Sarah Pruys
After five successful years in Kenora, Dryden, and Sioux Lookout, the BizKids Camp made its inaugural appearance in Fort Frances last week to give children an opportunity to learn the skills needed to be successful in today’s economy.
Run by the Northwest Business Centre, the camp for children aged nine-12 teaches basic business and entrepreneurship skills in a week-long course.
“The Northwest Business Centre is a service for youth and adults that is throughout all of the Rainy River and Kenora districts,” noted Stefanie Armstrong, a small business advisor in Dryden.
“We empower entrepreneurs,” she explained. “We provide help with writing business plans, finding start-up funding, and learning skills to start a new business, to expand an existing business, or help with succession planning.”
Along with summer student Cameron Chambers from Kenora, they taught eight children throughout the week, with activities culminating in a “Market Day” on Scott Street on Friday, where the youth sold their handmade products from 11 a.m.-1 p.m.
“During the week, they’re learning about entrepreneurship, they’re learning about making a profit and change, and all of the things a real business would have to learn,” Armstrong noted.
“And then they make handmade crafts, and that’s what they’re selling.”
Armstrong said they do all kinds of games throughout the week.
“Sometimes crossword puzzles or Bingo with business terms,” she remarked. “And they design what they think an entrepreneur should look like, and they write advertising.
“One of the most popular activities is they invent a product and then they have a mock ‘Dragon’s Den.’
“We had incredible support from Betty’s and Taggs Source for Sports in giving tours to the kids and teaching them first-hand about running a business,” added Armstrong, who also thanked the Rainy River Future Development Corp. and Fort Frances Chamber of Commerce for their support.
Twelve-year-old Amy Wickstrom of Dryden was one of the participants in the camp, with a business called “Fudgelicious.”
“I chose to make fudge because I like fudge, and it actually won an award in the Dryden Fair,” she explained.
“So I thought, ‘Why don’t I take that and make it into a small business?’”
Wickstrom enjoyed the program.
“It was very good,” she enthused. “It was fun and we did a few tours, and got to see and learn things that you wouldn’t normally know.
“We got to look around in Betty’s and hear the stories behind it,” she added. “And we also got to look in Taggs Source for Sports, and we got the full tour of Taggs, we saw everything.
“It was pretty cool!”
And her award-winning fudge proved to very popular. “I sold out within the first hour-and-a-half,” Wickstrom noted.
In fact, many of the youngsters were selling out of their snacks, bracelets, and bookmarks. But Conal Jarvis, 11, who said he lived “about a kilometre outside of city limits,” still had a few packages of cookies left around noon.
“I own ‘Conal’s Cretaceous Cookie,’” he explained. “I’m selling three little dinosaur cookies, and I’ve attached little dinosaurs and little info tags to each.
“And I’ve got my stuffed animal, ‘Buddy,’ [another dinosaur] holding up my sign.
“And currently it’s going very well,” said Jarvis. “[I’ve made] $48 if I remember correctly.”
He carefully was keeping track of his profits—and even offered to count his friend’s money for them.
He was selling a package of three cookies for $5, or two packages for $8.
For ‘The best cookies in 65 million years,’ that’s a pretty good deal.
Dinosaur information was free, however, and Jarvis did not hesitate in saying that “the T. rex is about 43-45 feet long, weighs 67 tonnes, is from the Maastrichtian to late Cretaceous period, and on top of that was dominant predator in its ecosystem.”
On the camp, he exclaimed, “It was awesome!”
“I learned how some of the businesses on Scott Street work, and I also learned how much time you have to put into a business to make it work, which is a lot,” he noted.
After the successful week the BizKids camp had here, it now is looking to expand into Red Lake and Ear Falls next summer.
