The Summer of 2020 was our official kick-off to Grit University - our summer internship program designed to help college age students start and run their own business while learning and implementing time tested life and success principles. This summer the business we created and launched was Grit Camp - a summer sports camp designed to teach mental, physical, and emotional resilience to young people. Here is a 2 minute video we had created by a recent graduate from Flagler College: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPpZiyLPpdg Our two summer interns, Colby Harris and Dylan Tedder, lived in our HQ here in Jacksonville, Florida. Their schedule included waking up at 5:40 am and taking a cold shower, working out from 6 am to 7 am everyday, meditating, breakfast at a local restaurant each morning, setting up and running camp from 8 am to 3 pm each day, marketing and promoting of Grit Camp, selling corporate sponsorships for the camp, outbound sales for an online company Towerclimber.com, reading 5 motivational/self-help books, and daily journaling. They each received a salary of $250 per week for 10 weeks (8 weeks of camp, 1 week of training, and 1 week of paid vacation), and they each received an additional profit sharing check of $3,500 to bring their total summer earnings to $6,000 each. Considering we had only 2 signups just 2 weeks before our first week of camp, the fact that we were a brand new camp that no one had heard of, and surviving during the pandemic shutdowns that occurred before and during the summer, we are very proud of our interns persevering through all of the obstacles and not only meeting our goal for the summer, but also exceeding it. Here are some of the additional highlights from the camp:
ended the summer with 207 total campers
for an additional charge to campers, we offered lunch from local restaurants and provided over $10,000 to local restaurants
hired 15 high school students that earned over 250 service hours and over $5,000 in profit
generated over $35,000 in revenue from campers attending Grit Camp
This past Tuesday, we hosted a banquet at Seasons52 for Colby and Dylan, their parents, and their girlfriends to honor them for the achievements and accomplishments this summer. We are very proud of their level of commitment, the incredible example they set for the campers they led all summer, the professionalism and adaptability they showed in running their business, and the amount of personal growth we saw in them throughout the summer. We hope that not only do they continue to develop the habits and skills they honed this summer, but also to pass on and share these lifestyle changes with others they have a chance to encounter back at school this Fall and beyond. We look forward to hiring more Grit University students for next summer and bringing back Grit Camp for the summer of 2021! Top Left: Colby and I and his summer earnings check Top Right: Myself, Dylan, and Colby on the last day outside of Grit Camp Bottom Left: Some of our summer interns at our appreciation lunch at Top Golf Bottom Right: Dylan, his girlfriend Hunter, and his parents Suzanne and Dale
