Bios
Long Bio
Brian Weisfeld is a thought leader in creativity and innovation, an author, and a passionate advocate for youth entrepreneurship who has been building businesses his entire life. In elementary school, he bought 95 pounds of gummy bears and hired his friends to sell them. As a teen, he made and sold mixtapes, sorted baseball cards (he got paid in cards), babysat four-days-a-week after school, and sold nuts and dried fruit (and more gummy bears) in a neighborhood store.
As an adult, Brian helped build well-known, billion-dollar companies including IMAX Corporation and Coupons.com. But everything changed when he watched his oldest daughter struggle to sell Girl Scout cookies, and he became increasingly frustrated by the lack of empowering influences for his two girls. So he bought a copy of Writing Children’s Books for Dummies and began a new journey: to inspire kids (especially girls!) to start their first lemonade stands or businesses, and to empower them with an entrepreneurial mindset.
Brian has co-authored several award-winning youth-entrepreneurship books including Penguin’s You’re The Boss: A Kid’s Ultimate Guide to Starting Your Own Business, a Junior Library Guild Gold Selection, and Macmillan’s The Startup Squad book series which was recommended by the American Library Association (ALA) as a diverse and inclusive read to teach young people about money.
Brian also founded and is the Executive Director of The Startup Squad Foundation, a fiscally-sponsored nonprofit dedicated to teaching entrepreneurship to girls from underserved communities.
Working with children opened Brian’s eyes to their remarkable creativity. Drawing on his professional experiences, Brian now helps adults and organizations become more creative and innovative by learning to think like 10-year olds. Brian delivers powerful keynotes, book talks, and workshops that elevate corporate creativity and innovation by driving people to innovate like a child and deliver like an expert. He has spoken to thousands of kids and adults across three continents during his career and was featured on Good Morning America for his work.
Brian lives in Silicon Valley and can often be found eating gummy bears with his wife while watching his two daughters sell lemonade from the end of their driveway.
Visit and learn more about Brian at brianweisfeld.com.
Medium Bio
Brian Weisfeld is a thought leader in creativity and innovation, an author, and a passionate advocate for youth entrepreneurship who has been building businesses his entire life. As a kid, he bought gummy bears and hired his friends to sell them. As a teen, he sorted baseball cards, babysat, and sold mixtapes. As an adult, he helped build well-known, billion-dollar companies including IMAX Corporation and Coupons.com.
Inspired by watching his daughters sell Girl Scout Cookies, Brian co-authored several traditionally-published books to inspire kids to start their first businesses and learn to think like entrepreneurs. His books have been recognized by both the Junior Library Guild and the American Library Association. He also founded The Startup Squad Foundation, a non-profit dedicated to teaching entrepreneurship to girls from underserved communities.
Working with kids opened Brian’s eyes to their remarkable creativity. Drawing on his professional experiences, he now inspires adults and organizations to be more creative and innovative by learning to think like 10-year olds.
Brian has spoken to thousands of kids and adults across three continents during his career and was featured on Good Morning America for his work. Brian lives in Silicon Valley with his wife and two daughters.
Baby Bio
Brian Weisfeld is a thought leader in creativity and innovation who spent his life building businesses, from starting a childhood gummy bear business to helping build IMAX Corporation and Coupons.com. He is also an award-winning children’s book author, a passionate advocate for youth entrepreneurship, and the founder of The Startup Squad Foundation, a non-profit dedicated to teaching entrepreneurship to girls from underserved communities. Brian’s work with kids opened his eyes to their remarkable creativity. Drawing on his professional experiences, he now inspires adults and companies to be more creative and innovative by learning to think like 10-year olds. Brian lives in Silicon Valley with his wife and two daughters.
YOU’RE THE BOSS:
A Kid’s Ultimate Guide to Starting Your Own Business
You’re The Boss
A Kid’s Ultimate Guide to Starting Your Own Business!
From the the renowned entrepreneur and co-author of The Startup Squad series, You’re The Boss: A Kid’s Ultimate Guide to Starting Your Own Business is a guide to entrepreneurship filled with everything a kid, tween, or teen needs to know to start their own business: from business ideas to finding customers to pricing products to building an empire!
Are you bursting with great ideas for a new business but aren’t quite sure where to start? Do you know that you’d be great at selling something but first need to figure out what that “something” actually is? Are you gearing up to be an entrepreneur but think that kids can’t really build anything big? If any of these sound like you—you’ve come to the right book!
You’re never too young to start a business. Whether you want to launch a babysitting service, run a lemonade stand, sell crafts online—or don’t even know what business to start—You’re the Boss is here to help. In this book, you’ll learn how to figure out which business is right for you, find your ideal customers, manage the competition, calculate costs and profits, pitch your ideas, and so much more.
Ready to build up the confidence, creativity, and grit that come along with being an entrepreneur—and ready to make some money and build your business empire along the way? Let You’re the Boss show you how!
You’re The Boss Book Cover (1.98 MB)
The Startup Squad Books
The Startup Squad (Book #1)
Girls mean business in a brand-new middle grade series about friendship and entrepreneurship!
All the great leaders had to start somewhere. And Theresa (“Resa” for short) is starting with the lemonade stand competition her teacher assigned to the class—but making it a success is going to be a lot harder than Resa thinks. The prize: line-skipping tickets to Adventure Central. The competition: Val, Resa’s middle school nemesis. And the biggest obstacle to success: Resa’s own teammates. Harriet is the class clown, Amelia is the new girl who thinks she knows best, and Didi is Resa’s steadfast friend—who doesn’t know the first thing about making or selling lemonade. The four of them quickly realize that the recipe for success is tough to perfect—but listening to each other is the first step. And making new friends might be the most important one…
The back of each book features tips from The Startup Squad and an inspirational profile of a girl entrepreneur!
Face The Music (Book #2)
In the second book of The Startup Squad series, Face the Music, Harriet’s brothers are hoping to enter a local battle of the bands. Winning could get them on a reality TV show! But low funds have left them without even a working guitar.
The Startup Squad jumps into action—and quickly pulls together a plan to sell T-shirts to raise money. They have a lot of great ideas—until everything starts to go wrong. Ruined t-shirts, musicians with stage fright, and money mishaps soon leave the girls with less funding than they started with.
When disappointed fans become an angry mob, the team realizes they have to get back into the groove before the band members—and the Startup Squad—break up for good!
The Startup Squad: Face The Music Cover (2.0 MB)
The Startup Squad: Face The Music Press Release (0.6 MB)
The Startup Squad: Face the Music Kirkus Review
Party Problems (Book #3)
Girls mean business in the third novel of this series about friendship and entrepreneurship that Katherine Applegate, Newbery Medal-winning author of The One and Only Ivan, calls “A great read!”
All four friends in the Startup Squad want to raise money—but when they can’t agree on what business to start next, they strike off on their own. Didi’s idea seems perfect: making place cards for a wedding.
But after the wedding planner gets sick, Didi finds herself in charge of everything—and then the caterer cancels and the band goes missing! Didi’s business is turning from a dream to a disaster. Will the Startup Squad come together in time to save the wedding?
BRIAN WEISFELD SPEAKING REEL
A taste of Brian in action inspiring adults and organizations to be more innovative and creative by thinking like 10-year olds.
THE IMPORTANCE OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP EDUCATION
Why is it so important that we teach kids entrepreneurship. Because entrepreneurship education changes kids’ lives. Watch my TEDx about to learn more about why I am so passionate about this topic.
MY INSPIRATION AND HOW YOU CAN FIND YOURS
Learn how my two daughters, several boxes of girl scout cookies, and too many fairy books inspired me to create The Startup Squad and how you can kindle your inspiration into something that just might change the world!