A head for business?

A couple of months ago we decided to treat our children, and we bought them a 3d printer, my “Product brain” did its usual party trick, and I spent an embarrassing amount of time researching and analysing, use cases, platforms, form factors, upgradeability…. Etc etc.

My wife brought me back to “Home brain” by saying “but is this for you or the kids”…. She was of course right (she usually is) so we settled for something designed to be an easy entry the world of 3d printing the Bambulab P1P, (this is not really the point of this post though, its just a really good device and if your looking for something family friendly I recommend). We have 3 boys, and they all have different imaginations so I was excited to see what they would come up with.

Fast forward 2 months and the printer has been a HUGE success, all 3 boys have made some amazing things with it and have even spent some of their own birthday money (the seemingly bottomless pot of cash that is always being used but never seems to shrink in size) to buy different colour filaments to enable more things to be made. So when my 11 year old twins started taking things into school to show their friends I was happy about it, they even made things for the teacher, the class they are in is named Kestrel so they printed out a Kestrel as a mascot to sit on her desk, all seemingly really nice things to do.

Then one night I heard them talking in the back of the car on the way home how someone said “they would pay ￡2 but it should really be ￡3” and also “let them have one for free now then we can charge them for the next…”“Work brain” back!

Me “what are you guys talking about?” I asked,

Youngest twin (by 1 minute I have to include this apparently) “Oh nothing” , “we are just saying that we could get more money for our prints now that people really want them!” ……….

Me “Wait you are charging people to make them things?”

Eldest twin “Yep just little things, things they saw we made for ourselves and the asked if we could make them one” Fairly innocent so far

Youngest twin “So we said we could but it cost money for the filament, and the printer, and the electricity, so they would need to pay us for them…..” ok still following but now its not just the goodness of their heart just passing on costs right?

Youngest twin again “and we worked it out, how many of each item we could print per roll of filament, then we added on a bit, and we charge them that much….. that way we get enough money that we can buy more filament, and our own prints would be free!”

………

………

Me “ok but are your friends happy to pay for these things? You said you had given some of them prints for free, but now you are charging, are they happy about that?”

Eldest twin “yep, we gave them free ones so they would see how good they were, and then we tell them what it costs to make them so they understand why we can’t give them away forever”

Me “what about the Falcon you did for the teacher, please tell me you didn’t ask her for money for that…..”

Youngest twin “nope, we did that so everyone would see the print at the front of the class and it would make them think of us, so they would want more stuff…..”

Me “errrrrm, ok, not sure how I feel about this, but as long as your friends are happy, and no one complains we can do it for now”

Later I was telling my wife about all this, and I was blown away, they had built a proper business model, but were completely oblivious to it;

• They started off just doing things they enjoyed for the sheer enjoyment,
• Realised that others liked what they were doing and were willing to pay for it.
• Looked at cost models and created a price structure building in margin
• Invested in different types of marketing, free gifts and then you pay for more, product placement on the teacher’s desk for brand awareness.
• And then they delivered on their commitments to their customers... I mean friends.

It was hard not to be both impressed and a little proud, but I was not involved in any of it, I have never coached them to be business minded or knowingly encouraged it. So where did it come from?

Is it simply learn by seeing, have they watched me work and some of it seeped in, or are they just natural entrepreneurs, is it something they watched (in which case what was it? so I share it with my teams ??)

Honestly, I have no idea, but now I see it I will try to nurture it, make sure they don’t get too carried away, ensure they stay doing it for the enjoyment, not the money, make sure they are just having fun, there is plenty of time for the grind later in life (I know, the irony, I wish I sometimes took my own advice ??) they aren't building an empire, or really starting a business (although I might, now I know is a viable one) but we get so caught up in thinking we are always the ones teaching our kids that its really refreshing when they teach us something back....

Anyway happy Monday everyone,