A South Florida high school student is working to make flights cleaner after he fell asleep on an airplane tray table and woke up with a nasty rash on his face – a topic that has been even more in the spotlight in recent weeks thanks to the Coronavirus.
Student turned entrepreneur Henry Hurowitz had a not so pleasant in-flight experience two years ago.
“I was flying from New York and I put my head down on my airplane tray table and I woke up and my brother pointed to my face and I had a huge rash on my face,” the student at NSU’s University school said.
Shocked, Hurowitz did some research and found out that airplane tray tables are eight times dirtier than a toilet flush button. What he learned led to an idea for a product he would later develop with other students called Germ Genie.
The group is part of the Junior Achievement program that aims to teach kids how to achieve economic success.
“Germ Genie is increasingly relevant with the outbreak of Coronavirus,” Hurowitz said. “We’ve been selling the product for four months the sales have been crazy honestly.”
University School says the kids have made tens of thousands of dollars from sales so far with part of the profits going back to investors and to the program – along with a donation to Joe DiMaggio Children’s Hospital.
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The program does require students to liquidate the company this April, but the group says they will transition to a limited liability company to continue running the business.
