Dear Shareholders (that's Mom, Dad, and my little brother Dev who got paid in cookies),

I am pleased to report that Maya's Lemonade completed its first full season of operations on August 29, 1999, with a total profit of $187.40. That is more than I made from my birthday and Diwali money put together last year. This page is the whole story, with the real numbers, because my dad says a business that doesn't write its numbers down isn't a business, it's a hobby.

I got the idea in May when our teacher had us read about how companies keep books. I asked my dad (he's an engineer, not an accountant, but he does our taxes) if I could run a real stand with a real ledger, and he said yes if I kept track of EVERYTHING and paid back what I borrowed. So I did. The ledger is a green notebook with columns I ruled myself. I typed it all in here in September.

Company facts: One location (the corner of our street, under Mrs. Alvarez's big maple tree). Open Saturdays and Sundays, about 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., June 5 through August 29. Price: 50 cents a cup. Cookies added June 26 at 25 cents each. Total cups sold: 631. Total cookies sold: 238.

"Costs" means what I spent that weekend on lemons, sugar, cups, ice, and (after June 26) cookie ingredients. I bought the groceries with my mom at the store on Friday nights and kept the receipts in an envelope taped inside the notebook. Revenue means money in the cash box (it's my dad's old tackle box) at the end of Sunday, minus the $5.00 in change I start with.

Where the profit went: $100.00 into my savings account at the bank (I have a passbook), $50.00 saved for next summer's start-up (I want a real cooler), $20.00 to the animal shelter, and $17.40 I spent. On what is my business.

Loans: I borrowed $20.00 from Dad on June 4 for the first groceries and paid it back on June 13. No interest, but he did make me sign a piece of paper.

1. THE SIGN. My first sign was a piece of notebook paper. You couldn't read it from a car. On June 12 I made a big one on yellow poster board with black letters six inches tall that just says LEMONADE 50¢ with an arrow. Sales went up 29% that weekend (40 cups instead of 31). I also put a smaller sign at the other end of the street so people driving in would know.
2. THE SHADY CORNER. For three weekends I was in front of our house, which gets full sun. Nobody wants to stand in the sun to buy lemonade, and the ice melted really fast, which is a cost. Mrs. Alvarez at the corner said I could set up under her maple tree. It's cooler, and more people walk past a corner than the middle of the block. Best decision of the summer.
3. THE COOKIE UPSELL. This was my mom's idea. When someone buys a cup, I ask "Would you like a cookie with that for a quarter?" About 4 out of 10 people said yes. Chocolate chip. Mom's recipe. One batch makes about 40 and costs around $2.50 to make, so cookies are actually a better deal for me than lemonade. Dad called this "margin." I call it "cookies."
4. SAYING HI. If you sit there and don't say anything people walk by. If you say "Hi! Would you like some fresh-squeezed lemonade?" they stop. Fresh-squeezed is the key word. It's true, too.
5. THE CASH BOX WITH CHANGE. I start every day with $5.00 in quarters and dimes. At first I didn't have change and a lady gave me a dollar for one cup and told me to keep it. That was nice but it's not a system.

1. THE RAINY WEEKEND (July 24-25). I bought all the groceries Friday night like always. Saturday it poured. I sat under the porch roof with the sign for two hours and sold 9 cups total, mostly to my neighbors who felt sorry for me. Sunday was drizzly and nobody came. The lemons and the ice were already bought, so I lost $3.65. LESSON: Watch the weather on the news on Friday before shopping. Now I check. Also, ice can't be saved but lemons can last a week in the fridge, so buy the ice on the day.
2. TOO MANY LEMONS the first weekend. I bought 24 lemons for 31 cups. That's dumb. Now I know one lemon makes about 3 to 4 cups. See the recipe.
3. PINK LEMONADE. I tried it one Saturday in July with food coloring. It tasted the same but three people asked what was in it and looked suspicious. Went back to regular.
4. MY BROTHER AS AN EMPLOYEE. Dev is 7. He spilled a pitcher, ate the inventory (4 cookies) and quit at 1:00 to watch TV. He was paid in cookies so at least he was cheap.
5. THE "LOYALTY CARD." I made punch cards, buy 5 get 1 free. Two people took one. One came back. Not worth the time it took to make 30 of them.

Makes one big pitcher (about 2 quarts), which is about 10 cups the size I sell (I fill the 9 oz. cups about 3/4 full with ice in first).

• 1 cup fresh lemon juice (that's 5 or 6 lemons, roll them on the counter first to get more juice)
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 6 cups cold water
• Ice

Stir the sugar into ONE cup of the water until it's totally dissolved (Mom heats it on the stove a little to make a syrup and that works better). Then add the lemon juice and the rest of the water. Taste it. If it's too sour add a little more sugar, if it's too sweet add water. Keep the pitcher in the cooler and put ice in the CUPS, not the pitcher, or it gets watery by 2:00.

Cost per pitcher: about $1.90 for lemons (at 3 for a dollar, which is what they mostly were this summer), about 25 cents of sugar, 10 cups at about 4 cents each, and ice. Call it $2.75 to make ten 50-cent cups. That's why it works.

• A real cooler so I stop losing ice. (Budgeted: $50.00 saved.)
• Iced tea as a second drink. Costs almost nothing to make. Grown-ups asked for it three times.
• Open Friday afternoons too if Mom says OK, because Friday after work people are walking the dog.
• Hire my friend Jessica for the Fourth of July weekend and split it. One person can't pour AND make change AND say hi when there's a line.
• A weather rule: if the news says 50% chance of rain or more, don't buy ice, and buy half the lemons.
• Goal: $250.00 profit. Dad says that's ambitious. I say I already know where the shady corner is.
• Also my dad says if I keep this up I might have to learn about sales tax. He was kind of joking. I think.

If you are a kid with a lemonade stand, e-mail me and tell me your numbers! I want to know if 50 cents is the right price everywhere. And if you are a grown-up who wants to give me business advice, that's OK too, but I already know about location, location, location.