Mikaila Ulmer
The 14-year-old founder and CEO of Me & the Bees Lemonade based in Austin, Texas, U.S. started her company as a lemonade stand at the age of four. She was inspired to start this business when at that young age, she was encouraged to make a product for the Acton’s Children’s Business Fair and was stung by a bee. After her great-grandmother sent her family a recipe book that had a recipe for Flaxseed Lemonade, she became obsessed with bees and their effect on the environment.
In 2009, at the age of 4, she started a simple lemonade stand which has since developed into a full-blown family business sold in several food stores in Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, and Texas. Ulmer, who was named one of TIME magazine’s most influential teens of 2017 has visited the White House and met former president Barack Obama on several occasions. In 2017, she mentioned that she was writing a children’s book on how to start and grow a business.