Like most 16-year-olds, Saffron Hickey has big dreams.
And with ambitions to work as a freelancer in hospitality and event management, the Cochranite has years of work ahead of her. But Saffron doesn’t shy away from a little hard work.
“Entrepreneurship and business have been a part of my live forever,” said Saffron, whose parents, Dominic and Zeta Hickey own Cochrane Early Learning Centre.
Helping her inch her way towards her dreams is her involvement with Junior Achievement of Southern Alberta (JA), where she has been working with a group of 14 students to develop Mugshot: A Junior Achievement Company.
Named president and CEO of the company, which produces recipe shots of 13 hot beverages and seven baked goods, Saffron has been able to try her hand at planning, problem solving, working with professional companies and teamwork.
“It’s amazingly professional,” commented her father Dominic on the JA program. “They aren’t just hanging out at the mall. (The students) are so ambitious and so dedicated.”
The program is designed to give students between the ages of 14 and 17 a professional edge, agreed JA Bow West regional coordinator Kim Williams-Lowe.
“It’s to give the students a taste of how a small business runs,” she said. “It takes them through the ups and downs… from start to finish.”
The student run companies are developed by the students, although they are under the watchful eye of local advisors. The teenagers learned everything from financial literacy, and market and product research, to developing business plans and shareholder reports.
Saffron can attest to the hardships and successes associated with running Mugshot. She was quick to admit she learned a few lessons over the duration of the program.
“The planning was such a huge part of the process,” she said. “But we found when things seemed really bad, it meant things are going to get better. Around Christmastime, everything was up in the air…but everything came together.
For Saffron, a Grade 11 student of a homeschool program, one of the biggest surprises of the program came following the mid-program business exam. She said she, and the rest of the Mugshot crew, did very well.
“It’s surprising how so much of the terminology and business practicalities sunk in,” she laughed. “We learned so much quicker when putting it into practice, rather than studying it from a textbook.”
As of Feb. 19, Mugshot has sold 50 Recipe Shots, with plans to sell the remainder of their inventory in the next few weeks, before the end of the JA program. In April, the group will join the rest of their JA peers at a celebration for all of the companies in Southern Alberta. At that time, scholarships and awards will be doled out.
Like Saffron, not all the students who participate in the program pursue a proper business degree. And that’s okay, said Williams-Lowe.
“They don’t necessarily have to go straight into a business program,” she said. “But, no matter what you do, most of us end up operating our own business to some extent. These skills apply for such a wide variety of careers.”
Junior Achievement offers a variety of programs beyond that of the 18-week project. Williams-Lowe runs programs that teach and encourage financial literacy for school children Grade 4 and up.
For more information on Junior Achievement of Southern Alberta, visit southern-alberta.jacan.org.
As for Mugshot, the student-run company will be selling their Recipe Shots at the Cochrane Early Learning Centre, as well as online at mugshot.jasacompanies.org. Check out their Facebook page, found under Mugshot — A Junior Achievement Company, sponsored by Encana, for more sales locations. The Recipe Shots will be selling for $20.
