Charlotte Morgan and the Lemonade Stand--Chapter 5 Shopping with Dad

 This is my next book. Charlotte Morgan and the Lemonade Stand.  

It is still in the work-in-progress phase. The cover I am posting here is a temp cover derived from the first book.  But I like sharing my work here first. 

 The book is leveled for third grade readers and up.

I am using the #steemiteducation tag because the book is about using math and earning money.   Click here for chapter 1. Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4

Summary: Charlotte goes shopping with her dad for supplies for the lemonade stand.  

Chapter 5 Shopping with Dad 

Dad pushed the grocery cart and looked his list.  “Obviously, we need lemonade.” He grabbed a large container off the shelf. “This one holds 64 ounces of mix. This will make five gallons of lemonade, let’s get two just in case. Each one is $3.99, round that to $4.”  

“So that’s $8 on the lemonade,” I said. 

“I recommend we get a large cooler with a spout. The kind that people drink from on the sidelines of football and soccer fields.” 

“How many cups would that hold?” 

“I have seen them in five or ten-gallon sizes. There is some math for you, how many cups would that hold?” Dad smiled. 

 “I’m not sure how many cups are in a gallon.” 

Dad stopped the cart and explained, “There are four quarts in a gallon. The word quart is related to the word quarter, meaning fourth. There are two pints for every quart…”

 “So that means there are eight pints to a gallon,” I interrupted. 

“Very good! Yes. And there are two cups to every pint…” 

“Meaning there are sixteen cups to a gallon,” I said.

 “There ya go, Tambourine! So, in a five-gallon cooler how many cups would that be?” Dad asked. 

I pictured it in my head. Sixteen times five. Six times five gives me 30. The three tens gets carried. Five times one is five, plus the three gives me 80.

 “Eighty cups!” I said. “So, since we have two containers of mix that makes ten gallons that means we can make 160 cups of lemonade with that."

“Excellent! Now let’s go find a cooler.” He started pushing the cart. We walked a couple of aisles and turned left. Dad picked up a big one. “Okay, this one holds ten gallons.”

 “Which means it holds 160 cups,” I said. 

“Correct, but it costs nearly $50.” Dad frowned a little. My heart sank. I knew that was a lot because of how Dad said the number. And he didn’t put the cooler in the cart, he held it above the cart. He was thinking about it. I wasn’t sure what to do. Then I saw the numbers in my head. If the cooler held 160 cups, at fifty cents a cup, that would earn $80. 

“Dad, if we got that and sold cups at 50 cents each that would earn $80.” 

“That’s true, but the difficulty with this is, we aren’t 100% certain that you will sell all the lemonade in the cooler.” 

I wasn’t prepared for that thought. He put the cooler back and picked up a smaller one. 

“This one holds five gallons and it costs $30.” The numbers appeared in my head again. Five gallons is 80 cups. 80 cups at 50 cents each is $40. Still more than the cost of the cooler. “So how much would you make if we used this one?” Dad asked.

 “40 dollars,” I replied. “But since the cooler costs 30 dollars, that would mean I could only make a $10-dollar profit on that cooler.” 

“Charlotte you’re forgetting, that we can always make more lemonade. If we pay $30 for this one, and refill it twice, you would make $80.”

 “Which would give me a $50 profit!” My mind raced at the untold riches I was about to come into. “Okay so let’s get this cooler and you can pay me back from the revenue you earn at the lemonade stand.” 

“Revenue?” I cocked an eyebrow at Dad. 

“Revenue is the money that is brought in to a business, it is not the profit. Profit as you already seem to know is the money you keep after you have paid all the things that help make the business. In this case, that would be the lemonade mix, the cups, and the cooler. Once your revenue has covered the cost of those items, then your business can be considered profitable. Which, of course, is the whole point of a business.”

 I smiled my biggest sweetest smile, “You’re not getting me the lemonade and cups yourself for free?” 

 Dad looked at my smile, paused, and replied, “We’ll see. Let’s go find the cups.” I was certain my smile was going to work. We walked to the other end of the aisle and found the cups. Red and blue plastic cups, one package with smaller cups, and one package with larger cups. “If your hope is to sell enough lemonade to need to refill it twice, you would need 160 cups. There are 32 cups in each package. If we need 160 cups how many packages do you think we would need to get?”

 “That sounds like two-digit division, so I’m not sure,” I replied.

 “Make a decent guess. How many cups would we have if we had ten packages?” 

I saw the numbers in my head. Ten times any number is just that number with a zero attached on the end. “320,” I replied. “We clearly don’t need 320 cups…Five packages!” I shouted. “If ten packages gets 320 cups, then five packages would get me 160 cups, because five is half of ten, and 160 is half of 320. So again, five packages needed.” 

Dad just stared at me for a moment, “That’s all correct.” He smiled. 

“But I think we should get six packages just in case of mistakes,” I said. 

“Fair enough. Now each package is $5.99, so that’s about $36.” $36 for the cups and the $30 for the cooler, that’s $66. I picked up another package of cups, when I saw a larger package. 

“Dad there are 100 cups in this package, and it’s $13.09 a package. With a hundred we would need two packages and the cost would be a little over $26.” 

“Well, that’s better than the $36 for the other cups.”  He put the first cups back and picked up two of the large packages of cups. 

I started adding the number out loud, “So let’s see, that’s $26 for the cups, plus the $8 for the lemonade, that’s $34. Add the $30 for the lemonade to that and you get $64.” 

Suddenly that sounded like a lot of money for a lemonade stand. 

“That sounds about right, Tambourine. Sometimes it costs money to start a business.”