The Rise of Gen Z Entrepreneurship in the Digital Age

[Music]

this past

june i visited my grandparents for the

day at their lakeside cottage

knowing my grandmother prefers lunch at

four in the afternoon

i brought everything i needed to be able

to crochet for a couple hours before

meal time

and while crochet is a hobby it’s also

the focus of my online arts business

purple pear purple pear offers crochet

pet look-alike plushies among other

serotonin-inducing creations

started when i was 14 it has since grown

to 6 400 plus social media followers

over 500 sales and consistent

four-figure months

in fact just a week before this visit i

just hired my first part-time employee

to help me keep up with the demand at

the time of this visit i had a queue of

50 orders with an august deadline

so my fingers were moving at lightning

speed

i was escaping the summer heat in the

living room when with my grandmother

when she responded that she hoped i was

still being a teenager

when i asked what she meant by that she

explained that she felt that sometimes i

dedicated too much time to purple pear

and not enough time to the

quintessential teenage

experience i knew she was concerned when

she said that sometimes she wished

i would decline a visit with her my

grandmother

to hang out with my teenage friends even

my grandmother wants me to get out more

i mean i get where she’s coming from

after all

the stereotypical teenager perpetuated

by the current media

is lazy and entitled seriously just

check out these facebook

memes i think you get the point

sometimes it can feel like gin z

teenagers today

are trapped in a lose-lose situation

if i want to stay at home and act like a

responsible adult

then i’m missing out on the teen

experience

conversely if i want to go out and text

some friends

instead of doing my homework suddenly i

spend too much time on my phone

speaking of phones being the first

generation to grow up with the internet

gen z lives wildly different lives than

any previous generation

we got our first phones in middle school

and we’ve occupied social media for a

big part of our lives

typically viewed as a negative growing

up in the online space

has equipped gen z with the skills to

become young leaders

right from our phones

when i first started purple pear i was

14 years old

and a freshman in high school crochet

was a hobby that soon consumed my life

in the best way possible

i brought my yarn everywhere to parties

appointments and even school

before long friends and family started

expressing interest in my creations

and i found i enjoyed other people

cherishing my stuff

almost as much as i enjoyed making it

and so by spring of 2018

i decided to monetize this passion

all i had was some yarn some hooks

and my phone and it turns out that was

all i needed

having managed a personal instagram

account since sixth grade

i knew the ins and outs of the app so it

was super quick and simple to set up a

second account purely for business

after growing my business’s social media

presence on instagram and later twitter

i could directly communicate with

customers and take custom orders just by

unlocking my phone

the powerful reached social media has

enabled me to ship out products to all

50 states

and three continents without even

leaving my house to market

i use my tablet to build and manage my

website through which i now sell the

majority of my inventory

i am literally running my business from

my phone

and as you can see out of my home

similarly in june 2020 i launched my

online jewelry brand autonomy jewels

in its first month autonomy jules

generated 300

in revenue and now has a 200 growth rate

all it took for me to make money was

internet access and some jewelry

no longer do entrepreneurs have to

invest thousands of dollars into a brick

and mortar shop

or travel all over the world pitching

their products

the face of entrepreneurship is changing

and the key

is social media

many of you are familiar with the

popular chinese app tick tock

a social media platform where consumers

can share short 15 second videos with

their audiences and build a following

sixty percent of tick tock users belong

to gin z

and the app is filled with young

teenagers promoting their small

businesses

one of these teenagers monica silva

started promoting her lip gloss brand

audacity cosmetics on tick tock in the

fall of 2019 when she was 17 years old

after producing videos consistently and

using her platform to scale her customer

base

audacity cosmetics had amassed over half

a million tick tock followers

by july of 2020 now

monica’s lip gloss launches sell out in

minutes and her business has generated

enough revenue to pay off her first year

of college in full

monica is another example of a gen z

teenager using her experience having

grown up in the online space

to her entrepreneurial advantage i don’t

have a business degree and neither does

monica

yet we’ve both jump started our careers

and scaled our businesses to generate

high demand

and consistent income a 2014 study from

the consultancy sparks and honey

found that 72 percent of high school

students wanted to start a business

if you’re a high school student and you

want to start a business

now is the time now more than ever there

are less and less constraints

for young entrepreneurs all you need to

start

is your phone internet access

and some self-initiative

now running a business means money is

inevitable part

and i’m lucky to be making enough to

sustain my boba tea addiction

this holiday season purple pear is

projected to gross two thousand dollars

a month

however to quote mark twain the

dictionary is the only place

where success comes before work

monica silva’s first lip gloss brand

launch did not sell out in minutes

purple pair made a whopping total of 32

dollars in april of 2019.

in fact it took me almost two whole

years to start making more than a

hundred dollars a month consistently

within my business

unless you’re already famous your

business is probably not going to blow

up overnight

and that’s completely okay you have to

be in it for the thrill of running your

own company

and although it sounds cliche do what

you love

and i promise the money will follow

being a teenager and ceo of two small

e-commerce businesses can be like living

a double life

you have to go to school and take

classes then come home and balance

homework with business work

as a small business owner you’re

responsible for managing all aspects of

your business

including but not limited to social

media

engagement product photography creation

customer service shipping packaging etc

it can get really overwhelming and in

fact last christmas

i had to refund 20 crochet orders

because i underestimated the academic

commitments of junior year

however i’ve not trade any of it for the

world the best teacher is experience

and being a business owner at such a

young age has quit me with skills that i

will use the rest of my life

not only are there hard practical skills

such as budgeting an income or building

a website

but also softer skills like learning how

to appropriately present myself online

and being comfortable talking to

strangers on a variety of virtual

platforms

overall my confidence has skyrocketed as

i’ve taken on these responsibilities and

reaped the rewards of my hard work

it makes me so happy when other teens

say i’ve inspired them to pursue their

own entrepreneurial passions

it’s crazy to imagine but teens today

have the potential to make waves

in all corners of the world

because the truth is you need it have

gone to business school

or even be out of middle school yet to

dip your toes into the world of business

not anymore at least gen z the first

generation

born with the internet at its fingertips

is making big moves

we are destroying all misconceptions

about age and education when it comes to

starting businesses

and being successful with our phones we

can tap into an entire world

of free resources limitless media and

millions of customers

with some self-initiative gen z is

proving that not all teenagers are lazy

and entitled

ceos inventors and activists are

becoming younger than ever

and our generation is harnessing the

power of social media

to pursue our passions and make positive

differences

so the next time you see one of those

terribly disparaging facebook memes

i urge you to consider it with a grain

of salt

leaving dirty dishes by the sink might

be typical teenage behavior

but now so is changing the world

thank you