Cameron Johnson was only nine years old when he began his first business. It was named Cheers for Tears and this company sold greeting and other cards. He found this inspiration from creating invitations for his parent’s holiday party.
A few years later, when Cameron was 12, he bought his sister’s collection of Ty Beanie Babies. He sold them online and profited tenfold. From here, he went straight to the Ty company. He purchased them at wholesale and continued to sell them on eBay and his Cheers for Tears website.
Soon, he had saved over $50,000. He used this to work on his next project, My EZ Mail. This was a computer service that could forward e-mails while keeping the personal details of the sender anonymous. Johnson hired a programmer that completed the program and two years later, My EZ Mail produced approximately $3,000 per month.
His next venture took him into the space of online advertisements. He and two other teens teamed up to form an online advertising company called Surfingprizes.com. The company “provided scrolling advertisements across the top of users’ Web browsers. Those who downloaded the software received 20 cents per hour (a tiny fraction of the value to the advertiser) for the inconvenience of having ads splay across their computer screens.”(Forbes.com)
This was so successful that “By the age of 15, he has been receiving checks amounting to $300,000 to $400,000 a month.”(leadershipintellect) Before he graduated from high school, Johnson was already worth over a million dollars.
Cameron Johnson is now CEO of Magic City Ford Lincoln. This is a dealership in Virginia that was founded by his great-grandfather.(aboutcameronjohnson) He also writes many books about entrepreneurship and public speeches.
The First Million: Cameron Johnson (forbes.com)
Cameron Johnson: Through Cheers and Tears | Leadership Intellect (wordpress.com)
Wow, Cameron was such an innovator at such a young age! So cool and encouraging to see. Overall great blog post very informative.
This was a very interesting story because at first I thought you were just blogging about a young entrepreneur and than you continued to explain the rest of Cameron’s journey as an entrepreneur. It is also very encouraging to see how much a person can grow and thrive.
This was a very interesting story because at first I thought you were just blogging about a young entrepreneur and than you continued to explain the rest of Cameron’s journey as an entrepreneur. It is also very encouraging to see how much a person can grow and thrive.