6-year-old, lemonade stand entrepreneur, donates profits to Red Cross
A North Las Vegas kindergartner donated more than $800 to the Southern Nevada American Red Cross Chapter, proceeds from his lemonade stand.
Henry Williams, a 6-year-old, woke up before 7 a.m. on Oct. 15 to start selling five batches of lemonade, a gallon of iced tea, 24 loaves of banana bread and 48 cookies through a lemonade stand in his neighborhood. His father posted on a Facebook community page the night before and the next morning, and the lemonade stand sold out by 11 a.m.
On Thursday evening, Williams and his family handed over the profits from his lemonade stand to Rachel Flanigan, executive director of the American Red Cross of Southern Nevada. His donations are going directly to funding lifesaving fire alarms, like the ones that saved a North Las Vegas family of seven who escaped a blaze because of fire alarms installed by the organization.
“It’s for all the good things you guys do,” Williams told Flanigan. Williams will make more than 40 families safer with his donation, Flanigan said.
She has set a goal to make 400 homes safer in Southern Nevada this year.
Williams was watching “Sesame Street” where he saw Elmo and the Cookie Monster had a lemonade stand to donate books to a local library. He told his mom he wanted to help his community, too.
“Henry approached me about doing a charity lemonade stand to give back, and he asked me to put together a list of my charities and what they do,” said Heather Williams, the 6-year-old’s mother. “He wanted the Red Cross because they donate smoke detectors and help people that have home fires.”
They started planning to have the lemonade stand when his dad came back from a military deployment.
In preparation for the lemonade stand, Williams’ father and grandfather helped squeeze the lemons. His 3-year-old brother helped make the banana bread.
“The Red Cross is grateful for all donations, large and small,” Flanigan said. “But Henry’s donation and story literally brought tears to our eyes. For such a young child to have a sense of giving to his community is truly heartwarming.”
After selling out before the afternoon, he persuaded his parents and grandfather to match his donations which brought the total donation to $881.88.
Henry Williams has already started to plan the next lemonade stand and told his mom that they’re going to need more supplies.
“We’re so proud of him,” Heather Williams said.
Contact Jimmy Romo at jromo@reviewjournal.com or call 702-383-0350. Follow @jimi_writes on Twitter.
