Like policemen, entrepreneurs are getting younger, as Alastair Gilmour discovers.

Mar 4 2009 by Alastair Gilmour, The Journal

RECESSION, economic downturn and credit squeeze mean absolutely nothing when you’re seven-and-three-quarters.

And, rightly so – there’s plenty of time to absorb the world’s fiscal misfortunes – but right now Robbie Binks is laying the foundations for a life as an entrepreneur.

Robbie, whose parents Tony and Monica run the award-winning Barrasford Arms gastropub in Barrasford, Northumberland, is an egg producer.

At the moment he’s an egg producer on a modest scale, but he can work out the difference between incomings and outgoings – the remainder being profit.

And, when he reveals that “money is my game”, there’s a sense that the North East business community will hear an awful lot more from the St Mary’s First School, Hexham, youngster.

“He saved up his birthday money and tooth fairy money to buy a chicken coop,” says Tony, who won The Journal Taste prize at the recent Gourmet Society North East Restaurant Awards for his insistence on sourcing local ingredients.

“He even took the teeth round the bar to show to customers. Everybody knew what he was saving for.”

Robbie then bought a dozen hens from a local free-range egg producer – striking a bargain at 50p each – after they had passed their commercial production prime.

He started walking round the village, knocking on doors until he’d built up a regular round.

The hens are still prolific layers and any eggs left over are sold to customers at the Barrasford Arms.

“They’re £1 for six, the cheapest in the North East,” says Robbie. “I was selling some in the bar last night and made £4. For my first deal I got £20 – it’s down to my quality skills.

“I’m saving up for a greenhouse now, but I’ll need 10 times as much as I’ve got already. I’m going to grow marrows for the Marrow Show. It was the best day of my life when I won the junior section last year, so I’m going to sell them to farmers and they can enter the show as well.”

This is not Robbie’s first venture into business nor, it seems, will it be his last.

When families stay in one of the pub’s rooms, he lets the children choose an egg for breakfast and although he hasn’t enough to supply the restaurant, he keeps the bar’s pickled eggs jar topped up.

He was also the instigator last year of a Lambing Dinners menu which features bangers and mash, pie and mash, stew and dumplings or fish and chips. Mum Monica says: “When everybody was out lambing, he helped by looking after the pet lambs.

“Groups of lads were delivering them in a shed 24 hours a day and living on bowls of cornflakes.

“Robbie felt sorry for them so we got some carry-out trays and they kept them hot in the Aga.

“He would go and live on the local farms if he could.”

Robbie’s ambition is to be a farmer. “I like different kinds of animals and the different jobs you can do,” he says.

Before that, however, he has discussed another business development with his parents.

Tony says: “He’s after a quad bike with a trailer big enough to take a yowe and two lambs.”

Robbie corrects him: “Two yowes, Dad.”