There are plenty of competitions and events for kids inventions, but not an organized and commercial approach to researching, developing and marketing a kid’s raw invention idea.” says Norm.

If your child’s business involves an innovation, head over to Norm’s site. It’s free to join, and there are lots of great resources. Your child may be the next Fraser Doherty or Ben Casnocha!