Garbage Man Joe and Entrepreneurship

Last February, Joe started his own little Garbage Can Curbside Service. For details, go HERE. In short, he asked our neighbors if he could roll out, and then back in, their garbage cans on trash day. In return, they would pay him 25¢ each week.

Over the last year, Joe has learned a little about self-reliance, independence, responsibility, entrepreneurship  and the value of a dollar. And the lessons were not staged by his parents. They were simply a result of his weekly job.

We've had many posts about the lessons he has learned, but now let us talk about the lesson in entrepreneurship.

Joe started his little garbage can business, and then grew it, with no second guessing. He knows no other way of working than to identify what he wants to do, where there is a need and going out and doing it.

Recently we were at the Discovery Green Flea Market and Joe saw a popular booth with handmade wooden chairs, tables, signs and other items. He asked to buy something but I told him that he and his father could easily build a bird house or tool box at home. His next idea was to build a whole lot of them and sell them.

Well, of course. Identify what you like, where there is a need, and do it.

As an adult, I think that many people get busy, tired and set in their ways. Some do recognize the opportunities all around but most just continue on with the same old thing they have always done.

I want to be someone who starts to recognize the opportunities all around me and I want my kids to know no other way.

I do not know if an entrepreneur is born or if one is made, but I do know that teaching someone to recognize opportunity, and to run with it, is something that has come from Garbage Man Joe's little business.