Sara Escobar

Evening Star

On Saturday, April 1, Heights Lumber & Supply held their fourth annual Build-a-Stand workshop in preparation for Lemonade Day. Nearly 100 kids attended the event, held at their location off West F.M. and 2410 in order to participate in various activities held by the business. When the event began at 2 p.m., they watched a demo on building a lemonade stand from pallets and were able to practice their wood working skills by building and painting their own customized ‘tip box’; the children ranged in age from elementary school to high school students. Heights Lumber & Supply provided complimentary pallets as well as a voucher for a quart of paint to pick up the following week. Parents and mentors had to reserve spots for the event in advance through Eventbrite. Children who attended were entered to win a custom-built lemonade stand from Heights Lumber to use on Lemonade Day.

HHES/SARA ESCOBAR
The winner of the raffle stands with his custom-built lemonade stand, along with Heights Lumber & Supply employees.

“This is definitely the biggest workshop we’ve had,” said Kelly Eakin, who has worked with Heights Lumber & Supply since she was a young girl. “We’re a family owned and operated business, so we’ve always promoted self-ownership and entrepreneurship. We were approached by Amanda Stephens, a director for Lemonade Day, about three years ago in hopes to put something like this together for the community. We’ve had a great response from the community.” Eakin went through the day that was full of activities for the children who attended. “The workshop started at two and ended at four. After the building demonstration, the kids were separated into five teams. There was a building station, a painting station, and a safety relay race where they took turns putting safety equipment on a volunteer; there was also a scavenger hunt where the kids had to find the lowest priced items to put together a lemonade stand. Chick-fil-a came out with their own lemonade, there was refreshments and tons of other games.” Eakin says the workshop also teaches the value of money to the youth, which is extremely helpful in getting them out of the house and giving them ownership of something.

Lemonade Day is part of a national initiative that teaches youth how to start, own and operate their own business.  By teaching key analytical skills and other vital techniques, Lemonade Day is meant to foster success and self-esteem. Each year in participating cities, young adults and children have the opportunity to experience entrepreneurship by setting up their own business during the community-wide Lemonade Day. According to lemonadeday.org, kids learn business skills, responsibility, financial literacy, goal setting and teamwork, and 90% of participating adults said Lemonade Day helped their youth correlate math with the real world.”

Eakins also wished to point out that while the symbolism behind a lemonade stand is tell-tale, any business can be incorporated during Lemonade Day, such as pastries and food or jewelry stands.

These lessons covered everything from finding an investor to being a socially responsible citizen. Lemonade Day will be held on Saturday, May 6, and is presented by First National Bank Texas, Fort Hood National Bank and other local sponsors. For more information about Lemonade Day, visit forthood.lemonadeday.org.