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KAYSVILLE — A 5-year-old entrepreneur from Davis County is spreading smiles across the Wasatch Front with his own business called Sneaky Bubba.
Raxon "Bubba" Garza became obsessed with trying to cook eggs on his own at the age of 2, but frequently ran into disaster. When he was still destroying things around the house at age 4, his parents told him he needed to start earning money if he was going to continue breaking things, his mother, Denise Garza, recalls.
A business owner herself, Garza helped little Bubba start a business of his own, at his request. During the Easter season this year, Bubba began his endeavor with curated Easter egg hunts in people's backyards.
Natalie Jensen one was of his customers and hired him to hide Easter eggs for her grandkids. He hid eggs with toys and candy in Jensen's yard before the party, and Jensen said it was a lot of fun.
"He's gonna go a long ways, this Bubba is … he's an up-and-coming star entrepreneur, and he's amazing," Jensen said.
Jensen and her daughters held a fundraiser for Love Hard, an organization that helps youth overcome trauma by offering more mental health resources at school, on the Fourth of July. The fundraiser was held at Jensen's local celebration, "Red, White and Boom," and they asked Bubba to help.
Bubba sold suckers and cotton candy, agreeing to donate half of his proceeds to the Love Hard fundraiser.
"He is just so cute and so fun and energetic," Jensen said. "And it was so cute that he knew he had to donate half of his money to this organization — and he was all about it."
Bubba now sells cotton candy, suckers, candy apples and other food-related items, like pizza-shaped sidewalk chalk, at Utah markets and vendor shows nearly every weekend.
"It's good for him, like his energy has to go into doing something besides destroying the house … he's so good at that," Denise Garza said.
As parents, she and her husband have never pushed him to keep doing the markets, but he wants to, because he loves it and has lofty financial goals.
"He has more visions than what we can probably keep up with, and I think people are shocked by that," Garza said.
Some of those aspirations include getting rich so that someone will iron his clothes for him, taking his whole family to Hawaii and earning $100 million, so that he can employ people who want to eat sugar all day.
Sneaky Bubba is a family affair.
Bubba consults with his mom about what he wants to sell, puts stickers on merchandise and creates personalized cards, his dad makes the cotton candy and his mom handles scheduling the events where they sell it all. If Bubba behaves at the vendor shows and helps clean up, he gets a portion of the revenues to buy toy blasters. The rest of the money goes right back into the business, while it is still growing.
One of the markets the Garzas participate in is the Juniper Market at Farmington Station, for which Whitney Coburn is the host and founder.
Coburn said Bubba is the one and only child vendor at the market and that customers love to interact with him.
"He's such a fun kid, and I feel like, just with kids in general, they're so full of life and they're just happy most of the time," Coburn said. "So, him and his family, they definitely bring just this happy, positive energy to our markets and they are just the kindest. He's a great kid."
Coburn is a regular customer of Sneaky Bubba's cotton candy, and she said they have some fun, unique flavors.
"I think it's cool, because when he comes to our events, people really see the future of entrepreneurship and small businesses — because he's just this young guy who's got this interest in business, so people love to support him and they love to see young kids learning to work hard and manage money and things like that," she added.
Garza encourages her son to support other businesses that might sell similar products, because she says if he supports them, they will support him and there's no need for anybody to tear anyone else down.
He's gonna go a long ways, this Bubba is … he's an up-and-coming star entrepreneur, and he's amazing.
–Natalie Jensen
To purchase Sneaky Bubba products outside of the markets, visit his Instagram @sneakybubba or his website. His Instagram account includes his adorable "daily advice" segment that's completely made up by him.
"If people could meet Bubba, their lives would be happier and more joyful, like he truly is one-of-a-kind kid," Garza said.
