A 16-year-old British girl earns £48,000 helping Chinese people name their babies

Beau Jessop

A 16-year-old has made £48,000 from a website she made to give Chinese babies English names.

Beau Jessup, a British A-level student from Gloucestershire, came up with the idea after a family visit to China.

They were out for a meal with friends when she was asked to give an English name to a newborn baby.

In China it is considered important to have an English name for future study or business with the UK.

'Special Name' requires the user to pick five of the 12 personality traits they hope their baby will grow into

In China they name their child based on the elements and Beau wanted a similarity between how they pick their Chinese name and how they pick their English name.

And she does this by assigning personality traits to each English name.

They also select the gender of the baby and pay the equivalent of 60p.

The three chosen names are then shared with family and friends on We-Chat, China's WhatsApp equivalent, to help make the final decision.

Each suggestion is printed on a certificate with its meaning and an example of a famous person with that name.

Beau says that when she was first asked to name her father's friend's baby, she was surprised.

"I'm not really qualified or relevant enough in that baby's life to be the person to give it a name."

But after hearing of some of the "embarrassing" names, Beau decided she needed to act.

There was someone called Rolex

"There are quite a few examples where people have gotten the names wrong."

Beau explains that the Chinese are fascinated by western culture but their access to it is restricted by the government in China.

There isn't open access to the internet so they can't use standard baby naming websites that people may use in the UK.

"Being exposed to luxury items and things like Harry Potter, Disney films and Lord of the Rings means they use those for reference.

"I once heard of someone called Gandalf and another called Cinderella."

That's according to the Office for National Statistics which released the complete set of data last week.

But Beau doesn't know which names are the most popular on her website, and she's "happy about that".

"It is called 'special name' and it's based on individual preference and what they personally want their child to be."

Beau says it's quite strange to know she's named more than 200,000 babies

"It's nice to be a part of such a happy experience and be a part of those young stages in a baby's life."

The site's success has been a pleasant surprise.

"I wanted to do it just to see if an idea could turn into more than just simply an idea.

"And I never expected it to become more than just a small project because I never really considered myself very academic.

"It is obviously a nice surprise, but it is definitely a surprise."

The website doesn't make a feature of Beau's age.

In fact it shows an older woman in the "about us" section.

"It is a photo of a lady from [stock photo site] Stockshare which I purchased as I wanted people to take the service seriously - and I was aware they may not take it seriously if they knew my age," she explains.

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