Teen keeps age a secret from international clients.

• Author: Quesnel, Joseph
• Position: News

A successful 18-year-old entrepreneur from New Liskeard maintains he must conceal his age from many of his wealthy international real estate clients in order to grow his online business.

Christopher Bragg, who recently relocated his business, Ketro, to North Bay, designs and markets an innovative award-winning online site that allows real estate brokers to maintain all of their business information on their own independent Web sites. Bragg only provides ongoing customer support to his clients. The site, he says, automatically updates real estate information, thereby allowing his clients to save on overhead costs.

The 18-year-old estimates that his average client saves about $40 a month by using the site. Real estate brokers, he says, also save money by not having to buy expensive software packages that allow one to edit and update one's own Web pages.

His young age, he says, has caused some potential clients to shy away from him, despite his successful product. Having a progressive company at his age did not even allow him to incorporate his business. Being under 18 when he established his company also prevented him from entering into contracts. As a student, he says he faced, and still continues to face today, numerous financial and regulatory obstacles in setting up and growing his business. Capital, he says, just is not forthcoming for students.

He gained extensive experience in Internet-based applications when he worked at a Sympatico Internet help desk in Haileybury at the age of 16. When Sympatico moved operations to another city, Bragg found work maintaining a Web site for a New Liskeard area real estate company. The site contained online information on real estate properties.

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Bragg, still 16, established his own Web design company called Clismatic Graphic, to handle the site. After Bragg stopped doing the work for the company, he was given access to the real estate clients from the area. Having...