Got the Beating of My Life: My First Attempt at Entrepreneurship

As a kid, I was always aware of my family background and financial strength—we didn’t have much beyond the basics. We had food, clothes on our backs, and a roof over our heads, but when it came to things like new toys, treats on the weekends, or even decent “pocket money” for school, those were luxuries that didn’t come often.

I remember the pocket money vividly. Most days, I get 5 Naira. On rare occasions, when a guest visited our home, I might get 10. Meanwhile, some of my classmates came to school with as much as 100 Naira—plenty to throw around on food, candy, or even toys—everyday kid’s dream, right? Typical, but I knew well enough not to compare myself to them. Still, I couldn’t shake the thought that maybe there was something I could do to make a little extra money.

I was in Primary Four (Basic 5) then, and the idea struck me at the start of a new school session. Like clockwork, we’d receive new sets of textbooks and notebooks, even if we hadn’t fully used the ones from the previous term. My friends and I, always creative, would draw and write stories in our free time at school. But we were constantly running out of pages to use and didn’t have extra notebooks to spare for our artistic endeavors. The best we could do was tear pages out of our school notebooks—which, of course, would get us into trouble with our teachers.

That’s when it hit me: I still had notebooks from the previous term that were only partially used. What if I took out the unused pages, stitched them together, and created brand-new notebooks? Thankfully, my mom was a seamstress, and I knew how to sew.

My plan was to combine the leftover pages into small notebooks, but I didn’t want them to just be plain. I wanted them to look like the branded notebooks we saw in stores, like the ones from Cowbell or Nunu Milk. I found some Pampers (baby’s diapers) packaging disposed in the trash. It was colorful and perfectly sized. I figured it could make a good cover for my new "products."

So I got to work. I tore out neatly the empty pages from my old notebooks, stitched them together, and used the Pampers packaging as the cover. The result was a small but neat notebook that I thought my friends would love. When I brought the notebooks to school, they were an instant hit. My friends, who also needed pages to draw and write, were more than happy to buy them. I started selling the notebooks for 5 or 10 Naira, depending on the size.

I was making money! For a kid who usually had only 5 Naira to spend per day, the profits felt like a fortune. My friends had plenty of cash to spare, and I was solving a problem for them—giving them notebooks they could use without getting punished for tearing pages from their school books. Business was good, but as you might expect, it didn’t last long.

Somehow, word of my little business venture reached the teachers, and that’s when things took a turn for the worse. To them, what I was doing was completely unacceptable. Selling something on school grounds without permission? That was a serious offense. I, as well as two of my “loyal customers” were hauled up and punished for my “crime.”

I will never forget the beating I received. One of the teachers even used his belt, and he didn’t stop until it snapped in half. It was the beating of my life. I wasn’t just punished physically; I was made to feel like I had committed some horrible act. Looking back, the message was clear: trying to be an entrepreneur was wrong. My business was shut down, and any thoughts I had of selling my notebooks again were crushed.

In that moment, my entrepreneurial spirit was stifled. What could have been encouraged as creative problem-solving was treated like a crime. I had identified a need, created a solution, and even found a market, but all of that was met with severe punishment.

Despite the harsh lesson, I didn’t stop making notebooks. I just kept them for myself, using them to write stories, draw, and even as journals for church. I still have some of those old notebooks today, smelling faintly of petrol because I had figured out how to make glue using petrol and Polystyrene foam. They’re a reminder of my first entrepreneurial venture—and of how quickly it was stamped out.

If I think back to that time, what saddens me isn’t the beating itself, but the lost opportunity. Imagine if, instead of punishing me, the teachers had recognized the value in what I was doing. What if they had encouraged my entrepreneurial mindset instead of treating it as a wrongdoing? Who knows where that early spark of creativity could have taken me?

The lesson I want to share from this experience is simple: don’t stifle the curiosity and creativity of children. When kids show an entrepreneurial mindset, even in small ways, it’s important to nurture it. The world is changing fast, and the younger generation isn’t as interested in following the traditional path of study, work, and retirement. They want to innovate, create, and solve problems in their own unique ways. And they should be encouraged to do so.

So, the next time you see a child trying to think outside the box—whether it’s selling something they made or coming up with a new idea—don’t be quick to shut them down. You never know where that spark of creativity might lead.

As for me, that early entrepreneurial lesson might have come with a beating, but it didn’t break my spirit. It only taught me to keep thinking, keep creating, and keep solving problems—no matter the obstacles.