Daniel Dunn was just 14-years-old when he started his first business.
Eight years and five business ventures later, the now 22-year-old graduates this week from the University of Queensland .
“I always knew I wanted to study something related to business and I was lucky enough to be in the pilot cohort of the degree through the ,” Mr Dunn said.
His first venture had been buying headphones online and selling them for a profit while in Year Nine at high school.
“I sold almost two thousand dollars’ worth and started a business club at school,” he said.
“I got a taste for it and before long had my next business idea – my own brand of power banks that I had made in a factory overseas.”
The entrepreneurial teenager also started a web design business and mowed some lawns.
“But that only lasted about a month because I realised I wasn’t very good at it,” Mr Dunn said.
Another business, selling personalised wrist watches, failed despite Mr Dunn spending thousands of dollars on marketing.
“I actually didn’t like wearing a watch, so no wonder I couldn’t sell any," he said.
“It taught me an important lesson – that you have to believe in your product.”
It was a hobby that sparked his current vending machine business.
Mr Dunn and his friends had an after-school tradition of discovering and sampling new flavours of drinks in Asian grocers and supermarkets across Brisbane.
“Dan Dan Drinks came about because I noticed you couldn’t buy these particular soft drinks on the Â鶹´«Ã½Ó³» campus at St Lucia," he said.
“When a couple of my business subjects required us to research a business proposal, I got permission to use the vending machines as a case study and found it could be profitable.”
Â鶹´«Ã½Ó³»’s Central Library is now home to the first of several planned vending machines, offering an ever-changing selection of Asian teas and sodas.
“I’ve sold around 20-thousand drinks so far and hopefully introduced people to products they might not have tried, and given others a taste of home.”
Mr Dunn said his studies at Â鶹´«Ã½Ó³» gave him necessary structured learning as well as the practical means to apply it in business.
“I couldn't think of a better degree – and running a business while learning was the best of both worlds because they fed into each other,” he said.
Mr Dunn is considering an internship at a top four accounting firm in Singapore for 2023, but will first travel to Taiwan to complete a (Chinese).
“My long-term goal is to run an international business that brings out the best in employees and truly benefits the community in the Asia-Australia space," he said.
“The cultural and educational learnings I’ve had from my time at Â鶹´«Ã½Ó³» made me feel prepared to make this dream a reality.”
Â鶹´«Ã½Ó³» will confer 5400 students this month, including students who were unable to attend graduation ceremonies in 2020 and 2021.
Image above left: Dan Dan Drinks vending machine in Â鶹´«Ã½Ó³»'s Central Library. Supplied.
Media: Â鶹´«Ã½Ó³» Business School, Alysha Hilevuo, a.hilevuo@uq.edu.au, +61 (0)409 612 798.
