Build A Biz Kids is teaching B.C.’s next generation of entrepreneurs

Kids can be quite creative when it comes to starting a side hustle. Some open a lemonade stand on a hot summer day. Others (when they’re old enough) try their hand at babysitting to save up a bit of money. 

For Leah Coss, CEO and co-founder of Build A Biz Kids, it was selling items at flea markets. “My brother and I, when we were about 11 and 12, we grabbed just anything we could find in our house, and hopped on buses and went by ourselves,” she recalls. “I can still feel that confidence I had about being independent: ‘I can take care of myself and look at me, I’m making real money and I’m talking to strangers.’” 

It’s these same sentiments Coss hopes to foster in the new generation of youth across British Columbia through her charity Build A Biz Kids. Primarily geared towards kids aged 7-14, Build A Biz Kids offers a range of programming including courses, workshops, market days, and partnered events for children to explore their entrepreneurial dreams. 

Through their grants and partnerships with libraries, public schools and other nonprofits, the charity is able to offer more programs to kids that are widely accessible. “The programs are free. They are where the kids live,” Coss says. “They have facilitators designed and trained to work with kids with different learning abilities or lived experiences or language barriers,” she adds.

By working in partnerships rather than distributing the programming themselves, in 2024 Build A Biz Kids increased the number of youth they reached in a year 15 times in just 15 months. “We’re now reaching thousands of kids every year instead of just hundreds, and it’s allowed us to go into even the most remote communities of B.C.,” Coss says, naming Sorrento, Greenwood, Lantzville, B.C. as a few examples. 

Wider reach means more events with adult entrepreneurs too. In February, Build A Biz Kids partnered with Thinkific and CEO Greg Smith to teach kids about leveraging their knowledge by creating courses. Build A Biz Kids has also worked with Brian Scudamore of O2E brands last November to learn about franchise models and pitch to a dragon.  

But it’s at the biannual markets that kids get to show off their sales skills and sell their products to real customers. “What we’re doing is putting kids in these situations where they’re actually launching a real business in a mall to strangers, not just their mom’s friends who are coming over thinking, this is adorable,” Coss says.

Their 2025 summer market will be on July 26th at Lougheed Mall, while their holiday market is usually held at The Amazing Brentwood. “Brentwood mall messaged us after our last event and said that they had broken a historical record for traffic,” Coss says, adding that it’s a family-friendly day that seniors and small business owners alike are inspired by. “These kids, they’re impressive. If you’ve ever been to a market with adults, these kids really rival the quality of what they’re doing and how they’re doing it. It’s quite a sight to be seen,” Coss says.

In terms of the businesses themselves, some kids stick to the tried-and-true products like candles, bath bombs and lip balms. Others are more adventurous and stock 3D printed items, slime or crochet headbands. “The number one thing that people say when they hear about what we do is, ‘I wish I had this when I was a kid,’” she says.

But for Coss, Build A Biz Kids is more than just an opportunity for youth to try their hand at entrepreneurship and learn a few tricks of the trade. It’s important for their mental health.

“Mental health [concerns] in youth under 25 is the highest out of any age group,” she notes.  “If we can get out ahead of it and help kids learn how to validate themselves from the inside so they don’t have to seek that external validation from others, I think that gives us a really big head start in creating a generation of happy individuals that can thrive no matter what society or their personal worlds throw at them.”