Ideas don’t have to break the bank! 20,000 young people loaned £10 and challenged to make a profit AND a difference in a month

School students this morning raided a giant piggybank outside the Bank of England building…but only took £10 each.

The event was one of several across the UK to launch Make Your Mark with a Tenner, a national enterprise competition which is loaning 20,000 young people £10 each, challenging them to make as much profit and social impact as they can in just one month.  A loan from the Tenner bank will give them the chance to make a profit far greater than today’s interest rates.

Those taking part include students in primary and secondary schools across the UK plus youth organisations like Medway Secure Training Unit, Liverpool Guides and UK Youth Parliament. All will be doing their best to turn their tenner loan into a larger sum. Once they have repaid the loan they can then choose to re-invest any profits into their business idea, give them to a good cause or even pocket them.

Oli Barrett, entrepreneur and founder of Make Your Mark with a Tenner, says: “Make Your Mark with a Tenner encourages young people to put a small amount of money to good use, with the chance of making a significant return, in stark contrast to the current economic crisis. Each participant will make the most of their own skills and talents, and experience first-hand what it’s like to turn an idea into a real money-making project.”

The competition is run by Make Your Mark, the campaign to give young people the confidence, skills and ambition to be enterprising. It is supported by NESTA (the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts) and funded by entrepreneurs Peter Jones and Michael and Xochi Birch, the founders of social networking site Bebo.

Michael and Xochi Birch comment: “Children and young people are naturally innovative and creative. Make Your Mark with a Tenner allows them to channel that natural ability while focusing on a very noble goal. This process shows them what can be achieved with an entrepreneurial mindset and hopefully giving them the inspiration to pursue a similar path later in life.”

There are 360 organisations enabling their young people to take part, and participants are already thinking big:
• Students at Orton Longueville in Peterborough plan to sell roses for Valentine’s Day, and they are working with a primary school who want to use the money to raise chickens!
• Teacher Eddie Lyall at Rossett school in North Yorkshire is allowing the whole of his year 7 and 8 students to apply for 500 tenners
• 2,000 students are taking part at Lutterworth College in Leicester

When the competition ran in 2007, the average profit on £10 was £90, the highest individual profit on £10 was £410, and the biggest team profit was £1,000 based on five students clubbing together.

Initiatives such as Make Your Mark with a Tenner are a great way for young people to learn enterprise skills and develop money-making ideas in a low-risk environment. Research shows that participants of enterprise training or experiences are much more likely to think about setting up their own business (GEM 2006).

Research released today by Creative Partnerships to promote July’s National Schools Festival, Shine, suggests that while half of the UK’s young people are concerned about the current economic climate, there is still a spirit of entrepreneurialism amongst 14 – 18 year-olds. They see the financial crisis as an opportunity for them to be more enterprising with their talents.
• One in five (20%) would consider starting their own business, with over two fifths (45%) considering selling on eBay
• More than one in ten (12%) are considering setting up a money-making venture in school

www.makeyourmark.org.uk/tenner