Lemonade venture leads to sweet success for 10-year-old entrepreneur

This article originally appeared on The Philadelphia Tribune.

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When Micah Harrigan started selling flavored lemonade at the age of eight, he had no idea that his business would grow so quickly.

Micah set up a lemonade and tea stand in South Philadelphia and his venture took off. He started to amass a large social media following and has garnered a buzz in the community.

“Me and mom didn’t really expect for it to get this big,” said the 10-year-old owner of Micah’s Mixx.

“That kind of really surprised me. It got a lot bigger than expected.”

Micah said the most interesting thing about being in business is the amount of support that he’s received from the community during the last two years.

He was only seven years old when he came up with the idea of selling lemonade. Micah said he wanted to get a job, but he was too young to work.

“I was trying to figure out something, so we came up with this,” Micah says of his venture.

Micah said he learned some key things about business and making profits by watching an episode of Shark Tank, a pitch show for entrepreneurs.

After two years of running his stand and selling his drinks in various pop ups, Micah is gearing up to take his business on the road. He and his mother, Danielle Harrigan are slated to start selling his lemonade from a mobile food truck in May. The duo launched a fundraiser to turn a school bus into a food truck.

Micah has received a $1,025 donation from Jeff Brown, president of Brown’s SuperStores, for his truck.

“He’s a dynamo,” Brown says of Micah.

“I was interested in business when I was that age and I was very enthusiastic about it. When I see Micah, I see myself when I was that age.”

“I just think that it’s very important that we let a young person grow into their skills and that we make opportunities available,” Brown continued. “It’s just part of building an entrepreneur for the future.”

Micah recently held a pop up event at the ShopRite of Oregon Avenue, marking the first time he vended at a major grocery store.

Brown plans to invite Micah back to set up at his stores once his food truck is up and running.

Harrigan is very proud of her son’s accomplishments. She often reads people’s social media comments after Micah is featured on the news and while most of the feedback is positive, some believe that she is pushing him to do this.

When they vend at pop up events, Harrigan said she’s often in the background, while Micah interacts with his customers.

“If anybody has ever watched Micah at a pop up, they’ll know that it’s something that he likes to do,” she said.

While Harrigan helps mix the drinks and drives her son to pop up events, she says Micah’s Mixx is all his. He has his LLC and an business bank account in his name.

“He comes up with his ideas and I just help,” Harrigan said.

Micah is a student at the Girard Academic Music Program. When the kid entrepreneur isn’t working on his school work or business, he enjoys playing video games, listening to music and watching soccer.

Micah’s Mixx offers a variety of lemonade flavors including traditional, blue raspberry, peach, strawberry and watermelon.

The lemonade is currently being sold at Josie’s Food Market, Rowhouse Grocery and V Marks the Shop in Philadelphia and Haddon Culinary in Collingwood, New Jersey.

Micah has ambitious plans for the future.

“We decided one of our main goals once the business really improves is franchises and/or celebrity promotion to help with the advertising,” he said.