NORTH EAST — Andrew Aspden is the owner and sole employee of a business begun as a sideline in December 2020.
Aspden makes high-end stone and wooden pens, wooden cocktail smokers, wooden “flight boards” that hold drinks and other items that he sells online and at shops in North East.
Aspden & Company earned $5,000 in 2020-21, doubled that in 2022 and is on track to earn between $30,000 and $40,000 this year. It’s growing so fast that Aspden is considering hiring part-time help this coming summer. He’s also considering bypassing college.
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Andrew Aspden is 17 and a junior honors student at North East High School. Between school commitments and games and practices with the Grapepickers baseball team, he works filling orders in a corner of his family’s barn.
“When I first started, the business was just a side hustle earning a couple bucks here and there. And that’s all I thought it would be,” Aspden said. “But it’s grown to be an everyday thing. Every day I’m making pens at home, working on the website or just doing maintenance.
“Some days, when I’m swamped, I stay up late to work because of school and baseball. During the holidays, there are nights when I work until midnight or 1 a.m. on school nights. But that’s what it takes. Some days and seasons are busier than others.”
Aspden got the idea for his business when he was 12 or 13, from a cousin who made pens and sold them at a New York winery.
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“I thought it was a pretty good idea,” he said. “I got a lathe one Christmas, but it kind of sat there for a while. Then when COVID hit, I was doing school online and was no longer doing some work for a neighbor. I had free time. So I ordered some parts kits online.”
Aspden started making pens, then got a job at the re.FOUND.ry antiques shop in North East, where the owner allowed him to sell his wares.
“After that, I started going around North East and selling to different businesses,” including Driftwood Wine Cellars and Courtyard Winery. “I was making sales left and right.”
Many of his sales now are via Etsy, an online marketplace for crafts and other unique wares. His ballpoint pens start at $34.99, and cartridge fountain pens at $77.99. His business has a five-star customer rating for workmanship and service.
Aspden found the site through online research. It’s also how he finds wood, stone, pen parts and other supplies, mainly from Penn State Industries in Philadelphia.
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He buys marble, jasper and other stone in roughly rectangular prisms.
“I drill it, process it on the lathe to get the cylinder shape, and then polish and press the pieces together,” Aspden said. It takes about 40 minutes to make each pen.
Aspden’s skills in production, purchasing, marketing, sales and shipping are mostly self-taught, again through internet research.
“I also watched a lot of YouTube videos,” he said.
In-person sales and marketing are favorite aspects of Aspden’s work.
“I like meeting people and taught myself how to communicate and do business with real business owners,” Aspden said. “It’s not something I could learn at school or that you can go online and learn. You just have to get yourself out there and do it. It’s one of the hardest but most valuable lessons I’ve learned.”
Online marketing, not so much.
“I don’t really like interacting on the internet, and I don’t like social media,” he said. “The problem with trying to make money is that you need to use those tools in order to do it. I’ve found someone to do that for me, and that was a big relief.”
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Aspden met Jason Drohn during North East High School’s Entrepreneur and Finance Week this school year when both were invited to speak about their businesses. Drohn, also of North East, is a marketing professional and founder of several businesses, including Leveling Up LLC and DoneForYou.com.
Drohn is developing an online marketing strategy for Aspden and creating an Aspden & Company website that is expected to launch this summer after Aspden turns 18.
In the meantime, his young client already has been able to do what few entrepreneurs and business owners have — create products and find a market for them, Drohn said.
“Because Andrew tapped into an already established audience on Etsy and was able to start building a customer base, he’s shortcut his path to success substantially. Now he’s got an email list, customers and revenue,” Drohn said.
Etsy has been a good platform for the business, but at a steep price, Aspden said.
“Etsy takes a ton of money for transaction fees,” he said. “Every time I make a sale, a lot of the money goes to Etsy and not a lot to me. I plan on keeping Etsy but am going to be more focused on my own website. That will be more of what I want with less in transaction fees, way less. And it will be more productive.”
Aspden had planned to study business in college, and still might.
“If I make enough money with my business, I won’t go to college. If I don’t, then I will,” he said. “The determining factor will be whether I make enough money to do this full time.
“It scares my parents a little when I say I don’t want to go to college.”
Aspden’s dad, James Aspden, works for Penelec. Mom Emily Aspden has her own physical therapy business. Andrew’s sisters, Kyla, 14, and Eva, 10, make wire-wrapped stone rings that they sell through his Etsy store.
“They do a very nice job. They’re very crafty,” Aspden said. “They handle their own end of everything. I just let them sell on my site.”
More young would-be entrepreneurs may be inspired by Aspden’s talk during Entrepreneur and Finance Week at school, said Dawn Coletta, a North East High School counselor who organized the career exploration event for 10th-graders.
“Hearing from someone so close to their age really resonates with students,” Coletta said. “When someone like Andrew has been able to create a business and run with it, other students can see themselves doing it.”
Contact Valerie Myers at [email protected].
