Jacob Rosenfeld is hunched over his laptop, plugging complicated algorithms into his Excel spreadsheet. His eyes light up when he calculates all the dough he’s made this quarter.
But this ambitious, hard-charging businessman isn’t cleaning up on Wall Street — he’s cleaning up snowy driveways and sidewalks in his Teaneck, NJ, nabe. Although he has yet to conquer the corridors of capitalism, the 15-year-old ninth-grader is already piling up cash from his booming shoveling business.
“This winter alone, I have brought in around $600,” says Rosenfeld, who’s such a pro that he even uses a specialized credit-card reader called Square to collect payments. “People don’t have cash on them, so to remedy my issue, I started taking credit cards. It’s defeated those awkward situations in which my customers owe me money.”
Apparently there is one group of people loving this winter’s arctic temperatures and mammoth white drifts: enterprising NYC-area teens who are doing big business courtesy of the never-ending snow and a little (frozen) elbow grease.
Eighteen-year-old twins Alexander and Daniel Martin easily cornered the shoveling market on their quiet street in Windsor Terrace, Brooklyn, this season.
“There’s no competition — we’re the only ones out there,” explains Daniel. Their proud mom, Pamela, kvells: “They put the shovels over their shoulders and march down the street. I put out an e-mail to the neighborhood list, and they’ve become quite popular.”
The brothers’ strategy? “We have a snow blower, but we prefer a manual shovel,” says a stoic Daniel. With the pluck of a captain of industry, he adds: “We’re pretty physically fit, so we don’t feel the effects like older people.”
They’ve already dug up $300 in profits this year, but because their school has been Scrooge-y with snow days, the teens are often forced off the clock; they lament the loss of profits to pro plowers who scour the area as soon as they head to class.
And they’re not the only budding CEOs frustrated by the woeful shortage of snow days.
Alex Berger, a 13-year-old from Edgemont, NY, often hounds his mom for permission to stay home from eighth grade in order to scoop out the neighbors’ driveways. His mother, Donna, recalls his frequent winter morning refrain: “Please, mom, can I miss school to shovel?”
There’s no stopping the 5-foot-9, 140-pound shoveling machine from keeping his eye on the prize on bitterly cold days, pushing snow for hours on end. (Except, perhaps, for a quick hot chocolate and snack break.)
“I have fun doing it,” he says modestly. “It’s a little side business.” But he’s ever mindful of competitors — and prepared to undercut them.
“My biggest competition are the trucks and landscapers; I think they charge $50 to $75,” he says. “Depending on size of driveway, my rates are $30 to $40. Normally no one tries to bargain.”
Danny Markham, who’s earned $1,000 scooping snow this winter, is also ruthless when it comes to rivals in the shoveling game.
“All my friends are wondering where the money is coming from,” he says. But when a pal tried to horn in on the action, Markham emphasized he’s a solo snow artist.
“I don’t want to split the profit, so I told him no,” he says. “Also, he only has a shovel.”
Markham, a 14-year-old from Demarest, NJ, prefers a little mechanical assistance. His dad taught him how to negotiate the new family snowblower, and the mini-mogul quickly graduated to snowier pastures.
“I used to have to do our driveway, and my dad would give me a little bit of money,” he recalls. “Then I realized I could make more money from people I’m not related to. It’s much easier with a snowblower — all you have to do is push it.”
Like Berger, Markham charges between $30 to $40 for a plow, except during what he deems a “super snowfall,” when his price jumps to $60.
Meanwhile, Evan Feder, 16, is more of a coalition builder when it comes to clearing drives. He enlisted two of his buddies to join his shoveling racket in Woodmere, NY, and boasts to neighbors that they get “three for the price of one!”
“We are old-school — prefer the shovel,” he says sagely, adding that his back-breaking efforts are frequently rewarded with offers of Oreos and hot cocoa.
The team’s base rate ranges from $40 to $80 — and Feder’s mom couldn’t be more thrilled about his profits.
“He doesn’t ask me for money now!” she raves. “I told him he’s going to have a Lamborghini by the summer!”
Feder has tucked the $250 he’s earned so far, this year, safely in the bank. (It would have been $290, but he lost $40 in a pesky snowbank.)
Resenfeld’s saving his cold, hard cash for a new camera lens, while Berger and Markham are setting their earnings aside for sneakers: Berger’s aiming for $200 Kevin Durant “All-Stars”; Markham’s going for $400 Air Jordans.
“I’m praying for 10 more snowstorms!” he says with a laugh.