What is Digg?251 Comments
- cello, on 02/15/2008, -1/+147Who's under 20 anymore?
- sublimemm, on 02/15/2008, -1/+83i am 20, and I failed miserably
- Lanefair, on 02/15/2008, -2/+78I'm 27. . .
- inactive, on 02/15/2008, -1/+74Prostitute your ass for one dollar to million of people.
- pbaehr, on 02/15/2008, -0/+53Me too. Unless step one is "invent a time machine" I'm afraid we're ***** out of luck.
- BirkBum, on 02/15/2008, -0/+44Is there a sequel titled, "So that didn't work. Now try to do it before you turn 30"? I really hope so.
- Tyr7BE, on 02/15/2008, -0/+37Go back to 1997, train a basic monkey to do basic HTML, and put him to work for you, making webpages for millions of dollars a pop. Sell it all in 1999.
- baramunchies, on 02/15/2008, -5/+37yes, multimillionaires without having played with friends when young. no thanks, money is not everything.
- ThatEvilGuy, on 02/15/2008, -1/+32Articles like this make me feel like *****. :(
- theOster, on 02/15/2008, -0/+29i'm 31 and i wish to hell i had more money. i went through architecture schooling and it was always told to us "don't go into architecture for the money, because there isnt any" we all agreed that we're doing it for the passion and nothing else. ***** that. now i'm in IT. and making double what i was in architecture. of course it all goes to beer, but whatever.
- ovset, on 02/15/2008, -1/+26I'm 18 and even I would rather enjoy my youth than spend it trying to become rich. You have plenty of time to try and become millionaires; enjoy now what you won't have later.
- jonlarge, on 02/15/2008, -0/+22assuming you had a time machine, I'm sure you could make plenty of money off of it
- Whatwedo, on 02/15/2008, -0/+22Or 1,000 REALLY fat chicks for 1000 bucks a piece.
- lndmn01, on 02/15/2008, -1/+22Step one: Buy (or build) time machine.
- volitor8555, on 02/15/2008, -0/+20Fat chicks need love too..but they gotta pay
- 4LeggedtriPod, on 02/15/2008, -1/+21Pics or it didn't happen.
- CaptRage, on 02/15/2008, -2/+22Is it more important to have money when you are young, or have fun?
- chingy1788, on 02/15/2008, -0/+20i have 1 month left to make a million...
- jerryterhorst, on 02/15/2008, -1/+21what the *****? i dont see any How-To steps on this site. buried.
- merper, on 02/15/2008, -1/+20Ok, come on, this is just stupid. Money may not be the most important thing, but these kids have put in the effort to earn it. Comparing them to celebs is just insulting.
- garf12, on 02/15/2008, -4/+21Alot of times its just luck. I managed to find some good timber land with a little bit of skill and whole lot of luck. I paid 2+ million in taxes for 06 and I was 22.
- rjc1187, on 02/15/2008, -0/+16I am 20 also, and have learned that financial success is only a small portion of life's...oh who the ***** am I kidding, I want to be rich goddamn it!!!!
- kent1146, on 02/15/2008, -4/+19Without the intro ads:
While their peers were out making trouble, these young achievers were making bank.
Forever in search of the secrets to entrepreneurial success, we peeked into the inspirational lives of five whiz kids who built million-dollar enterprises before the age of 20.
They partnered with friends, siblings and mentors, or did the work on their own. Three are from the U.S., two from the U.K. All started at age 15 or younger--and one before he broke double digits.
Their common thread: preternatural business sense and demon drive to turn ideas into reality.
In Pictures: Businesses Of The (Really) Young And Successful
Five Teen Millionaire Entrepreneurs: Fraser Doherty, Ashley Qualls, Catherine Cook, Cameron Johnson, Adam Hildreth
In Pictures: Eight Ways To Make Money Online
While four of the five were making a mint on the Internet, Fraser Doherty was doing things the old-fashioned way. In 2002, at the age of 14, Doherty started making jams from his grandmother's recipes in his parents' kitchen in Edinburgh, Scotland. Neighbors and church friends loved them. As word spread, Doherty started receiving orders faster than he could produce them at home, so he rented time at a 200-person food-processing factory several days a month.
Go With The Flow
By age 16, Doherty left school (with his parents' blessing) to work on his jams full time. In early 2007, Waitrose, a high-end supermarket in the U.K., approached Doherty, hoping to sell his Superjam products in their stores. Within months there were Superjam jars on the shelves of 184 Waitrose stores, hoisting Doherty and his business to new heights.
Doherty borrowed 5,000 pounds (about $9,000) from a bank to cover general expenses and more factory time to produce three flavors: Blueberry & Blackcurrant, Rhubarb & Ginger and Cranberry & Raspberry. Tesco (other-otc: TSCDY - news - people ) followed, adding Doherty's products to 300 stores across the U.K. In March, Superjam will launch at Tesco in Ireland.
Last year Superjam hit $750,000 in sales and is on track to double that in 2008 (about 50,000 jars a month). Based on a reasonable valuation multiple of one times revenue--jelly-maker J.M. Smucker (nyse: SJM - news - people ) trades at 1.2 times sales--Doherty's 100% stake is worth in the neighborhood of $1 million to $2 million.
Not bad for a 19-year-old. Doherty's recommendation to other young entrepreneurs: "Have an attitude of adventure, and enjoy the journey."
Double Down
Cameron Johnson truly took that perspective to heart, parlaying one hit into the next. Back in 1994, when he was just 9, Johnson launched his first business out of his home in Virginia, making invitations for his parents' holiday party. By the seasoned age of 11, Johnson had saved up several thousand dollars selling greeting cards. He called his company Cheers and Tears.
But the little guy didn't stop there. At age 12, Johnson offered his younger sister $100 for her collection of 30 Ty Beanie Babies, all the rage at that time. The young entrepreneur quickly earned 10 times that amount by selling the dolls on eBay (nasdaq: EBAY - news - people ). Smelling potential, he contacted Ty and began purchasing the dolls at wholesale with the aim of selling them on eBay and on his Cheers and Tears Web site.
In less than a year, Johnson banked $50,000--seed money for his next venture, My EZ Mail, a service that forwarded e-mails to a particular account without revealing the recipient's personal information. He hired a programmer to flesh out his idea, and within two years My EZ Mail was generating up to $3,000 per month in advertising revenue.
Be Fearless
Johnson still wasn't done. In 1997, he joined forces with two other teen entrepreneurs, Aaron Greenspan and Tom Kho, to create an online advertising company called Surfingprizes.com, which provided scrolling advertisements across the top of users' Web browsers. Those who downloaded the software received 20 cents per hour (a tiny fraction of the value to the advertiser) for the inconvenience of having ads splay across their computer screens.
The boys employed a classic pyramid strategy to spread the service. Users who managed to refer Surfingprizes.com to a new customer would nab 10% of that new person's hourly revenue.
But Johnson and company didn't just sell software--they wanted a piece of that juicy ad revenue too. Their solution: partnering with companies such as DoubleClick, L90 and Advertising.com that could sell the ads for them. Under the agreements, the middlemen would collect 30% of any ad revenue sold, while the three boys split the remaining 70%, out of which they paid those referral fees.
"I was 15 years old and receiving checks between $300,000 and $400,000 per month," says Johnson. At 19, he sold the company name and software (but not the customer database) to an undisclosed buyer. Says Johnson, "Before my high school graduation, my combined assets were worth more than $1 million."
Now just 23, and with other ventures under his belt, Johnson spends his time giving speeches and promoting a new book. "Put yourself out there," he advises. "Don't be afraid of rejection. Don't be afraid to ask anything."
Stick To A Vision
At 15, Catherine Cook and her brother Dave, 17, were flipping through their high school yearbook and came up with the idea to develop a free interactive version online. In 2005, the two convinced their older brother Geoff, a budding Web entrepreneur himself, to invest $250,000 and his time to help them launch MyYearbook.com, a social-networking site based in Skillman, N.J.
Soon after, the Cooks merged with Zenhex.com, an ad-supported site where users post a variety of homemade quizzes, more than doubling the number of eyeballs taking in their site. But when they tried to expand even further, they hit some snags. Potential investors wanted to move the company's headquarters to New York (the Cooks wanted to stay put). They also wanted to have ads appear on users' personal profile pages (the Cooks didn't).
Good thing the Cooks stuck to their vision. By 2006, MyYearbook had raised $4.1 million from the likes of U.S. Venture Partners and First Round Capital. Since then, the site has attracted such advertisers as Neutrogena, Disney (nyse: DIS - news - people ) and ABC; has grown to 3 million members worldwide; and rakes in annual sales in the "seven figures," says Catherine.
How to compete in an industry dominated by MySpace and Facebook? Mine a niche. "[Our site is] specifically for high school students, and we really listen to the suggestions of our members," says Catherine.
While the Cooks decline to discuss the value of their stake in the business, one MyYearbook investor (who agreed to speak only if unidentified) claims the Cooks' chunk is worth "well over $1 million."
Seven figures is real money to anyone, let alone a teenager. Yet despite their heady success, all of these young world-beaters seem to remain--refreshingly--kids at heart. "I'm not driving around in fancy cars," says Doherty. "I'm in it totally for the adventure."
Profits and perspective: Sounds like a recipe for even greater success in the decades to come. - Shakermaker, on 02/15/2008, -0/+15Nineteen year olds?
- yohnstoppable, on 02/15/2008, -0/+15buy a sports almanac, and don't let biff get his greasy mitts on it
- thebrawl, on 02/15/2008, -0/+15Or 100 preachers for 10,000 bucks apiece.
Starting to seem feasible isn't it? - Displace, on 02/15/2008, -1/+15Not pictured: the thousands of teenagers who failed, doing the exact same things sans luck
- omelette, on 02/15/2008, -0/+14if you had TWO time machines, then you could take one back in time!
- inactive, on 02/15/2008, -1/+15Even if they didn't do anything except keep their million in a mutual fund they'd be multi-millionaires by 40.
- spiritditch, on 02/15/2008, -1/+14Oh my God, you're a loser! Loser!
- macwac, on 02/15/2008, -2/+15... they made millions while you were digging! Owned (so was I)
- subsistenc3, on 02/15/2008, -1/+14Um... money, obviously. Who needs to make fun when you can buy it?
(There was a bit of sarcasm in there). - iucraigmc, on 02/15/2008, -0/+13OR, you could not anticipate creating a startup business to rely on being a millionaire and make smart investing decisions starting at a young age. For example, investing $180 a month for 40 years in a good growth stock mutual fund will yield $1,147,822.90. This is how the average person can become a millionaire making $30,000 a year. Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University FTW
- ghostlywind, on 02/15/2008, -0/+13Well damn my 20th birthday is tomorrow, i don't think i have enough time to do this.
- Rodalli, on 02/15/2008, -2/+15Alternate title, "How to Spend Your Entire Adult Life Trying to Compensate for a Wasted Youth"
- Cyber_Akuma, on 02/15/2008, -0/+12Better hope on the lottery then...
- JettaMan, on 02/15/2008, -1/+13Money absolutely. You will have an infinitely more fun life in your teens and twenties if you have a lot of money. And unlike the weenie above, no sarcasm here.
- garf12, on 02/15/2008, -0/+12Nope I'm smart enough to not go to federal pound me in the ***** ass prison.
- exomni, on 02/15/2008, -2/+14You can't have one without the other.
No money = misery. - cscalfani, on 02/15/2008, -1/+13First, start with $10 million...
- appletoapple, on 02/15/2008, -0/+12Money may not be the most important thing, and it may not buy you happiness, but life is a whole lot easier when you have it than when you don't.
- Toshibi, on 02/15/2008, -1/+12I'm 28...
- yohnstoppable, on 02/15/2008, -0/+11ya, but not before i'm 20 :(
- ell0bo, on 02/15/2008, -0/+10The generation that's now 18 and younger... no offense but you guys have been ridiculously coddled. It started while I was growing up (I'm 25), and I've watch as thing have gotten progressively worse. Kids coming into college don't have the fundamentals, because of the every child left behind act, the girls are sluttier (which I guess is a good thing in college), but unfortunately they also think they own the world (which most of them deserve nothing more then the title bitch). The guys you see coming in are punks and whiny little brats that don't know what it means to actually work. If you look at sports... most of the time they grew up having played baseball where everyone had to play no matter how much they sucked, or they won an award just for showing up. I fear we're making the next generate soft, but that's my opinion.
That being said, I won't argue there are quality outliers out there, but all in all there has been a migration toward the pusification of the American populous. - bigbird, on 02/15/2008, -1/+11Coulda used this yesterday, being my 20th birthday today.
- thebrawl, on 02/15/2008, -0/+10so you've already made your million. sweet.
- gypsi, on 02/15/2008, -0/+9these articles should be titled "how some other guy made x millions before y. as for you? sucks to be you."
- inactive, on 02/15/2008, -1/+10Too late.
- mrASSMAN, on 02/15/2008, -0/+8Man, 2009 will be the best year ever! We'll get a new president and I'll be receiving a million-dollar check in the mail for my birthday!
So where do I sign up.. - WillyF, on 02/15/2008, -0/+8"The boys employed a classic pyramid strategy to spread the service. Users who managed to refer Surfingprizes.com to a new customer would nab 10% of that new person's hourly revenue."
Pyramid strategy? I thought the term was scheme. -
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