15-Year-Old Opens Toy Store in Nashua

When you ask Josh Heinzl where his business instinct comes from, the red-haired, freckled 15-year-old shrugs and says it has to with juju. Juju?

"Yeah it's kind of that feeling, it's just when something feels right. It's hard to describe, you just have to feel it, you know?"

It's an African word having to do with the supernatural. And Josh does have an uncanny knowledge of how business works. When he was 12 he joined a LEGO robotics team. He realized he could turn a profit by buying LEGO pieces in bulk and then selling the parts online. His age was never an issue.

"You have the money, they have the product, it's pretty simple right? It doesn't matter how old you are to do that."

His parents fronted their son 10-thousand dollars and he opened Josh's Toys and Games last month at the Pheasant Lane Mall in Nashua. Josh is home-schooled, already a senior, but he thinks about business almost all the time. His Dad, Carl, says it’s a gift.

"How could you say that Mozart, when he was 4, could play the music he could? What could you attribute that to? It's almost the same type of thing. You can't, it's just there."

Carl says Josh has always been uniquely driven. He’s got a second-degree black belt in karate, a ham radio license, plays in a jazz band and does underwater photography. But Josh doesn’t see himself as unusual.

"I’m not exactly sure why other people don’t go out and do what they want to do. They say ‘oh man, I wish I could do that.’ I guess I don’t know why people don’t go and try it."

Josh’s selection ranges from the classics – Lincoln Logs and tinker toys – to card games, chemistry kits and board games involving lasers. Of his seven employees, four are family members, including his 13-year-old brother Jonathan.

"Right now I'm actually just sales associate, but I like to think of myself as co-owner."

And their mother Mary likes to think part of their success comes from the fact that those two choose what fills the shelves.

"It's a 13 and 15-year-old picking the merchandise for the store for a population that's geared from about 10 years old on up. So who better to pick the merchandise, than those peers?"

On a recent Sunday, Elizabeth and Mark Hutchins of Nashua browsed for gifts for their kids.

"About a year ago my son wrote to the Pheasant Lane Mall and asked them to put a Lego store in here, which might be coincidental [laughs]. But this is what this place needs."

Josh plans to open a couple more stores before college. He says with low prices, stuff he knows people like, and his juju, he'll do well.

"Oh yeah, well, you have to, have to use the juju. Definitely! That's the key right there."

For NHPR News, I'm Avishay Artsy.