How it works

Students do not just learn about business. They run one.

They write a plan, pitch it to family and friends, record what people put behind them, spend it on the idea, sell something to a real customer, and write back to their backers about how it went.

It is a first funding round, scaled down to a twelve year old. No money passes through Hatchable at any point.

1. 1

   The business plan

   They work out what they are actually building

   Across the middle of the course, students fill in a one page business plan. Who has the problem, what the answer is, what it costs to make, how they would reach people. It builds up module by module rather than being written in one go, so by the end it is theirs and they can defend every line of it.

2. 2

   The pitch deck

   They build a pitch and share it with people who know them

   A page with their idea, a video if they want one, the plan behind it, and what they are asking for. It has a private link. Nobody can find it by searching, and the student can switch it off or change the link at any time.

3. 3

   The friends and family round

   Family and friends back them

   An aunt watches the pitch and says she is in for $25. A neighbour puts in $10. Hatchable writes it down. The money itself moves the way that family already moves money, by e-transfer or in cash, and the student ticks it off when it arrives.

4. 4

   Use of funds

   They spend it, and they can see where it went

   Supplies, ingredients, materials, a stall at a market. The student records what they spent. Their money page adds up what came in and what went out and tells them the difference, including when that difference is negative, which it usually is at the start.

5. 5

   Revenue

   They sell something to somebody who is not their mum

   A simple shop page with a private link. Customers choose what they want and reserve it. There is no card and no checkout. They pay the student in person when they collect it, which is how a school fair has always worked.

6. 6

   The backer update

   They write back to the people who backed them

   Three questions. What happened, what did you learn, what next. The numbers are already filled in because we know them. Once the student publishes it, everyone holding the pitch link sees it at the top of the page, above the ask.

Questions people ask

Does Hatchable take any of the money?

No, and it never touches it. We record what people promised and what the student marked as received. The money moves between the family and the student directly, in whatever way they already send each other money. We take no cut of it, because it never passes through us.

So it is not real money?

It is entirely real money. What is not real is Hatchable being involved in it. A student who raises $140 has $140, sent to them by people they know. We just keep the record straight.

Is this asking children to fundraise from relatives?

It is asking them to explain an idea well enough that someone chooses to back it, which is a different thing and is the actual skill. Nobody is obliged to pledge anything. A student whose family cannot put money in still does every other part of the course, and a pitch that gets no backers is a normal and useful outcome to have to write about afterwards.

Why not just use Shopify or Etsy?

Because a student under 18 cannot hold the account. Shopify and Etsy both require the account holder to be 18, and Square has no provision for minors at all. On those platforms a parent has to be the merchant, accept the terms and carry the tax, so the young person is helping run a business that legally belongs to somebody else. Here they own it, because no payment goes through us and so there is no merchant account to open.

Who can see a student's pitch?

Only people the student sends the link to. Pitch pages are not listed anywhere, are not indexed by search engines, and there is no way to browse from one to another. The student can unshare at any time, or generate a new link, which immediately breaks every link they sent before.

What does the teacher see?

Which lessons each student has finished, what they have handed in, and their pitch if they enter it into a class showcase. Teachers approve every showcase entry before anyone outside the class can see it.