Students gain market experience

Students that are a part of the Barbados Entrepreneurship Foundation’s $20 Challenge, got the opportunity to gain some business experience during the Mega Flea Market, which took place St. Gabriel’s Primary School grounds last Saturday.

Sophia Lisk, Assistant Programme Coordinator at the Barbados Entrepreneurship Foundation (BEF) told The Barbados Advocate that the BEF tried to provide students with marketplace opportunities where they got to interact with the general public.

“You usually have various competitions that don’t always give students the opportunity to interact with the general public. So we try to choose different marketplaces so that they have the
opportunity to interact with different types of people and learn different ways in which to market themselves,” she said.

“At the end of November we were at the Sky Mall and now we’re here, which is a different atmosphere, which means they are forced to gauge their techniques to sell and lure people into their area.”

Lisk noted that the challenge was meant to give them a taste of what it was like to have and operate their own businesses. She revealed that this year they had the largest number of schools involved in the challenge.

“We have 18 schools participating this year, which is the most we’ve had so far. We have Graydon Sealy Secondary School with the largest contingent of students as well,” she said.

“We have businesses in the range of beauty products, food, and beverages, arts and craft. They’re some things that are unique that you don’t see too often like the Origami Creations and the lip scrubs and face scrubs. The students have been extremely creative with the things that they have been putting forward to us this year.”

She added that 45 businesses were present yesterday morning, totalling just under 100 students.

Twelve-year-old Melanie Alleyne and Alyssa Blades, also 12, from Queen’s College (QC) expressed that they were very excited to be there yesterday and noted that they were looking forward to the selling their Origami creations and interacting with the consumers. Meanwhile Isabella Serrette and Kayla Walker, also of QC, mentioned that while they were excited to be a part of the big flea market, it was going to be a challenge for them to lure in customers due to their introvert behaviours. However, they noted that their shyness was not going to be a hindrance, as they were committed to getting customers for their businesses.