On the way to being his own boss
Andrew Riggs / The Collegian
Business major and entrepreneur student Ashley Smith-Jenkins runs two businesses with his father. Smith-Jenkins said learning to balance working with his father, being a Webmaster and full-time student simultaneously is a challenge.
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By Kirsten Hoverman
The Collegian
Fresno State business and entrepreneurship major Ashley Smith-Jenkins is putting all his coins into the right businesses.
Smith-Jenkins is the Webmaster and IT manager for his father Henry Jenkins’ home-based businesses in Merced: Modern American Money, Inc. and Hammer ‘N’ Nails.
“This is kind of like a hobby, but a hobby that turned into a business,” Smith-Jenkins said.
Based on how crisp a dollar is, there is value to it. Mistakes made by the Bureau of Engraving and Printing where numbers don’t match on the bill are also worth value.
“Those right there are attributes collectors look at when they’re trying to collect a particular bank note,” Smith-Jenkins said.
“Our goal is to collect paper money and resell it back to the public,” Smith-Jenkins said. “We collect paper money based on particular attributes, we let it sit for a minute, because over time it starts to gain more value just like any type of collectibles.”
“My father owned Hank’s Coins and Currency, which had a good reputation in the numismatics field locally,” Smith-Jenkins said. “Starting in the summer of 2004, my father decided he wanted to start his own Web site to sell his own coins and currency that he had been collecting.
“He asked me to see if I could do it for him.”
At this time, Smith-Jenkins was switching his major from computer engineering to business with an entrepreneur mindset.
“I knew I needed to gain more business experience,” Smith-Jenkins said. “Currently we expect to be done with the Web site by the end of this year.
“Much of the business is done on the Internet, in major numismatic magazines such as Bank Note Porter, Coin World and a couple of other magazines,” he said.
In the future Modern American Money, Inc. may partner up with PMG Notes, a business that grades the quality of the notes and coins.
The second business Smith-Jenkins and his father own is Hammer ‘N’ Nails, which offers home improvement contracting services to the greater Merced Area, Chowchilla and the City of Madera.
“My father got his State of California General Building Contractor’s License and painting license in 1991 in Altadena, Calif.,” Smith-Jenkins said. “The same year he moved to Merced and continued his business there.
“For the past 15 years my father has been doing odd jobs for people in Merced and they all loved his work.”
Hammer ‘N’ Nails began offering home improvement contracting services to the public and gained a strong level of success.
“We went ahead and got incorporated with a business lawyer,” Smith-Jenkins said. “The business lawyer decided it would be best to take the existing Hammer ‘N’ Nails business and incorporate it with Modern American Money.”
Smith-Jenkins said he would like Hammer ‘N’ Nails to become a major home improvement service in Merced County.
“We’d like to turn it into sort of a franchise with regional offices,” Smith-Jenkins said. “We’re trying to juggle two different businesses.
“To do that plus learn how to do web development, plus going to school at the same time it’s a lot of work,” he said. That’s the real challenge.”
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