103. What Are the Five Ps of Entrepreneurship?

Today, Connor and Brittany talk to Scott Donnell, a serial entrepreneur who is giving families and kids the tools they need to start their own businesses.

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Links:

• My First Sale

Here’s a transcript of our conversation:

Connor: Hey, Brittany.

Brittany: Hi, Connor.

Connor: Hey, I’m excited. Today, as our listeners know, the people who have the Tuttletwins books, one of our books, the TuttleTwins, and their Spectacular Show Business is all about entrepreneurship, which is a really big word, right? Like entrepreneur, I, have a hard time spelling that word.

Brittany: Yes, me too.

Connor: You know, business owner is easier, right? but entrepreneurship or, being your own boss, creating, you know, products and services, is really awesome because we’re serving other people. We’re helping solve their problems, and in exchange, they’re paying us and we can create wealth. It’s just such a fun thing. And any kid who’s had a lemonade stand knows how this works. And so I’m excited. Today we have a guest on the show, Scott Donald, my friend, who is an entrepreneur, and we’re gonna talk about what it means to be an entrepreneur and kinda walk through it a little bit more. Scott, thanks for joining us.

Scott Donald: Thanks, guys. This is great to be here. Thanks for having me.

Brittany: Of course. Happy to have you.

Connor: Well, maybe Scott, let’s first start, tell us just a tiny bit of your story. You’re an entrepreneur in, several ways, I feel like, so give our audience kind of a little bit of a taste of what kind of an entrepreneur you’ve been until now.

Scott Donald: Yeah, well, I, love business, right? And, you know, my company is my first sale. We didn’t say the word entrepreneurship in the company cuz it’s kind of hard to spell and but yeah, myfirstsale.com is the company now. But I’ve always loved entrepreneurship. You know, we helped kids launch businesses now on the site, but I’ve loved business all the way since I was in third grade. my first business was, a bead gecko key chains, right? I created these little key chains outta beads and sold them to my down the street, all to my friends and family for a dollar 50. You know, I ended up hiring my friends to make them for a quarter. It was really, really fun. we did hundreds of them until I got shut down by the principal because none of my friends were going to recess. They were, they were inside my speed. Geckos, It’s so funny. So I’ve just always had a knack for business and finding a product that, somebody else would want, or it solves a problem for them, and then you make it for ’em and you help ’em get it, and it’s a win-win for both people. So I’ve done that in a lot of different businesses over the years and yeah, so here we are today.

Connor: What I like about your story is, you know, it started when you were a kid. Some kids just seem to have that knack and others can discover it or create it. It’s not like, only certain people get to be an entrepreneur. There are a lot of opportunities, even as kids to pursue even, oh, you know, my kids we’re talking right now about making a little, pizza, company for the neighborhood because my wife makes amazing pizzas. And so the kids can help all the ingredients and the setup and the cooking and the delivery, and we can actually provide people with delicious homemade pizzas. And so here, my kids, you know, get this opportunity. Now, I, want to focus a little bit because as an entrepreneur, you actually sent me this list, which I really like. You call it like the five peas of entre entrepreneurship. So I wanna walk through that, really quick with you to understand what those are, and more importantly, for our listeners to kinda learn about these Ps and how they can actually take advantage of them and apply them in their life. So let’s just start with the first one. And, I think this one’s easy. You are a passionate guy. You get very excited about this kind of stuff. So the first Ps is passion. Why is it important to be passionate, about something to be an entrepreneur?

Scott Donald: Absolutely. Okay, so passion is the first P that we teach at my first sale. because you have to find out what you love, right? So passion is, what gets me through the hard times in business, right? Everybody has difficult times. And, I think one of the coolest things about being an entrepreneur is learning grit and confidence, and excitement to overcome challenges and solve problems. And I think every kid should learn this, by the way, even if you’re not gonna be an entrepreneur when you grow up, just every kid should learn these, skills of entrepreneurs. So finding your passion is the first thing that we really care about finding is, okay, this is what we say passion is, Connor. We say it’s, it’s where these three things meet. Are you ready? What do you love? What are you really good at? And what is a need in the world? Okay? That’s what we think. A good passion, sweet spot. We call it the sweet spot. What is something you’re really, really good at? You know, like you, love to write, you love to research. Yeah, you love principles of freedom. You, like, and you’re really good at it, right? And then it solves a huge need in the world. You found your passion, right? So that’s what we want kids to start thinking about it. Do you love to make things with your hands? Do you love to write? Do you love art? Do you love how engines work? Do you love to speak? Do you love animals? Do you love making cartoon books? Do you know, we have thousands of kids that launch their own businesses on the site because they’re finding first something that really, really interests them, right? So that’s passion.

Connor: Cool.

Brittany: Yeah, I have one thing to question to follow up on that. You’ve talked before, I listened to some other interviews with you about failure. So what if there’s something, you know, somebody’s really passionate about something, they have this idea, but they can’t really get it off the ground, or, maybe they keep messing up and they keep failing, You know, I don’t like saying the F word because I don’t like getting it in people’s heads, but, what do you have to say about failure and how that plays into the five Ps?

Scott Donald: Yeah, so I look at it like this. So passion is sort of like honing in on the target, okay? People find out their real passions just as they get older and as you test and try a lot of things. So you gotta think about, okay, what is the best thing that I love to do? Okay, maybe I’ll try this product, maybe I’ll try this idea. You’ve gotta be okay with testing and trying out a lot of things. We love it when kids have apprenticeships, for instance, go find someone that you love, their idea of their job, and what they do all day. And just learn from them and see if it’s something that fits you. You know, if you wanna start a business making something, try it out. It’s, cheap, it’s easy. Like we, one of the biggest things we wanna teach kids is don’t worry, you know, fail. There’s no such thing as real failure as a kid entrepreneur. it’s learning, right? I, tried a thousand things as I was growing up to find out what my sweet spot was. So it’s, you either win or you learn. It’s not win or lose, it’s win or learn. And here, here’s a good example. Brittany, did you know that, um, Amazon, the largest company in the world, did you know that they tried 10,000 things every day for their business?

Brittany: I did not know that.

Scott Donald: It’s called split tests. They, test buttons and projects and, titles of things, and they try new algorithms. They have a set, this is what they do to get better. They fail ninety-nine hundred and ninety-nine times out of 10,000 every day to find that one winning click, that one winning button or title. And that’s what grows their business so fast to become one of the best in the world. So we don’t want you to fear trying things out, we want you to try as many things as you can to get the be to be the best entrepreneur and find the best passion sweet spot.

Brittany: So it’s kind of goes to the next question. So the next P is product. And you talked about Amazon, you’re trying all these different things. So what can you tell our listeners about product and how that plays into entrepreneurship?

Scott Donald: Yeah, so, we ask a lot of questions on, the site about when we train folks about, you know, do you want to have, a product or a service, right? It can be walking dogs, right? It could be coaching other people, it could be fitness classes, right? There’s a lot of things that we, we help kids, kids do. But it can be a product that you use with your hands, like art, it can be a product that, that you make something that, that is like an article of clothing. Maybe it’s a bookmark, maybe it’s you love making sweets like Connor said with the kids. They love the family pizza business, they love making food, right? So when you, think about a product you wanna see, it’s something I really love to do. But also, do you want something that’s expensive to make high quality? Do you want it to be something that’s really cheap to make and you can sell a lot of ’em at a lower price, right? So there’s kinda three things, better, faster, cheaper, right? It, do you wanna make something that’s, just the best in the world with, the highest quality? Do you wanna make something that’s fast, right? Like Jimmy John’s, you know, if you order Jimmy John’s, they’re famous for bringing your sub to right to your door and a couple of minutes, right? Or they make it on the spot really fast, or do you want to be cheaper, right? Walmart, a lot of things at Walmart are really, really cheap. And if I go to maybe like Whole Foods or somewhere else, it’s, more expensive, but it has the higher quality. So when you think about a product, you kind of gotta ask yourself all those questions.

Connor: Scott, you actually, I think, covered pretty well the next P which is price. But maybe just add on a little exclamation point there. What, is the thought that kids, you know, would be entrepreneurs need to think up about price? How do we figure out what to charge for something?

Scott Donald: This one’s, my favorite actually. well, actually profit is, I’ll tell you why in a minute. But price is so important leading to profit because price is how you figure out what is the best amount of money you should charge somebody for the product that you have. And there’s a lot of, you know, really intense academic ways of doing it. But there’s a really easy way for kids, go ask people, okay, go ask your family and then your friends, and then go ask your neighbors that, don’t really, you know, they’re not your friends. So try to ask people. And guess what, if everyone says yes, they’ll pay $6 for your brownies or whatever. If everyone says yes, you might wanna make it $7 and see what they say. And if nobody says yes, you might wanna make it four. You know, that’s the easiest way to learn about price. Ask people. So, you know, when we do our coaching and our training before they launch their actual store page on, my first sale, they, they have to go talk to five people at least and, give them the what it is, and talk about it with them and then ask them, you know, would you pay this amount? And so that’s why price is such a great one cuz it gets you out there talking to people and it really helps you understand what’s the best amount to charge.

Brittany: That’s a good segue into profit, which is one of my favorites cuz profit is the money you get to keep. But so tell us a little bit about profit and how that plays into everything.

Scott Donald: Yeah, profit makes the economy work. You know, profit is so important. It is, people sometimes think of it as a bad thing. And I don’t know why you’d ever think that. It provides for our families, it provides for our kids, it provides for our business to grow and hire people. Profit is what’s left over after you sell a product to somebody and if you don’t have any money left over, you can’t actually do it again. And so the best businesses, in my opinion, have enough profit to grow and reinvest and hire more people and serve their customers even better. And so profit to us, we have a very simple equation. It’s the price. You’re gonna charge somebody, let’s say it’s $5 minus the cost. It made you, you had to spend to make the product or service. And then what’s left over is your profit. So if I’m gonna sell my brownies to you, Britney for $5, then I’m gonna take my cost and I’m gonna say, okay, my cost is the batter and the eggs and the milk and the brownie mix and everything I needed to do and maybe the wrapper, you know, and a sticker that says, thanks so much for being my customer. All that maybe costs about $3, right? Maybe almost $3 in total or two 50. Okay, let’s say two 50. And if it costs me $2 and 50 cents to do all that, what’s left over Brittany from the $5?

Brittany: So if it was $2, we got about $3 left over.

Scott Donald: Yeah. So $2, there’s $3 left over, if I charged you two 50, there would be two 50 left over. If I charged you, if it cost me $3 and I charged you five, I’d have $2 left over. So that’s the difference in profit, right? If it costs me $5 to make the brownies and I sold it to you for $5, I don’t have any profit.

Brittany: Yeah, you’re not making anything

Scott Donald: Yeah, then I can’t go buy any more brownie mix unless I went and got a loan from the bank or the government. And we wanna avoid that. So, that’s the idea here is profit is what’s left over and you wanna make sure you have great profit and still be able to serve your customers. And so what our kids learn is, you know, do I want a high-profit margin for every customer? Do I want a lower profit margin? Maybe if I lowered my price a little bit and had a little bit less profit, I could sell to way more people who would buy it at the lower price. So it’s a fun math game that, that kids can play to find out what their perfect profit number is.

Connor: I laugh inside when someone says fun and math in the, but, when money is involved, that’s, when kids light up. I’ve shared Scott with you on a previous conversation about seeing kids, you know, doing these little kids market things that we’ve done in Utah and seeing, seeing them light up when they realize how this all works and when they see it start working, they come alive. The final P that I want to go over, and then we’re gonna talk, briefly as we end about, my first sale and a fun little offer that you have for our audience here. So the final P that we wanna talk about is pitch, right? Kids are gonna have to gather all this information. They actually have to get customers. So what’s involved in making the pitch?

Scott Donald: That’s right. So your first my first sale, right? That’s why we named it. We want kids to have this awesome feeling of their first sale. There’s not, there’s no better feeling than that as a kid to ha to make something with your hands and then sell it to somebody else who really wants it. Because guess what? That’s all the economy is you guys. People making things that other people want and need and getting it for them. And if you can sell it to them for more and make a profit, you win and they win. And so the pitch is basically just three parts. What it is, why it’s the best, and how much, those the three little parts of a great pitch. What it is, okay, I’m selling these amazing brownies. Why it’s the best, Brittany, these are the best brownies because it’s my grandma’s secret recipe, okay? They are unbelievable. They melt in your mouth, they are completely organic, they don’t have much sugar and they taste delicious, right? Why it’s the best. And then how much? And I’m selling to you for a special price today, a $5. Would you like some? right Brittany?

Brittany: Sign me up, right? I’m, a drool and I want some of these brownies now.

Scott Donald: There you go. So that is a pitch, what it is, why it’s the best and how much. And I think that if kids understood that, it would give them a lot more confidence to be able to talk to other people in their neighborhood, their family, their friends. If you can make something that other people need with your own hands and then sell it to them successfully and build this business, there’s few things I’ve ever seen that give kids more confidence for the future. So if parents want to empower their kids, this is the way to go. I mean, teach them this entrepreneurship stuff young because it lasts for life. I mean, talk about inoculating a child against socialism. I dunno if I can say that, but yeah.

Connor: Oh yeah, we say it all the time. and you know, in the Tuttletwins in their spectacular show business, we walk through, you know, the business plan and what you need to know and who you need help from and all those kinds of things. And even hearing, this interview Scott, and learning about the five Ps of entrepreneurship and everything you’re saying, there’s a lot of kids listening and their parents being like, that sounds great. We want that. So I don’t want you to give it all away right now, but give at least just a little bit of a teaser. If people go to my first sale, we have a special link where you guys are gonna be able to get an offer. What are people gonna find when they go there? How are you guys helping the kids listening actually become entrepreneurs?

Scott Donald: Yeah, this is our passion. We, love teaching kids about entrepreneurship, but kids learn by doing, right? So you actually wanna make it really, really easy and fun for them to launch their own business and they can launch it for a day, for a week, they can continue on, but most people, you know, parents are busy, right? And so we wanted to make this really, really simple for them to do like a weekend project for a few weeks. So myfirstsale.com/Tuttletwins is where people can go and we’ll give ’em a very special offer there to sign up. I mean, the whole thing’s only 97 bucks and we’re gonna give you guys a, special discount by going there over the next few weeks. but that’s the idea we made it really simple for families who are busy. maybe on a Saturday for a couple of Saturdays in a row, you go spend an hour and go through the fun videos, go through the exercises to one you learn, two you prep, and three you launch, and then we give you your own business page that you fill out with your pictures of your product. You literally list the product there on the page and we help you send it out to all your family and friends. And we have kids who are making any as low as a couple of hundred dollars, as much as $3,500 is the top launch day sales we’ve seen.

Brittany: That’s just one day. Wow. Oh

Scott Donald: Yeah, the check it out creator complain, shout out. They have these, this t-shirt brand 70 customers already $3,600 almost sold. They’re crushing it. And this is not uncommon to get kids with 500 to a thousand dollars. And you know, you’re talking about fun. It is really cool to make something that gets loved by other people and it makes their lives better. So we just make it really easy. You follow the checklist, the kids learn a ton, and then you can shut off the page after you’re launched three days of launch and celebrate as a family. or you can continue on. It’s totally up to you guys. And it’s about 12 hours in total, right? Three hours of prep, four hours or three hours of learning, four hours of prep, and then your launch day, or two. So we always have a celebration at the end, right? When you’re done, we want, you to celebrate the wins and then post your lessons learned on your page. That’s really, really important.

Brittany: Oh, that’s fun. So they get to kind of reflect on what happened and what they learned.

Scott Donald: Oh yeah. Well, this is like, Etsy for kids. We, have like, You have to give thumbs-up ratings and reviews of the kids instead of stars. You give thumbs up and kids like post their lessons learned as they go to all their customers and family and friends. We just made it really kid-centric. And so now we can bring more kids, and business through the site. I also, I also probably say one more thing. We launched a virtual business fair program. So you can check out the events page and we’re, going to like school schools, friend groups, neighborhoods, and it’s a virtual fair where kids can pitch to hundreds of people on like a online zoom style cartoon booth. And they literally sell, their product. It’s really, really cool. So a bunch of different groups of kids are already booking up their spots. It’s a two-hour fair. So if anybody’s listening and interested, check out the events and reserve your spot.

Connor: So guys, make sure you go to myfirstsale.com/Tuttletwins, if that’s too hard or you’re out driving, just head to the show notes page at Tuttletwins.com slash podcast. We’ll link to it over there Scott, what I really like about this, is you’re an entrepreneur and now you’re giving back helping create future entrepreneurs. That’s super awesome and it’s a great way for kids who’ve been reading in the Tuttletwins books to begin to apply some of what they’ve been learning and put it into practice. So myfirstsale.com/Tuttletwins, you’ll get your special discount. Get started. Tons of fun. Hey Scott, thanks for joining us. That was a great interview.

Brittany: Yes, thank you.

Scott Donald: Thanks, guys. I love what you guys are doing too. Thanks for letting me be a part.

Brittany: What a fun treat for our listeners. Cause I know one thing we talk a lot about is entrepreneurship, but I think this really helps take everything we’ve talked about and kinda give kids an applicable way to do it, to start running their own businesses. So, very exciting.

Connor: Yeah, it’s a great way, I think to put into practice and, actually start to like, get your hands dirty, right? and let’s actually start trying this out. So, I’ve chatted with Scott. What they’re doing is super cool if you guys as a family are looking as like a family project so parents can help their kids launch a little business and put some thought into what it could be. You don’t even ha need to have ideas right now, right? My first sale is set up to kinda help you think through what are the opportunities and what are my skills and what are the problems I can solve. So head to myfirstsale.com/Tuttletwins. We arrange for them to give you guys a fun little deal and you guys can get started. Brittany is always a great conversation and we’ll see you next time.

Brittany: Talk to you Later.