Young Entrepreneur Launches High School Startups.comTo Help Turn Teenagers Into Millionaires;...

Business Editors/Education Writers

PALM SPRINGS, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov. 1, 2000

HighSchoolStartups.com, the first site created by and for teen entrepreneurs, launched today to encourage entrepreneurship among teenagers.

High School Startups.com (www.highschoolstartups.com)

offers teenagers a startups guide providing nuts and bolts advice on launching an e-business, a $5,000+ national business plan competition, a $1,500 Web site competition, information on starting a High School Startups Club as an extracurricular activity, and a full directory of Internet internship listings.

"The days of lemonade stands and babysitting businesses are long gone," said the 22 year-old founder of HighSchoolStartups, Geoff Cook. "High School students have a significant advantage as entrepreneurs since they need not make $100K in their first year to pay their mortgage, feed their families, or replace their current income. HighSchoolStartups.com will help the new generation of young businesspeople capitalize on this advantage to emerge with the upper-hand in e-business."

Cook founded the site after learning firsthand how difficult it is to start an e-business as a young person. At 19, he founded the company EssayEdge.com. "Running EssayEdge out of my dorm room and trying to juggle classes, investors, and customers was not easy," said Cook.

By his senior year of college however, he was pulling in over $60,000 a month from his 10' x 10' Harvard dorm room. Four days after he graduated, he closed a round of investment for over a million dollars and now runs his 100+ person business from his desert headquarters in Palm Springs. HighSchoolStartups.com does not charge students for any information or services and only runs banner advertising for Cook's favorite charities, like the Muscular Dystrophy Association, GreenPeace, American Red Cross, etc.

Designed as a destination site for young people serious about entrepreneurship, HighSchoolStartups.com features:

-- Start-Up Guide: Students learn how use youth to a business advantage,
promote the business without expensive banner advertising, pick a server,
design a site, establish a legal corporation, conduct e-commerce, select
partners, etc.

-- Business Plan Competition: The greatest young entrepreneurs compete
nationally for over $5,000 in prizes. The prize money will grow as more
sponsors are found.

-- Startup Club: Realizing that not all students are ready to start an
e-business, students learn how to start a High School Startups Club in their
school to discuss entrepreneurship with other students and to gain a valuable
extracurricular activity that helps with college admissions.

-- Community: Entrepreneurial teens will have the opportunity to learn find an
Internet internship, learn from their peers, read inspirational articles on
those who have made it and so on.