As the summer heat continues to rise, an event this weekend is looking to help cool people down, while also helping children learn about entrepreneurship and leadership skills.
Lemonade Day will be returning to the Golden Triangle all day on Saturday. Lemonade Day is a national organization that originated in Texas in 2007, though the event first came to Starkville in 2018.
“It’s encouraging entrepreneurship in youth, with the most pure form, which is the lemonade stand,” Mississippi State’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Outreach Program Coordinator Garrison Walker said.
By 2019, the event expanded throughout the Golden Triangle to Columbus and West Point. It is also expanding to Louisville this year.
As of Monday afternoon, there were 222 children and 67 stands already registered in the area, but participants can register any time up until Lemonade Day on Saturday, Walker said.
“It’s just grown and gotten more people involved, more parents, more adults, but primarily more kids and more lemonade stands,” Walker said.
Cadence Bank is the annual sponsor that aids in licensing the event, while MSU’s E-Center acts as the go-between for the cities and the Lemonade Day organization for the event.
Once registered, children receive information on how to run their stand including creating a budget, setting profit goals and serving customers.
Stands will report their earnings and the top earner of each city will receive a prize.
“In years past, we’ve done bicycles, but I think we’re going to be doing Amazon gift cards,” Walker said.
Lisa Klutts, executive director of the West Point-Clay County Growth Alliance, said the event is always “fun” and a great way to support the community and for these children to learn entrepreneurial skills.
“It’s really to develop business skills, but it’s getting out that day and supporting our community, which is our people, which is the next generation, the youth,” Klutts said.
“They are so excited to sell their lemonade … and we teach them through this process to save some money. Also spend some money because you worked hard,” Klutts added.
The event is expected to draw a crowd to downtown Columbus, which will hopefully bring engagement to other stores, Executive Director of Main Street Columbus Barbara Bigelow said.
“There’s a lot of great children’s activities, but this, as far as main street downtown promotions go, this one is geared strictly to kids, which is wonderful,” Bigelow said. “All of our events are family friendly, and we love to have children participate. But this is an event where they can shine.”
Even though Lemonade Day is only on Saturday, the E-Center is still looking to get children involved throughout the summer if they can’t get out on Saturday.
“The 14th isn’t the end all,” Walker said. “They can still do it after the fact, and we’ll try to make an effort to go support them at the lemonade stand.”
Children and their parents can register their stands and add them to the online map for free at lemonadeday.org/golden-triangle.
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