With the cancelation of summer activities, trips, and camps due to COVID-19, many students took the initiative to start their own businesses over the summer. Ranging from clothing businesses, car detailing services, bagel delivery services, and more, these students’ businesses serve the community and have taught their owners many valuable lessons.

Deluxe Detail Service, founded by junior Noah Michaelson and other BHS juniors including Ryan Nakisher, Alex Gadd, and Ryan Krause, is a business that provides a deep cleaning of cars. These students were in search of a business endeavor to occupy them over the summer, and they heard about going into car detailing from a neighbor and a cousin who both did the same thing in high school. They immediately knew that starting a detailing business was a perfect opportunity for them since implementing safety policies for COVID-19 would be easy.

To get the business off the ground, Michaelson and his friends made a plan including launching social media accounts to market their new business. Michaelson says, “many of our clients heard about Deluxe Detail from Facebook, so that has been a helpful tool in spreading the word.”The next steps they took were ordering the materials for detailing online, making an organizational spreadsheet, and practicing cleaning the cars of their friends and family.

According to Michaelson, he enjoys the job very much, his favorite parts being able to create his own hours and work with his friends. Even though the job is fun overall, Michaelson says that “there are challenges that we face including organizing and keeping track of equipment and appointments, and managing our finances.” Because of these challenges, Michaelson says, “I have grown as a person and business owner and learned many lessons that I will take with me in the future.” Michaelson learned about staying on top of the tasks that keep a new business running smoothly.

For any student that is looking to start a business, Michaelson says, “Just go for it! Starting a business is a great experience that you will not forget!”

Another student business owner is junior Jordyn Wolf who took over BaGals from Julie Krasnick and Lauren Schostak, members of BHS class of 2020. Wolf and fellow BHS junior Ella Sturtz now run BaGals. Wolf says she has “thoroughly enjoyed the experience.” BaGals is a business that delivers fresh bagels and toppings to families in Huntington Woods and Berkley on Sunday mornings. Although it seems like a simple thing to do, Wolf and Sturtz perform many late night and early morning tasks to ensure the satisfaction of their customers. Starting at 3 pm on Friday, the girls reach out to their customers asking them to submit their bagel orders by Saturday night. When all of the bagel orders are received, they total up the various kinds of bagels and fax over their spreadsheet to New York Bagel for the orders to be ready in the morning. Bright and early at 5:30 on Sunday morning, Sturz and Wolf “start by heading to New York Bagel, picking up the bagels from the back entrance, and bringing them back to one of [their] houses to sort in individual bags.” Throughout the past few months, they have learned the most efficient ways to deliver the bagels which include making a map of all the customers’ addresses so they know which order to go in and keeping a checklist. After about 3 hours, they have delivered the bagels and are done for the weekend!

Although Wolf and Sturtz started a business in the midst of a global pandemic, they feel “these past few months have been a success” and that they have learned a lot so far. Even though they made a few mistakes such as forgetting different items at New York Bagel, they, as well as their customers, are understanding that this is a learning process.

Wolf says,“It is okay to have a few bumps in the road. We learned from our mistakes and have became more mature about running a business and making money.”

Last but not least, Junior Ari Bonds started a clothing business called AZRA over the summer. With all her extra spare time, Bonds found herself sewing and creating new clothing items and bags for herself to wear. When her mom noticed how creative and well done her creations were, she suggested that Bonds start selling them. Bonds started accounts on Instagram and Depop and started reaching out to small influencers and business owners on social media to spread the word about her business.

Bonds primarily sells one-of-a-kind shoulder bags and jewelry in which she describes as “eye catching.” To make her business even more professional, she started a website called shopazra.com from which you can directly order her merchandise. She has creative photos of her designs on her instagram as well as on her website to make her brand gain attention. Although Bonds learned that it takes a lot of patience and determination to start a business, she feels that she has continuously learned more about being a business owner and creator in order to improve her business.

She says that the most rewarding part of starting AZRA is “seeing the satisfaction of strangers and friends after they receive the product she worked so hard on.”

Overall, BHS students used the extra time over the summer to be productive, learn about starting a business, and become young entrepreneurs.