An excellent little piece in the Arizona Journal about teenager Christian Alf, who started his own business capitalising on solving a local problem -- rat-proofing homes in an area where roof rats have, in the words of the Journal, "invaded."
An excerpt:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>
"Most of the time you're just on the roof sitting by a pipe cutting wire," he said. "But it's real interesting and I like meeting new people."
Alf and his dad hit upon the idea after rat-proofing his grandparents' home near Rural Road and Southern Avenue, where Tempe's first roof rats appeared in January. He started with neighbors and church friends, but word spread like wildfire and now his name and number are flying over Tempe phone lines. The 17-year-old Tempe Preparatory Academy junior can be found most weekends and after school crawling around East Valley roofs covering pipes and vents with stucco diamond mesh to keep roof rats from invading attics.
Alf charges $30 a house and already has more business than he can handle on his own. He has hired three older friends to help. They've rat-proofed 75 houses in the area of Rural Road and Southern Avenue, along with a few in Ahwatukee Foothills. They can usually get to a customer within a week, can rat-proof a house within an hour, and come equipped with their own ladder and supplies.
"Most of the people I get are elderly single people," Alf said. "But I am now starting to get quite a few people who just don't have time."
Alf said he's learned a lot from his new entrepreneurial venture, including the basics of scheduling appointments, managing employees that are older than he is and stocking supplies.
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
(full story here)
Call me old-fashioned, but it stirs my heart to see a young man jumping on a local market-driven problem with a solution and creating success for himself, goodwill among his neighbours, and even opportunity for others in the form of the jobs he has provided to his three assistants.
But unfortunately some shithead bureaucrat read the above-linked article and was driven to an apoplectic rage, because the kid was shut down the day after the article ran.
God Bless America, the Land of Opportunity.
Phaedrus
An excerpt:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>
"Most of the time you're just on the roof sitting by a pipe cutting wire," he said. "But it's real interesting and I like meeting new people."
Alf and his dad hit upon the idea after rat-proofing his grandparents' home near Rural Road and Southern Avenue, where Tempe's first roof rats appeared in January. He started with neighbors and church friends, but word spread like wildfire and now his name and number are flying over Tempe phone lines. The 17-year-old Tempe Preparatory Academy junior can be found most weekends and after school crawling around East Valley roofs covering pipes and vents with stucco diamond mesh to keep roof rats from invading attics.
Alf charges $30 a house and already has more business than he can handle on his own. He has hired three older friends to help. They've rat-proofed 75 houses in the area of Rural Road and Southern Avenue, along with a few in Ahwatukee Foothills. They can usually get to a customer within a week, can rat-proof a house within an hour, and come equipped with their own ladder and supplies.
"Most of the people I get are elderly single people," Alf said. "But I am now starting to get quite a few people who just don't have time."
Alf said he's learned a lot from his new entrepreneurial venture, including the basics of scheduling appointments, managing employees that are older than he is and stocking supplies.
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
(full story here)
Call me old-fashioned, but it stirs my heart to see a young man jumping on a local market-driven problem with a solution and creating success for himself, goodwill among his neighbours, and even opportunity for others in the form of the jobs he has provided to his three assistants.
But unfortunately some shithead bureaucrat read the above-linked article and was driven to an apoplectic rage, because the kid was shut down the day after the article ran.
God Bless America, the Land of Opportunity.
Phaedrus
