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A 5-year-old child from Seattle is showing that there isn’t an age requirement for wanting to help others.
Edison Juel was on a family trip on Hawaii’s Big Island when the devastating wildfires occurred in the island of Maui, which have killed a confirmed 115 people and nearly destroyed the town of Lahaina. Edison, whose nickname is Eddie, overheard his parents watching news reports of the tragedy.
“It was Wednesday afternoon, we had the news on and he asked me to turn it off, because he said that made him too sad,” Eddie’s mother, Ami Juel told USA TODAY. “At that point, I realized he really was paying attention and listening, that we needed to actually address it. I hadn’t really intended to tell him about it necessarily.”
Ami said their family had stayed in Lahaina earlier that year and explained where the fires were at and that he was safe but that many people were hurt. While it was difficult for Eddie to comprehend the devastation at a young age, it was easy for him to want to help people in any way he could.
‘Burned down to ashes’:Why devastated Lahaina Town is such a cherished place on Maui
Weeks later after they returned from their trip, Eddie shared the idea of starting a stand, similar to one he had seen on a previous Colorado trip, and donating all the money to support victims of the wildfires. Amy said she and her husband immediately supported the idea and set up a lemonade stand on Saturday on their busy Seattle street.
The stand ran from 10am to 6pm and sold pink and yellow lemonade, sparkling water, popsicles, ice cream sandwiches, candy and some of Eddie’s toys, Ami said. Ami posted videos on social media and told their friends and family. Lemonade sold for a dollar each, but most people gave $5, $10 and $20 bills as part of their donation.
To Ami and her husband’s surprise their one day business found success quickly. Back to back cars would line up to purchase summer refreshments and many people donated online including one person from Honolulu who heard about the business from local news coverage.
“Most people were like, ‘this is so cool. What a great idea. We’ve been looking for ways to help. We felt so helpless and didn’t know where to donate,'” Ami said. “A lot of people came by and stopped and told us like their story of a trip to Hawaii or some connection they had to the island.”
The lemonade stand made over $17,000 as of Friday, with combination of profits from the stand, online donations and corporate matching from programs at Ami and her husband’s jobs.
Ami said Eddie had a great time with the whole process with the exception of the amount of thank you videos he had to record in regard to Venmo donations. He especially loved giving detailed product summaries to customers at the lemonade stand.
“I don’t think he understands that this is just like not a normal response,” Ami shared. “I had a lemonade stand as a kid. I remember waving and smiling for a long time hoping to get a car every now and then. But it was like, there’s periods where it was just every car stopped.”
Ami and her husband were proud of Eddie’s creativity and generosity and happy to support his positive ideas.
“Struck by how his generosity invited others to be generous,” Ami said. “It was not something we could have orchestrated for him so it was nice to see that was an idea he has.”
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