QUILCENE — It’s a Tuesday afternoon in a Quilcene High School classroom, and students sit circled around their entrepreneurial mentors, Joe and Joy Baisch.
The students, most of them freshmen and sophomores, are hearing a lesson plan that most 15 and 16 year olds won’t hear for several years, if ever.
“We didn’t do too bad money-wise,” said Joy Baisch of a recent shellfish dinner hosted by the Quilcene School student-run shellfish company, Big Quil Enterprises.
“We were down $300 from last year. But $300 is $300.”
The atmosphere in the room is like that of a board meeting led by a chief executive officer except that people are wearing frayed jeans and T-shirts rather than business suits.
For the past three years, with help from a $220,000 grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Baisches have been shepherding Quilcene School District students through the dollars and cents of operating a shellfish company, coined Big Quil Enterprises.
The two act as business managers, working from their life experience.
In 1967, Joy Baisch was an original stockholder and general manager of Red Robin Restaurant, which now has locations up and down the West Coast.
The Baisches started a document shredding company in Seattle in 1981 called America Data Guard and sold it in 1992 when they moved to Brinnon.
They now own and manage a bed and breakfast in Brinnon.
About 50 students
Big Quil Enterprises, comprised of about 50 students, operates in partnership with the Quilcene School District and the 4-H Club, which is an extension of the Washington State University Learning Center.
The business leases a beach on Quilcene Bay where the students harvest oysters and clams.
The harvested shellfish, of which Quilcene is nationally and internationally famous for producing, are processed by Shelton-based Taylor Shellfish Co.
The students prepare and sell the shellfish at various festivals throughout the region, such as the Brinnon Shrimp Fest and the Quilcene Fair.
Pamela Roberts, 4-H coordinator and former principal of Quilcene School District, works closely with the business.
“We’re hoping that through this initiative, that these kids who live in a remote location realize they can be players on an international scale,” said Roberts.
Because of the partnership with Taylor Shellfish Co., many of the shellfish make it to the far reaches of the globe.
“It’s been pretty cool because our oysters that we harvest get shipped around the world and to Europe and stuff,” said Big Quil Enterprises worker Shelbi Thompson, 15.
Like at any business, the students are paid for the time they put into harvesting and working on the operation.
The Baisches wouldn’t say how much Big Quil Enterprises makes in a year, but they said the goal is to make the business self-sustaining and profitable.