Skip to content
Search AI Powered

Latest Stories

People Describe The Secret 'Black Market' Operations Kids Had At Their School

People Describe The Secret 'Black Market' Operations Kids Had At Their School

One young girl whispers into another girl's ear

Photo by Vitolda Klein on Unsplash

There is always a way to make money.

We can start to collect coin as early Pre-K.

We just have to be creative.

And who is more creative than a person who thinks they have nothing to lose?

Every school has a black market system.

Things are being sold and traded for that would shock us all.


Redditor AWESOMEKITTY7364 wanted to discuss the school system's biggest entrepeneurs, so they asked:

"What 'black market' did kids at your school run?"

I know a friend who sold pickles laced with vodka in high school.

She made a killing.

Mixtures

Mix Lab GIF by BrownSugarAppGiphy

"Used to crush up warheads and mix them with sugar. Sold them by the straw with the ends melted. .50 a piece."

timelydemise13

'you got the goods?'

"I used to deal in whiteboard markers for teachers in high school. One teacher had a tendency to hoard them, leaving none for other teachers. I would take markers from him and provide them to other teachers in need."

"While there was no formal payment, I was given a little bit more leniency at times (e. g. Requests to leave the classroom for a moment etc)."

"Once the marker would start squealing on the whiteboard because it was almost empty, I'd get teachers giving me a nod as if to say 'you got the goods?' I'd then supply them with the marker color of their choosing (usually black)."

"It was actually a lot of fun, and I never heard teachers talk about my systems or chastise me for taking markers."

stoic4somethings

An Unfair Edge

"I was in elementary school when pogs were big. Everyone had cool slammers and stuff but I didn't have money for good ones. My dad made one out of 1/2' mild steel for me and used an engraving pen to make a simple pattern. Everyone was asking me where I got them from."

"I didn't wanna lose my unfair edge but i also knew i could make money. My dad had a big sheet of this 1/2' steel. I told them I was the only one who could get them. I sold them for 15 bucks a pop. My dad kept 10 I got 5. And thats when I learned what overhead was."

FNC1A1

Dress Code

"I went to a private high school with a strict dress code, ties, belt, etc. So I bought a bunch of ties and belts from a thrift store and ran a lucrative rental business out of my locker."

ccrawsh

"If you forgot your gym uniform more than once, you would get fined $5 to rent a uniform from the teacher or serve a detention. I would buy an extra set in the beginning of the school year of each size, and then rent them out/wash them myself undercutting the teachers 'fine' at a cost of $3. Very lucrative over my middle and high school years."

exorthderp

Got Pepsi?

Fail Diet Coke GIF by MOODMANGiphy

"I used to sell coke (the drink) because they didn't allow fizzy drinks to be brought in."

Seventy0

Everyone loves a good fizz...

Copy-Sell

King Yes GIFGiphy

"The only guy in the school who's family had proper TV channels used to tape wrestling events and rent them out."

221

Knock-Offs

"I have family in NY and would go visit a couple times a year back in high school. Every once in a while we'd visit Chinatown in NYC and I'd end up buying $100s worth of fake watches (Rolex, Tag, Gucci, etc) return to school and sell them for double than what I paid for them."

firkin_slang_whanger

"A lot of people still do this. They fly off to China, buy cheap knock-offs and sell them for a huge mark-up wherever they’re from. It’s big business here in the Philippines."

Mist3rTryHard

Currency

"My school used the metallic ends of pencils as a currency. Bronze was rarest, so it was the most expensive. Green was most common, so it was the least. We traded for erasers or pencil cases or a spot up in the four square line. Eventually got banned but we still operated with people acting as banks to keep the currency hidden and to keep transactions hidden."

Flavory_Boat50

Deals

" Pokemon cards we would hide under playground equipment and trade them because the teachers would take them if they saw them. So we always set up 'deals' in class and created a whole Pokemon card trading network."

immapengoon

"We did something similar in my school. We also bet cards on matches. That got shut down pretty quick. We didn't see anything wrong with it at the time. Ahhh, those were the days."

an_elaborate_prank

Bag Full

Black Friday Christmas GIF by TargetGiphy

"At my school they too all sweets out of the vending machines and replaced them with healthy snacks."

"In the local town there was a sweet shop where you could buy a kilo of mixed sweets for £5, so every week I would go there and buy £1 of small paper bags and spend the Sunday night before school repackaging them all ready for the week ahead."

"Come Monday I would go into school and load my bag up every day selling the bags for 50p."

HeisenbergCooks

Kids are shady, yet diligent.

What kind of sneaky operations did your school have? Let us know in the comment below.

More from Trending/best-of-reddit

Millie Bobby Brown
Michael Buckner/Variety/Getty Images

Millie Bobby Brown Tells The Media To 'Get Off My F—king Case' After Cruel Scrutiny Over Her Looks

Stranger Things Millie Bobby Brown has called out the media—again—for their portrayal of her appearance in their headlines.

Brown's career was hard-launched when she was ten years old when she introduced the iconic "Eleven" character in the Stranger Things franchise, and the public has really struggled to accept the fact that she's a human being who will grow and change like the rest of us, meaning she can't stay ten years old forever.

Keep ReadingShow less
Glenn Close
Edward Berthelot/WireImage

Glenn Close Offers Hilarious Reaction After 'All's Fair' Is Met With Abysmal Reviews From Critics

Well, Disney+ and Hulu's new Ryan Murphy series All's Fair hasn't exactly gone according to plan, garnering some of the worst reviews in the history of television.

And star Glenn Close had a perfect response to the critics.

Keep ReadingShow less
Gavin Newsom
Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Newsom Offers Scathing One-Word Response To 8 Democrats Who Caved And Voted With GOP To End Shutdown

California Governor Gavin Newsom criticized the eight Democratic Senators who voted with Republicans to end the government shutdown by advancing a spending deal that notably omits an extension of expanded Affordable Care Act (ACA) subsidies.

Under the current agreement, the enhanced subsidies would expire, though senators would have the option to revisit the issue later in the year. Supporters of the compromise say that deferring the vote was the only viable path forward, as many Republicans refused to discuss the subsidies until the government reopened.

Keep ReadingShow less
artificial intelligence
Aidin Geranre on Unsplash

People Reveal How They Lost Their Jobs To Artificial Intelligence

The concept of artificial intelligence (AI) dates back thousands of years with ancient myths. Later, inventors would create automatons that moved independently through the use of gears, cogs, and springs.

But for a long time, the idea of an artificial brain was relegated to science fiction.

Keep ReadingShow less
Donald Trump; Barack Obama
Andrew Harnik/Getty Images; Alex Wong/Getty Images

Trump Slammed After Seemingly Believing Patently False Post From Satirical Website About Obama

President Donald Trump was called out after he shared an article headline about former President Barack Obama—without realizing it came from a satirical news site published nearly nine months earlier.

The post came from the Dunning-Kruger Times, a satirical website, claiming that Obama is making millions in "royalties" from Affordable Care Act (ACA) subsidies. The piece from the site makes the specific false claim that the advisory Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) had stopped paying Obama $2.6 million a year in "royalties associated with Obamacare."

Keep ReadingShow less