0:00:04 A thousand bucks a month, renting out plastic bins?
0:00:05 What’s up?
0:00:06 What’s up?
0:00:07 Nicole Over here.
0:00:08 Welcome to the Side Castle Show.
0:00:09 It’s the entrepreneurship podcast.
0:00:10 You can actually apply.
0:00:15 I’ve got a fun case study for you today under the category of buying something once and
0:00:17 getting paid for it over and over again, a creative rental business.
0:00:23 For the last 10 years, my guest has been renting out moving boxes, relatively low startup
0:00:28 cost, steady and maybe even increasing demand in just a few hours to week that it takes
0:00:34 to run on the side from his day job from HalBoxRental.com Gary Graywall.
0:00:36 Welcome to the Side Castle Show.
0:00:37 Thanks, Nick.
0:00:38 Thanks for having me here today.
0:00:39 You bet.
0:00:40 Stick around in this one.
0:00:44 You hear how Gary came up with this random idea, how he gets customers and how he handles
0:00:49 the storage and delivery logistics for this physical inventory business.
0:00:54 Now, you know, I love a fun rental side hustle, fun rental business and boxes certainly aren’t
0:00:58 the only thing that you can rent out for a profit, which is why I put together a list
0:01:02 of 25 other unconventional things that you can make money renting out.
0:01:09 That is yours for free to download at the show notes for this episode at sidehustlenation.com/Gary
0:01:13 or you can just follow the link in the episode description and it’ll get you over there.
0:01:14 Gary, how’d you come up with this idea?
0:01:15 This was a pretty random one.
0:01:20 Basically, like I was in college UCLA and I think it was move-in day for fall quarter.
0:01:21 There was just tons and tons of boxes.
0:01:25 There was piles and piles and piles of boxes everywhere and I was like, man, that’s pretty
0:01:26 unsightly.
0:01:28 Like I’ve always been very sustainability focused.
0:01:31 You know, I thought, well, there’s got to be something better than this.
0:01:36 And so I just typed in in Google like rent moving boxes and I found there was a company
0:01:41 in Canada called Frogbox and I thought that was such a cool idea.
0:01:46 You just basically get boxes delivered to you and then there are these plastic crates
0:01:50 basically with the lids attached and then you pack them, you move and somebody comes
0:01:51 and takes them away.
0:01:52 That’s a great idea.
0:01:56 Why don’t I start something like this because there’s nothing like that where I could find
0:01:57 it during that time.
0:01:58 Okay.
0:02:00 So somebody was doing it in Canada, Frogbox.
0:02:05 And instead of being discouraged, which would sometimes be my reaction, like, oh, I come
0:02:09 up with this great business idea, of course, Google it and then, oh, somebody else is
0:02:10 already doing that.
0:02:12 I could be like, well, back to the drawing board, like, no, no, no.
0:02:15 Well, maybe in this case, they’re doing it in a separate area and say, okay, I could
0:02:17 bring this idea to California.
0:02:18 Yeah.
0:02:21 That’s the thing is like these kinds of businesses.
0:02:22 It’s like, it’s just like a coffee shop.
0:02:27 If you go to this really cool shop or restaurant and there’s nothing like that where you live,
0:02:28 you can duplicate it.
0:02:29 You can make it your own.
0:02:32 Now, if it was like, if I was selling these boxes and I was like, I’m just going to sell
0:02:36 these boxes, well, I probably would be out of business because there’s much larger companies
0:02:40 doing that who can take on smaller margins and have greater exposure.
0:02:43 And it becomes a commodity type of thing.
0:02:44 Yeah.
0:02:45 Yeah.
0:02:46 It’s very localized, right?
0:02:50 Like, they’re not going to deliver boxes to your door from Canada to California.
0:02:54 And so this was something that, you know, my hometown in Sacramento, California, there
0:02:57 is no company that does what we do.
0:02:59 Even today, I don’t know of any.
0:03:00 That’s their primary line of business.
0:03:02 Now, it has caught on.
0:03:06 Some movers are like offering this to their customers, but we are the primary offering
0:03:07 here.
0:03:08 Yeah.
0:03:11 And I want to highlight too, even if there is somebody else doing it, there’s room for
0:03:13 more than one sushi restaurant in town.
0:03:17 There’s, you know, if you have a decent population, there’s, there’s a little room for a healthy
0:03:18 competition.
0:03:23 And you can think about other ways to differentiate yourself aside from just the product.
0:03:26 But in this case, it was somewhat of a, of a blue ocean.
0:03:29 But then the next question is like, is there any demand for this?
0:03:34 Like, did, did moving customers know that this was an option or is there a little like
0:03:36 market education that has to happen?
0:03:40 You know, Nick, even today, after 10 years in business, I still get calls and emails
0:03:42 like, why haven’t I heard from you guys before?
0:03:44 I didn’t even know this existed.
0:03:48 So obviously we could do a little bit of a better job, I guess, of publicity.
0:03:51 And this just goes into the fact that, you know, it is a side gig.
0:03:56 I contribute maybe three hours a week to it, probably could do more, but we have a consistent
0:03:57 stream of customers.
0:04:02 And we’re at this point, we have the biggest groups that come to us, biggest clients is
0:04:07 return clients and people finding us from referrals and Google.
0:04:10 So fortunately our Google search is working well.
0:04:16 They search rent, moving boxes in Sacramento or any of the outlying suburbs.
0:04:17 They’re probably going to find us.
0:04:19 We’re on that first page.
0:04:24 And we have relationships with a lot of interior designers and organizing companies out here.
0:04:28 So that’s kind of like our niche is if they’re working with a client who wants to redo their
0:04:32 kitchen or have a, organize their whole house, well, they got to pack it all up because they
0:04:34 have to redo it.
0:04:39 And they like to use our boxes because they’re eco-friendly, they’re ergonomic, they’re useful,
0:04:41 and they can stay on site for a couple of weeks.
0:04:43 So what was the first move here?
0:04:47 So you Google rent, moving boxes, you find this competitor in Canada for some level of
0:04:52 validation and then you just go to Home Depot and order up a bunch of those, like I’m picturing
0:04:55 like the giant Tupperware bin type of things.
0:04:59 Yeah, it’s funny you say that because that’s exactly the first thing that I did as I went
0:05:03 to, I think it was Lowe’s and they have like these big black, you know, like people store
0:05:05 their Christmas decorations in their garage.
0:05:06 Yeah.
0:05:07 Yeah.
0:05:08 Our attic is filled with these things.
0:05:09 Yeah.
0:05:11 And that’s what you should use because I didn’t know where else to buy them.
0:05:13 I was just like, oh, I’m just going to start this business.
0:05:14 Why not?
0:05:15 I was 23 years old.
0:05:18 And so I bought like five and I was like, well, it’s kind of a lot of money.
0:05:20 You have to do a different business.
0:05:22 And then I kind of hemmed and hawed for a couple of weeks on it.
0:05:28 I returned them and I Googled like, I think I reached out to a competitor in Texas.
0:05:29 It’s like, where do you guys get your boxes?
0:05:34 And they’re like, oh, there’s this company in Florida and Nevada called Reusable Transport
0:05:35 Packaging.
0:05:38 They’re one of the companies that sell, they’re kind of like a U line where they sell all
0:05:45 kinds of various business products like forklifts and dollies and trays and tape and all kinds
0:05:46 of stuff.
0:05:49 So these companies sell boxes like this in a bulk inventory.
0:05:54 You can’t just buy one or two, you need to buy 50, 100, 500 boxes.
0:05:59 So when I saw that I was like, okay, I’m going to go in with both feet and make the investment
0:06:00 and see what happens.
0:06:02 Do you remember how much it was or how many boxes you got?
0:06:03 Yeah.
0:06:07 I initially ordered, I think 50 and it was close to $2,000 with delivery.
0:06:08 Yeah.
0:06:09 You can’t do this with just five.
0:06:11 People got more than five boxes worth of stuff.
0:06:16 It’s got to have enough to hold a house or an apartment’s worth of belongings.
0:06:17 Right.
0:06:23 And I quickly found that out is clients would consistently ask, especially after we got
0:06:27 established after a couple of years, they would want 100 boxes.
0:06:30 And that’s especially true for when we started to do office moves.
0:06:35 So a lot of law firms or what not want to move offices, they want 100 boxes.
0:06:38 And so that’s when we had to start ordering more.
0:06:41 And then the nice thing too is these boxes last over 100 moves.
0:06:42 Yeah.
0:06:43 Right?
0:06:46 So we’re not ordering new boxes every month or even every year, it’s maybe every couple
0:06:47 of years to refresh our inventory.
0:06:48 Okay.
0:06:51 So you’re a couple grand into it, you got 50 boxes.
0:06:52 Where do you, where do you put them?
0:06:55 Like is there a room in your garage for this stuff?
0:06:56 No, I wish.
0:06:57 Initially there was.
0:06:59 First month was there.
0:07:02 I then got a storage unit so that I could, because you know, sometimes people want to
0:07:03 pick up the boxes.
0:07:07 I don’t want people coming to my house and picking up boxes, you know, and I think it
0:07:11 was like $80 a month to rent a storage unit for my boxes.
0:07:15 And then after that, when we started to get a little busier, I actually had moved to Denver
0:07:18 and I said, okay, well, I don’t want to step down the business, but I want to move to Denver
0:07:19 for this job.
0:07:24 So I reached out to a moving company and this is one of the craziest things I’ve ever done.
0:07:27 He’s one of the, this guy, he owns a moving company out here.
0:07:30 He’s one of the top rated movers in Sacramento.
0:07:33 And I explained that he had referred some customers to me and I had reached out to him
0:07:36 like, hey, tell your customers about our boxes.
0:07:37 And I said, hey, I have this crazy idea.
0:07:39 You want to go into business together?
0:07:43 Everyone that you bring to me and you take care of the delivery, I’ll handle the clients
0:07:45 and we’ll share the revenue.
0:07:48 And I went into business with somebody I’d spoken on the phone, but I’d never actually
0:07:52 met, which I thought was the craziest thing anybody could do, but I did it and we continued
0:07:53 to grow.
0:07:57 But this solves your logistics problem of, you know, having to meet customers at the
0:08:01 place, like maybe the moving company can keep them at their facility or they can handle
0:08:05 that delivery since they’re going to be moving those belongings anyways.
0:08:06 Yeah.
0:08:07 And that’s exactly what happened.
0:08:09 They moved all the boxes to their warehouse area.
0:08:13 And so that basically took care of rent and reduced our expenses.
0:08:17 And so when they would have a move, they would just, you know, take our boxes with their
0:08:20 moving truck, deliver them and then go to another move.
0:08:25 And so it’s very strategic kind of how they do it, but some customers do still pick them
0:08:26 up.
0:08:30 So the first booking, you know, and how that person found you, is it still trying to get
0:08:37 on moving company’s preferred vendor list or, you know, was it early Google rankings?
0:08:40 Talk to me about the first couple of bookings where you’re like, oh, I’m slowly going to
0:08:42 start to recoup this initial startup cost.
0:08:43 Yeah.
0:08:46 So it’s funny enough, our website initially was very clunky.
0:08:50 I had one of our interns at the first job I was at, I paid him 50 bucks to make our website.
0:08:53 So there wasn’t a way to book it like there is now.
0:08:57 And so the first, I actually started off marketing on Craigslist.
0:09:01 So on Craigslist, there’s a section where it says services offered, right?
0:09:03 Or like, you know, you need some help with something.
0:09:06 So I put on their rent moving boxes, right?
0:09:08 Super, super sketchy.
0:09:09 But I said, well, it’s free.
0:09:13 There’s no harm in this because I don’t have to pay a search engine, I’m to put up Facebook
0:09:14 ads or anything like that.
0:09:18 You know, 10 years ago, Craigslist was a different landscape than it is today, right?
0:09:20 It was a different era of the internet.
0:09:21 Yeah.
0:09:22 It was, right?
0:09:25 It was where you, I mean, I found a tennis partner on there, roommates, I sold my car.
0:09:29 Like it’s not, it was used much more than I feel like than it is now.
0:09:30 Yeah.
0:09:33 And maybe today you could do a similar tactic on Facebook marketplace because that’s where
0:09:36 I went to look for moving boxes for our recent move.
0:09:37 Right.
0:09:38 And people are giving them away and like, okay, we’ll go pick these up.
0:09:40 So you’re exactly right, right?
0:09:44 Like people give stuff away, it’s easier, it’s more community feel, you have a more trustworthiness
0:09:45 there.
0:09:46 But back then I just had no inhibition.
0:09:50 I was like, yeah, I’ll just go on and, and I couldn’t believe that we got an email from
0:09:51 somebody that was like, yeah, I want to rent these.
0:09:52 I want to try these out.
0:09:56 And it was a woman living in an apartment, like a senior apartment in a not so great
0:09:57 part of town.
0:10:02 And so I took this intern with me, we rented a truck from Home Depot, like those $19 per
0:10:05 hour trucks, because I don’t know what else to do.
0:10:08 And one of the boxes actually flew out on the freeway.
0:10:09 No.
0:10:12 So we learned that we need to close the lids and tie them down.
0:10:13 Who would have thought they could fly out.
0:10:18 And so we grabbed that, got back on track and we went to this woman and delivered the boxes
0:10:21 and was like, yeah, so we’ll be back in a week to pick them back up.
0:10:22 Okay.
0:10:24 And so she was just doing an in town move.
0:10:25 Yeah.
0:10:29 She was moving from a one bedroom apartment from North, the Northern part of town to one
0:10:32 bedroom apartment on the Southern, to the Southern part of town.
0:10:35 So it was just her and her cat and she was a great fan.
0:10:39 And we learned the one thing about the negative about this business, Nick, is that think about
0:10:40 it.
0:10:41 You’re renting stuff out.
0:10:43 What it’s, what’s means you get it back, hopefully.
0:10:46 So the things you have to look out for is, are you getting all your boxes back?
0:10:47 Are they damaged?
0:10:48 Yeah.
0:10:49 And are they clean?
0:10:50 Like they should be.
0:10:55 Sometimes you’ll find like pat hair, human hair, sprinkles, all kinds of stuff in the
0:10:57 boxes after people have done moving.
0:11:00 And you have to make sure that it’s clean and sanitized for the next customer.
0:11:02 So the not so luxurious part of this business.
0:11:04 No, that makes sense.
0:11:08 More with Gary in just a moment, including how he priced the rental service, the pitch
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0:13:46 What does it cost to rent these things out?
0:13:47 How do you figure out pricing?
0:13:51 That’s where the competition really helps is that you look at what other people are charging
0:13:53 in other cities.
0:13:59 There’s companies now in Southern California, Bay Area, Texas, Arizona, even Colorado.
0:14:01 You see what they’re charging.
0:14:04 What we did is basically just test out the market.
0:14:08 We wanted to have a higher margin to make up for the lower volume.
0:14:13 We started to increase our prices and we would still get people that wouldn’t say, “There’s
0:14:18 maybe a few people per year that are like, ‘That’s a lot of money, $400 for rent boxes.
0:14:19 I don’t know if I want to do that.’”
0:14:25 But most people really don’t bat an eye because they see that if I’m paying movers $2,000
0:14:29 or $3,000 to pack up and move my house, I don’t have to go because they’re going to
0:14:33 charge too to bring you boxes and tape them up and build them up and dispose of them and
0:14:34 everything.
0:14:38 So we figured out pricing just from trial and error and also just looking at what the
0:14:41 competition nationally was charging.
0:14:46 On the pricing page at CalBoxvernal.com, it looks like it’s a combination of how many
0:14:49 do you need and how long do you need them.
0:14:53 So like 50 boxes for a week, it gives you plenty of time to pack everything up, move
0:14:54 it across town.
0:14:59 You got to do local moves because if you’re moving to Seattle, I need my boxes back.
0:15:03 It’s got to be in town moves so your moving company partner can bring them back to headquarters
0:15:06 or you can go pick them up and take them back to the storage unit.
0:15:07 Yep, that’s exactly right.
0:15:11 And we do quite, actually, we’ve had a few people that moved.
0:15:13 Sacramento’s been a hot spot for people from the Bay Area to move to because it’s much
0:15:15 cheaper, especially after the pandemic.
0:15:20 So we actually had people that said, “I want to rent your boxes and I’ll drop them off
0:15:23 to you once I move to the Bay Area, once I move to Sacramento.”
0:15:28 So if they moved to Sacramento, they would drive here, pick up our boxes, go home, pack
0:15:31 and once they move here, they’d either pick them up or they’d drop them back off.
0:15:34 So I will say it’s just a culture, I guess.
0:15:38 People are big into sustainability in different parts of the country and want that zero waste
0:15:40 and there’s that brand awareness out there.
0:15:44 There’s a great company in the Bay Area called ZipGo, they do what we do.
0:15:48 They rent out these boxes and sometimes they’re like, “Yeah, I wish we could give our boxes
0:15:51 to somebody and they move up there and then you take them and we somehow get them back.”
0:15:54 So there is a logistical issue, obviously, if you rent them out.
0:15:58 So long distance moves are not our strong suit, but everything else is.
0:15:59 Got it.
0:16:05 And then if somebody is sitting on these, maybe it’s a corporate reload and they need
0:16:08 to go into storage for a minute, I guess you’re charging them every week so you’re still making
0:16:13 money on that inventory, but it kind of limits the booking requests that come in to say, “We’ll
0:16:16 shoot that inventory as tied up right now.”
0:16:17 Yeah, we’ve had that.
0:16:21 We’ve had, and especially it’s the corporate moves and those renovation projects, is they’re
0:16:22 like, “Okay, we’ll have it.
0:16:24 We want to rent it for two weeks.
0:16:25 Two weeks turns into three weeks to four weeks.”
0:16:28 We’ve had a customer that rented it for almost two months.
0:16:33 And yeah, it does tie up the inventory, but from what I see it as they’re paying, we could
0:16:35 have had a customer that week, we could have not.
0:16:39 And if we do, yeah, I do have to say, “Really sorry, we’re booked up.”
0:16:42 And that creates a, “Wow, it’s like kind of that waitlist phenomenon.
0:16:44 I’m like, “Oh, I want it even more now.”
0:16:48 So maybe I’ll, I mean, I’ve had people that honestly, they’ve delayed their move date
0:16:53 or delayed their escrow or closing their lease on their apartment because like, “I’ll wait
0:16:54 till you’re ready.”
0:16:57 I mean, that’s like music to any business owner’s ears, right?
0:16:58 Yeah.
0:17:02 Is you have to turn away a customer, but you’re creating that scarcity effect in an inadvertently,
0:17:03 right?
0:17:04 But you’re still creating it.
0:17:08 And now they want to come back and like, they’ll change themselves to work with you.
0:17:09 Yeah.
0:17:10 The inventory is making money.
0:17:11 So it’s fine.
0:17:13 How many boxes do you have now?
0:17:14 Close to a thousand.
0:17:15 Oh my God.
0:17:16 Okay.
0:17:17 That’s more than I expected.
0:17:18 Yeah.
0:17:20 Cause like, I mean, most rentals are like 100 to 200 boxes.
0:17:23 And sometimes we have two or three at a time.
0:17:24 Okay.
0:17:25 So you’ve got plenty of capacity.
0:17:26 Yeah.
0:17:30 And it’s also a lot cheaper to order a lot at once so that you’re not paying additional
0:17:34 shipping and logistic fees and also if some boxes break or whatever, like you have the
0:17:35 rest of that.
0:17:36 Yeah.
0:17:37 You make sense.
0:17:38 So you got to be able to fill that demand.
0:17:39 Wow.
0:17:40 Okay.
0:17:43 So starting out marketing on Craigslist, you know, renting, renting the pickup truck from
0:17:44 Hope Depot to deliver these things.
0:17:49 And then eventually it sounds like your move, you know, even though this is a hands on local
0:17:54 based business, you’re moving several states away halfway across the country to Colorado.
0:17:59 And yet the business is still able to operate thanks to this moving company partnership.
0:18:03 Can you play that card, you know, with multiple different moving companies?
0:18:07 Like you sprinkle that inventory around to like to cast a wide net here or what’s, what’s
0:18:08 the play?
0:18:12 You know, the funny thing is like when we were new and even, even once we were like a couple
0:18:15 years into business, moving companies did not like us.
0:18:20 And the reason is a lot of moving companies already want to sell boxes to their customers
0:18:22 cardboard boxes, right?
0:18:26 So in essence, if we were partnering with them, we’re drawing their attention away, we’re
0:18:27 taking revenue from them.
0:18:31 The way I approached it with them was like, it’s not, you know, obviously you can present
0:18:35 the choice, but if they want to rent, obviously it’s going to be financially lucrative to
0:18:38 you because you’re helping them get what they want, right?
0:18:41 Giving your customers options is always a good idea.
0:18:45 But that it wouldn’t really be logistically possible because, I mean, to coordinate with
0:18:49 several different people, I mean, a one person can’t, can’t do all that.
0:18:53 And I honestly think that our service radius is a pretty good amount.
0:18:55 It’s about 25 miles in Sacramento.
0:18:59 And we still service outlying area, we just charge additional for delivery.
0:19:01 So we still are able to do that.
0:19:05 And Steve, my business partner, is just an incredible human who’s very flexible.
0:19:06 He’s on top of things.
0:19:09 And he’s the only person I can really trust to do it.
0:19:10 What was the pitch?
0:19:16 Was like, we’ll split revenue 50/50, we’ll, it sounds like, because after a few of these,
0:19:20 my entrepreneurial spidey senses got to go off and be like, well, maybe I should just
0:19:21 buy my own boxes.
0:19:23 Why am I sharing revenue with this guy?
0:19:24 I’ll do it all the work.
0:19:25 Yeah.
0:19:26 No, it’s true.
0:19:29 I mean, and I thought of that too, but I said, do you want to buy the company from me?
0:19:33 He’s like, you know, I want to get out of the moving business.
0:19:34 And he’s been saying this for a while.
0:19:38 So he’s like, no, I don’t, I don’t want to really do that.
0:19:41 And he doesn’t want, I guess he just really doesn’t want the hassle of doing it.
0:19:43 But to be honest, that’s another thing somebody could have done.
0:19:46 I think there was another company actually in Sacramento, there was two.
0:19:49 One was called Ubox, I think they went out of business, you know?
0:19:53 And so it’s just a matter of like, people think it’s a great, you know, they see it
0:19:54 in concept.
0:19:55 Oh, he’s doing it.
0:19:57 I can just do it as a simple concept, but there’s an execution involved.
0:19:59 And also I have very low overhead.
0:20:04 So it’s like, once you buy the boxes, the arrangement that we have is that, you know, I pay hosting
0:20:10 for the website, I pay for splitting the revenue, cleaning the boxes, delivery, all of that comes
0:20:12 through only when we have a client.
0:20:16 If I don’t have a customer for a whole month or two months, I’m not paying anything.
0:20:17 There’s no expenses other than the website.
0:20:18 There’s no utilities.
0:20:19 There’s no rent.
0:20:20 There’s no employees.
0:20:21 There’s nothing.
0:20:22 So we can withstand dry spells.
0:20:23 Got it.
0:20:24 Got it.
0:20:29 If you get a booking request that is independent of the moving company partner, does he still
0:20:32 have to go and deliver those boxes?
0:20:33 Yep.
0:20:36 Our delivery guy does everything, whether they come through that lead source, any lead
0:20:37 source.
0:20:42 So most of our leads are coming from Google referrals, previous customers and interior
0:20:43 remodeling specialists.
0:20:44 Okay.
0:20:45 Yeah.
0:20:48 When you start kind of listing these off, you know, I think of just, you know, oh, my
0:20:50 lease is up, I’m moving or my change jobs.
0:20:53 So I’m moving to a different area, but there’s a lot of different occasions where you might
0:20:54 need to pack up stuff.
0:20:58 I guess we did it last year with the kitchen remodels, I guess we got to, you know, move
0:20:59 everything out.
0:21:01 And it’s like, oh gosh, there’s a lot of stuff here.
0:21:06 And so all these different occasions where people might be in the market for something
0:21:10 like this and kind of looking for those strategic partnerships, I love the interior designer
0:21:11 angle.
0:21:13 I’ve never thought of, but that makes sense.
0:21:14 Yeah.
0:21:15 And we kind of fell into it by accident.
0:21:19 We had somebody reach out to us saying, oh, I didn’t even know.
0:21:20 Another one that was like, I don’t know.
0:21:21 You guys existed.
0:21:22 Why didn’t I know about you before?
0:21:24 And she introduced us.
0:21:27 There’s apparently there’s like meetups of interior designers and there’s like, there’s
0:21:32 like these conventions for like organizers, which I would never have imagined.
0:21:34 And they have a lot of business.
0:21:39 A lot of people have big homes and discussion or income and they want to hire these people
0:21:42 to make their pantries Instagram worthy.
0:21:47 And you know, what happens is that then translates into their office needs work.
0:21:48 This needs work.
0:21:49 Their kids need work.
0:21:53 So whether they move, remodel, get a design work done, get any renovations done.
0:21:57 And we also do a lot of retail stores now, which just was from accident.
0:22:02 There was a store that sold auto parts and very mom and pop stores, auto parts and machinery.
0:22:04 And they were getting their floors redone.
0:22:08 So they had to pack up everything off of their shelves and store it for two weeks while the
0:22:09 floors got done.
0:22:12 So they wanted our boxes because they thought the cardboard, everything’s going to collapse.
0:22:13 It’s going to tear.
0:22:14 It’s not strong enough.
0:22:15 Okay.
0:22:18 And, you know, so there’s just so much opportunity for using these boxes.
0:22:22 That’s not just for somebody moving from one house to another house.
0:22:23 Gotcha.
0:22:24 And did they find you through the website?
0:22:25 They did.
0:22:26 Okay.
0:22:32 Was there anything specific that you did to help it in terms of local SEO ranking?
0:22:37 I honestly just Googled like how to improve your search rankings and I use Wix, which I
0:22:40 guess wasn’t very recommended, but it was cheap at the time when they had a package
0:22:41 deal.
0:22:45 And so I just, you know, would put keywords on our homepage and other pages and connect
0:22:46 our socials.
0:22:51 One business owner gave me a suggestion to, you should allow people to directly have a
0:22:55 booking request on your website rather than sending you an email or calling.
0:22:58 Just put some, you know, form in there, how many boxes you want, when you want it, all
0:23:00 of that and send it to you.
0:23:02 And that’s been heavily utilized as well.
0:23:04 So I’m really not sure what it is.
0:23:05 I’m grateful for it.
0:23:08 But, you know, Wix too also has like an SEO checklist, like, did you do this, did you
0:23:09 do this, do this?
0:23:11 So I’ve been working on that.
0:23:15 I haven’t hired anybody to do any of our website or technical stuff.
0:23:17 Maybe I should, but it’s been working so far.
0:23:18 So far.
0:23:19 So good.
0:23:20 If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
0:23:21 Yeah.
0:23:26 Ten years ago, I would have been really hesitant to recommend Wix from an SEO standpoint just
0:23:31 because a lot of their stuff was kind of dynamically loaded, hidden behind JavaScript in a lot of
0:23:32 ways.
0:23:33 Right.
0:23:37 So it’s been a bit, and by virtue of being one of the few players in town, it sounds
0:23:40 like, hey, look, you know, eventually you’re going to trickle to the top of Google just
0:23:45 by virtue of word of mouth and, you know, the on-page factors that you do have in place
0:23:49 here where it says, you know, if you need moving boxes in Sacramento and you want to
0:23:50 rent them, here we are.
0:23:51 Yeah.
0:23:52 Some of it is luck.
0:23:55 Some of it is just doing what you can to be proactive about making sure you have the right
0:23:56 content on your website.
0:24:02 Now, how about the interior design, like, it didn’t sound like you went to this conference,
0:24:06 but it sounds like you were proactive about building those relationships, too.
0:24:07 Yeah.
0:24:12 It was, once this first woman had reached out to us, she was really nice, and she did
0:24:15 like an, we didn’t have Instagram until about two years ago.
0:24:20 We just had a Facebook page, again, I’ve never done any advertising, really.
0:24:23 And she’s like, you need to get Instagram so I can put you guys on my story.
0:24:26 So we created an Instagram page, and she did.
0:24:27 And that was great.
0:24:28 She’s like, look at these boxes.
0:24:29 They’re called great.
0:24:30 They are.
0:24:31 They’re so easy, eco-friendly.
0:24:35 You need a little spin on the, on the dolly and, and her friends found it, like, wow,
0:24:36 where are these?
0:24:37 Who’s the owner?
0:24:38 Where do I find them?
0:24:42 So that’s the power of the community here is that it’s, it’s, it’s just like they trust
0:24:45 each other, they lean on each other, even though they’re in competition, right?
0:24:49 They don’t want somebody doing something that their clients are, think are really cool and
0:24:51 they don’t offer it or they don’t know anything about it.
0:24:56 So we don’t do a lot of moves with them, but we do a lot of, like I said, organizing projects.
0:24:57 All right.
0:24:59 This is Cal Box rental on Instagram.
0:25:00 We’ll link that up.
0:25:04 If you want to go check it out, what kind of risks are associated with this business?
0:25:07 I mean, it’s, it seems pretty straightforward.
0:25:11 Like it’s a, it’s a plastic box, but I don’t know, you find any risk or liability here that
0:25:12 people should be aware of?
0:25:13 Yeah.
0:25:14 It’s a couple of things.
0:25:18 I mean, one of the things that we did was, I mean, my first customer, we did have a rental
0:25:19 agreement, right?
0:25:23 So technically she could have just like kept the boxes or destroyed them and I would have
0:25:25 no recourse or she’s like, I don’t have any boxes.
0:25:26 What are you talking about?
0:25:27 But fortunately she didn’t do that.
0:25:28 So it was after that.
0:25:29 I was like, you know what?
0:25:33 I should probably have something more than email to make sure customers are on the hook
0:25:34 for this.
0:25:37 So I went to, I think I went to the library and I looked up like, you know, those NOLO
0:25:39 books and they have like how to write a contract.
0:25:42 So I just Googled like how to have a rental contract.
0:25:45 And I would just put stuff in there that basically indemnified us for anything.
0:25:49 If they were, the boxes were dirty, if they were, if they were late, how much we would
0:25:50 charge them.
0:25:53 If they got hurt or if there’s liquids in them, like we’re not liable.
0:25:58 So we basically made sure that the rental agreement had, what are they renting from?
0:26:00 What dates are they renting it?
0:26:01 When are they do?
0:26:02 And also payment information.
0:26:06 So in the beginning days, we only took credit card, we had, you know, square, it was like
0:26:10 if I was meeting them, we would slide little thing on your smartphone, but now you can
0:26:11 enter it manually.
0:26:16 And now we’ve gradually moved since Venmo does business now, we, we primarily try to
0:26:18 do Venmo and just keep all our transactions there.
0:26:22 We also take PayPal because the thing is like when I send a rental agreement to a customer,
0:26:24 we don’t have any fancy docusign or anything like that.
0:26:28 They would have to enter in their credit card information onto the PDF and then send it
0:26:29 back to me.
0:26:30 And that’s not very secure.
0:26:34 So most of the time, if they’re really persistent on doing credit card, which usually they are,
0:26:38 if they’re like a company because they want that, the points and all of that is we would
0:26:39 do it over the phone.
0:26:41 So I would take their information over the phone.
0:26:45 And then once their rental is complete, then I discard the information because one mistake
0:26:50 I made was if somebody paid by credit card or whatever, and then they didn’t return all
0:26:55 of the boxes or they were damaged or something, I don’t find out until somebody goes and cleans
0:26:56 the boxes.
0:26:58 And they have to call them back and be like, we have to charge you this.
0:27:01 And if they don’t, if I don’t have the information on file, I don’t have as much leverage.
0:27:02 Okay.
0:27:04 How did you find that cleaner person?
0:27:08 Is this like, is this like an Airbnb short-term rental type of cleaner?
0:27:10 Take a pressure washer to these things or, you know, spray them out.
0:27:11 I used to do it most of the time.
0:27:15 I mean, when I was, when I was here and then, you know, since I’ve been back, I’ve been
0:27:16 doing it.
0:27:19 But now in the last few years, it’s the same value to their deliveries.
0:27:21 He’s an employee of the moving company.
0:27:25 And you know, they have downtime if they have one move or two moves a day, there may be
0:27:30 done by three o’clock and he’ll spend an hour or two cleaning the boxes and it’s, he doesn’t
0:27:33 charge much and it, but it is work, right?
0:27:36 Because it’s like, you have to clean each box inside and out.
0:27:40 And the one, the sticky things literally Nick is that people leave their labels on these
0:27:41 boxes.
0:27:45 So fortunately they’ll say, like they’ll put painters tape, which is great, right?
0:27:50 You can just tear it right off, but sometimes they’ll put like, you know, like really adhesive
0:27:53 stuff on these boxes, like, and those are hard to take off.
0:27:57 So we now provide dry erase markers for our customers.
0:28:00 If they request them, they can just write it on the boxes.
0:28:02 And then if they forget to do it, it’ll just come off.
0:28:03 I’ll be clean them.
0:28:04 Oh, interesting.
0:28:05 So the dry erase will just, uh, just scrub off.
0:28:06 Yeah.
0:28:10 There’s actually a pre-made smooth section of plastic on the boxes, on the side and on
0:28:13 the top, where they can put a label in like designed for that.
0:28:14 Yeah.
0:28:15 Exactly.
0:28:18 On the other risks, though, I would say that there, there is a concern that if a client,
0:28:22 if a customer, you know, when you pick up your boxes, if you’re not there doing it,
0:28:26 you may not know because let’s say somebody returns their boxes, they’re gonna be in stacks
0:28:27 of five, right?
0:28:30 They’re not going to have every box just out on its own because you’re just stackable.
0:28:35 So if they go back to the warehouse and let’s say if you are cracked or there’s some that
0:28:40 are really dirty or have hairs or dirt or something, who knows what they moved, right?
0:28:43 You have to go back to the customer and you have to make a decision because if you call
0:28:48 them and say, I’m going to have to charge you a hundred dollars for cleaning or whatever,
0:28:49 you’re probably going to put a bad taste in the mouth.
0:28:51 Well, I didn’t do that or I don’t remember that.
0:28:53 And now they may not write you a good review.
0:28:55 They may not come back as a customer.
0:28:56 They may not refer you.
0:28:59 So you have to really play that accordingly.
0:29:02 So I try to just judge it based upon my interaction with the customer.
0:29:05 If it’s one or two boxes that are dirty, I’m not going to charge them.
0:29:08 But if it’s a consistent amount, we’re going to charge them.
0:29:10 And also if they damage the boxes, we have to charge them.
0:29:15 And the thing about that that’s difficult is if I’m not there, if my business partner
0:29:19 is not there and the delivery guy misses it, and let’s say that that box that’s already
0:29:21 damaged goes to a new inventory.
0:29:25 Now that customer got something and I may have to charge them.
0:29:28 So it’s really making sure that we play our due diligence correctly to make sure that
0:29:35 we’re giving each customer clean, new, good shape inventory so we don’t run into this.
0:29:37 And we have a reminder on the rental agreement.
0:29:42 When their rent is when their rental period is due, we also say please make sure you wipe
0:29:46 down the boxes and they’re all empty and all the labels are removed.
0:29:47 Most people listen to that.
0:29:50 Some people don’t, which is why we just clean boxes after each rental.
0:29:51 Sure.
0:29:52 Got it.
0:29:58 And you carry some sort of like general liability policy in case, I don’t know, somebody cuts
0:29:59 their hand open.
0:30:03 It doesn’t seem like there’s a huge level of liability there, but you never know.
0:30:04 Yeah, you never know.
0:30:07 And that’s the thing is like, you know, I’ve toyed back and forth with bundling this with
0:30:12 another LLC or, but yeah, you definitely want to have business liability insurance because
0:30:16 you never know, let’s say somebody, you know, hurt, like you said, hurts their hand on the
0:30:21 box or, you know, they feel like they were charged for cleaning when it wasn’t really
0:30:22 dirty.
0:30:24 So you just want to make sure you protect yourself in any case.
0:30:27 I don’t think this is a very high risk business at all.
0:30:32 Now, if we were like helping them back and I had employees, then that’s a different concern.
0:30:35 But this is just them getting boxes delivered to their doorstep.
0:30:38 They’re then in their possession and then we pick them up.
0:30:42 You know, compared to some of the other rental businesses that we were renting out cars on
0:30:46 Turo or we did an episode on renting out mobility scooters, like, oh, you know, this thing had
0:30:47 a mind of its own.
0:30:52 It accelerated and it drove me into a ditch and there’s other things that, you know, would
0:30:56 definitely check the box for having more liability than a plastic tub.
0:30:58 Yeah, an inanimate object.
0:31:03 More with Gary in just a moment, including collecting positive customer reviews, managing
0:31:07 the inventory and scheduling and his goals for the future of this business right after
0:31:08 this.
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0:32:35 Being an entrepreneur and being able to work remotely definitely has its perks.
0:32:41 I’ve recorded podcasts everywhere from Vietnam to Italy, drafted newsletters from Japan,
0:32:45 hosted mastermind meetings from Spain, ended up being the middle of the night to get to
0:32:49 US business hours, and outlined courses in Mexico.
0:32:53 The common thread of all of these trips though is Airbnb.
0:32:57 We love being able to get exactly what we’re looking for in a place to stay and have a
0:33:02 more local experience than staying in some giant hotel chain.
0:33:03 And you know me.
0:33:06 I’m always thinking about the next side hustle idea, the next income stream, right?
0:33:11 And one that’s at the top of the list is hosting our place on Airbnb while we’re traveling.
0:33:13 That way the house doesn’t have to sit empty.
0:33:17 We could use the income to help pay for the trip, and we’ve heard from several successful
0:33:19 Airbnb hosts on the show.
0:33:24 And what’s interesting is a lot of them started with almost that exact strategy, running their
0:33:27 place or even a spare room while they’re out of town.
0:33:32 Taking inspiration from that, you might have an Airbnb right under your nose.
0:33:35 In fact, your home might be worth more than you think.
0:33:39 You can find out how much at Airbnb.com/host.
0:33:45 That’s Airbnb.com/host to find out how much your home is worth.
0:33:47 You bet you’re collecting reviews.
0:33:52 This is going to be Google, Yelp, Facebook, any platforms that you’ve prioritized and
0:33:56 anything proactive that you’re doing to collect those reviews from happy customers.
0:33:57 Yeah.
0:33:58 So I am under my signature for our business email.
0:34:02 I do have a link to both our Google page and also Yelp.
0:34:06 So most of the time customers will leave it on their own, but I do make an effort.
0:34:09 I think my business partner told me about this app called Nice Job or something like
0:34:12 that where it sends like a couple of texts to the customer.
0:34:13 Hey, how was your experience?
0:34:14 Write a review.
0:34:19 So I just have like a template that I just text to the customers through our phone app.
0:34:21 We use Google Voice.
0:34:23 And so I would just ask them like, how was your experience?
0:34:27 Like I would call them and say, Hey, if it was good, like would you mind leaving us a
0:34:28 review?
0:34:29 Most people are happy to do that.
0:34:30 Some people are just like, you did great.
0:34:31 I’ll refer you.
0:34:32 I don’t leave reviews.
0:34:34 And then some people that didn’t have a good experience just don’t answer me.
0:34:37 They’re just like, I’m not going to leave you a bad review, but I’m not going to talk
0:34:38 about this anymore.
0:34:40 Like I just want to be done with it, which is fine.
0:34:41 Like right.
0:34:44 It’s everybody’s right, but we’re really fortunate in the people that have done left
0:34:45 reviews.
0:34:49 I mean, we have a five star rating on Yelp and Google, a clean five star rating, which
0:34:53 is, it’s really, I’m proud of that because after 12 years of business, right?
0:34:57 You might have a disgruntled customer that was like, Oh, they overcharged me.
0:34:58 Their boxes are bad quality.
0:35:02 They were late on their delivery or, you know, these boxes aren’t that great anyways or
0:35:03 whatever.
0:35:04 Right.
0:35:05 But fortunately, like it’s been pretty cool.
0:35:06 Yeah.
0:35:07 Yeah.
0:35:09 It’s like a law of large numbers is bound to happen after you serve enough clients.
0:35:11 Somebody is bound to be unhappy, but that’s great.
0:35:15 I like this proactive follow up to say, Hey, how was your thing?
0:35:19 And if you were, you know, giving me positive, would you mind just typing that same thing
0:35:22 into the review platform of your choice?
0:35:23 That’d be great.
0:35:24 Yeah.
0:35:25 Exactly.
0:35:26 You mentioned it just takes a few hours a week to run.
0:35:28 Where does your time go in the business these days?
0:35:29 Yeah.
0:35:33 Honestly, Nick, it’s just a matter of answering requests by email and phone.
0:35:37 So I’ll get a phone call, get a voicemail, I’ll get an email and they’ll be like, they’ll
0:35:40 have some questions when it kind of get the boxes, how many boxes do I need, how big are
0:35:42 the boxes, et cetera.
0:35:45 And then I help them kind of create a rental agreement and I’ll do the scheduling.
0:35:49 I’ll connect with my business partner and then he gets the rental agreement.
0:35:52 He contacts the customer and what they’re able to deliver.
0:35:53 And that’s basically it.
0:35:57 And then during the deliveries, I have a, I have a spreadsheet of, you know, who’s renting
0:35:59 what during what time, what do they do?
0:36:01 So we make sure we get them back on time.
0:36:02 And that’s really about it.
0:36:06 I also spend a couple of hours a week creating those relationships in the industry.
0:36:09 So if we’ve worked with people in the past, like, what are you seeing today?
0:36:12 You know, would you like to do a custom promo code together?
0:36:15 Do you want to do a, do you want to collaborate on a social media post?
0:36:19 You know, we’ll have like specials, like a spooktober, like this month, we’re giving
0:36:23 a free extra week of rental for anybody who rents with us.
0:36:28 So we always just try to do something creative and just try to connect with people and those
0:36:32 who are centers of influence to make sure that they are aware of us still, that we are
0:36:34 still around and then we can work together.
0:36:35 Got it.
0:36:39 I was going to ask about the spreadsheet for inventory management because with a thousand
0:36:44 boxes and people with different parts of town, you know, with different numbers of boxes,
0:36:49 like that starts to become a little bit of a logistical challenge, but it is just to
0:36:50 just spreadsheet.
0:36:54 You kind of have an idea of which, you know, how many are with which customer at what time
0:36:55 and when they’re supposed to come back.
0:36:56 Yeah, that’s exactly right.
0:37:00 It’s just a matter of where are these boxes, when are they due, and that’s what we go
0:37:01 based off.
0:37:06 So if I get a rental request and I see that there’s boxes due in a week, but they want
0:37:10 them this weekend, I’m like, well, they’re not, we can deliver them as soon as this time.
0:37:15 So I can see like which boxes are coming back when to make sure because if a customer wants
0:37:20 like a hundred boxes, that’s a lot harder to do if we’re booked than if they want 50
0:37:21 boxes.
0:37:24 But usually at most the time with the level of boxes we have now, I mean, we’re not a
0:37:27 crazy, you know, million dollar company, right?
0:37:29 So we usually have the ability to do that.
0:37:32 We’re just the neighborhood box rental company here.
0:37:37 Is there a target revenue number or fulfillment metric, like how many are being utilized at
0:37:38 any given time?
0:37:41 Like, are there key metrics that you’re tracking for this business?
0:37:45 You know, it’s just, did we do better than last year, right?
0:37:46 That’s what it is for me.
0:37:50 I mean, I mean, I should be more and I know there’s been people on this podcast and show
0:37:53 that are really like running lucrative businesses.
0:37:57 But for me, this is not something that I can really scale nationally, right?
0:38:00 Because it’s very localized and also a lot of people do it in other cities.
0:38:04 And for me, I’m just happy doing like, this is a, this is an experiment to me, to be honest.
0:38:07 Like I was 23, I was like, what risk do I have?
0:38:11 I want to say that I started a business and I wanted to combine it with my passion for
0:38:13 sustainability and zero waste.
0:38:14 So I started it.
0:38:19 And this now, I mean, it pays for basically all of my fun money, you know, I don’t have
0:38:23 to worry about, oh man, I can’t join my friends out to eat or go on this trip or buy a new
0:38:25 paddle board or whatever I want to do.
0:38:26 It pays for all of that.
0:38:27 It’s a side hustle.
0:38:28 That’s exactly what it is.
0:38:30 And my hope is that it continues to grow.
0:38:35 So more people use it and save, save cardboard boxes and the, you know, maybe we can do something
0:38:36 else.
0:38:40 But I mean, we were recently in like a local magazine and there was a feature on us on
0:38:42 Good Day Sacramento.
0:38:47 So you know, we try to speak to good community partners and make sure that we continue to
0:38:48 do well.
0:38:51 Were you doing any proactive PR outreach for that or they somehow found you like, hey,
0:38:52 this is a cool story.
0:38:57 I actually researched, there was a segment I saw on another local business and I was
0:38:58 like, oh, they do that.
0:38:59 That’s a really cool segment.
0:39:00 They do.
0:39:03 I mean, it’s not a very, it’s not obviously a national audience like the today show or
0:39:04 anything.
0:39:07 But you know, I reached out, I saw that there’s a lady who had an email that did this and
0:39:09 I reached out to her and we went back and forth a few times.
0:39:12 So you know, hopefully we have a chance to do something.
0:39:19 I think a lot of local side hustles have this, you know, PR play in their playbook because
0:39:23 especially if it’s something that’s a little bit, a little bit creative, a little bit different,
0:39:26 like renting out moving boxes or it’s like, oh, that’s unique.
0:39:31 Oh, you could turn that into a business and these publications like to feature local people
0:39:36 and feel good stories and they’re kind of looking for angles like this, especially oh,
0:39:41 there’s a sustainability play or there’s some angle here that can weave into the story that
0:39:42 they already want to tell.
0:39:43 Yeah.
0:39:44 Yeah.
0:39:46 Oh, look, you know, local businessman does good or local side hustler.
0:39:50 It’s kind of how can you tap into what they’re already looking to talk about?
0:39:51 Yeah.
0:39:52 100%.
0:39:53 Yeah.
0:39:54 It’s a really good community magazine.
0:39:55 It’s called Style Magazine.
0:39:56 It’s great.
0:39:57 It’s free.
0:40:01 It’s always got like cool little stories and tips from experts, but it’s really great in
0:40:06 that it brings business owners, small business owners in the community to give advice or like
0:40:08 they’ll pro like they always have like business profiles.
0:40:09 Why’d you get into this business?
0:40:11 You know, what made you get into this business?
0:40:12 Why do you live here?
0:40:13 Blah, blah, blah.
0:40:16 And so you really get to meet the business owners behind your local coffee shop, your local
0:40:19 auto mechanic or whatever it might be.
0:40:23 So it really kind of ties that together with their business and to your point gives a unique
0:40:27 angle on people with that expertise, how they can help the community.
0:40:28 Yeah.
0:40:31 And if nothing else, hopefully a backlink, hopefully some social proof, you know, as
0:40:34 seen on, you know, good day Sacramento or something.
0:40:35 Yeah, exactly.
0:40:39 So you may look, you know, this is local, we don’t do cross country moves.
0:40:43 Is there a geographic expansion?
0:40:45 Is there a, you know, product skew expansion?
0:40:48 Like where do you, you know, aside from just, we’re going to ride.
0:40:53 The rising tide of interest and awareness in sustainable moving box rental.
0:40:54 Like there’s a new category.
0:40:57 This is something that, you know, more and more people become aware of it for moving
0:40:58 or for storage.
0:41:00 Like you’re going to be a beneficiary of that.
0:41:04 Is there anything else to like pour some gas on the fire or say we’re, we’re good with
0:41:05 what we get?
0:41:07 You know, obviously there always is, right?
0:41:12 We can always get more inventory, rent a bigger space, have a bigger space, get more clients.
0:41:16 But for this particular business, I don’t, I don’t anticipate us 10 Xing or becoming
0:41:20 like a, you know, franchising different units or do anything like that.
0:41:25 I mean, we have a really good name and our clients and community loves us and hope that
0:41:30 as the population continues to grow, there’s tons of more houses out here that we can continue
0:41:31 to serve them.
0:41:34 And there’s, there’s a more renting boxes.
0:41:39 I’ll be happy when renting boxes is more normal than buying cardboard boxes, right?
0:41:41 That means that we were able to prove our concept.
0:41:44 I don’t know if or when that’ll happen.
0:41:47 But if people are like, Oh, I got to rent boxes from him move and they’re like, Oh yeah,
0:41:48 where do you rent your boxes from?
0:41:51 And that’s like an actual normal conversation that happens.
0:41:54 Then I’ll be like, okay, we succeeded because we were the only ones, at least the first
0:41:59 ones here to bring rentable moving boxes to the Sacramento area.
0:42:00 And now it’s normal.
0:42:04 Now it’s something that everybody does and that’ll be mean success.
0:42:05 Very good.
0:42:09 Well, I imagine you keep chipping away toward that goal and I’m excited to see where you
0:42:10 take it.
0:42:14 It’s been over a decade in the business and sounds like it’s set up to be sustainable
0:42:17 without a lot of time investment required to keep it growing.
0:42:18 So very cool.
0:42:23 Gary, thanks so much for stopping by your, the author of financial fives.
0:42:29 This is the top 325 ways to save, earn and thrive to retire before 65.
0:42:33 You can find that at financialfives.com.
0:42:36 The box rental business is CalBoxRental.com.
0:42:43 If you want to check that out, check out what that Wix site looks like, CalBoxRental.com.
0:42:46 Let’s wrap this thing up with your number one tip for side hustle nation.
0:42:50 The number one tip is just try, just start something, right?
0:42:52 Do something that’s going to move the needle.
0:42:56 That’s all the best thing I can do because we can plan and research and talk to people.
0:43:00 But I can tell you that unless I just told myself that I’m just going to go to home deep
0:43:03 in by these boxes and you see that receipt and you see the box in the back of your car
0:43:07 and sitting in your garage, you’re like, okay, I need to do something, right?
0:43:09 It’s something to start that wheel turning, right?
0:43:14 Buy that domain name, you know, reach out to somebody, whatever you need to do, pay somebody
0:43:18 a hundred bucks to give you a really cool logo and slogan, whatever it means that whatever
0:43:20 your idea is, just try something and start.
0:43:23 Yeah, some kind of a forced action.
0:43:28 You’ll find that momentum breeds momentum and there’s some law of entrepreneurial physics
0:43:31 where an entrepreneur in motion tends to stay in motion.
0:43:35 It’s just that zero to one to get that motivation to go do that first thing.
0:43:36 And here we are.
0:43:40 10, 12 years later, it’s become a really cool side hustle that you built.
0:43:44 A couple of takeaways for me before we wrap up.
0:43:49 Number one is obviously this focus on partnerships and relationships.
0:43:53 Partnerships on the delivery and logistics side and then on the relationship side, think
0:43:58 about that strategic partner of who are your target customers already doing business with?
0:43:59 How can you make them?
0:44:03 You’re not a competitor, but they’re an ally or a potential referral source for you.
0:44:09 We talked about them as lead fountains instead of onesie-toosie lead trickles.
0:44:11 It’s like, who might need this service again and again and again?
0:44:13 I really like the focus there.
0:44:16 And then the second thing is like, well, what else could I rent out?
0:44:20 Like thinking about something that checks this box, like pretty durable asset, sure, some
0:44:24 of them are going to break, but the cost of each individual one is not a ton and something
0:44:28 that could really have a long lifespan, long shelf life.
0:44:30 I think that’s really just an interesting one.
0:44:33 And something that, like you mentioned, is going to be more and more people become aware
0:44:34 of it.
0:44:37 So you put yourself in a good position to capture some of that demand, just like side
0:44:42 hustle nation has captured a rising tide of interest in side hustles over the last decade.
0:44:47 So I’m trying to see what gold rush can you sell shovels into almost and the sustainability
0:44:52 zero waste is like a broader umbrella, maybe one of those to look into.
0:44:55 So like we talked about, not the only thing that you can rent out for a profit.
0:44:58 So make sure to grab your free listener bonus for this week.
0:45:01 That’s my list of 25 other unconventional rental ideas.
0:45:05 You may be able to borrow some of Gary’s playbook for on the marketing and partnership
0:45:06 side.
0:45:12 You can grab that for free at the show notes for this episode at side hustle nation.com/gary.
0:45:16 Or just follow the link in the episode description in your podcast player app.
0:45:17 It’ll get you right over there.
0:45:20 Other rental episodes for consideration, if you like this model.
0:45:23 We talked about the mobility scooter guy.
0:45:24 Love this episode.
0:45:27 We’re doing like three grand a month with a fleet of six or seven mobility scooters
0:45:28 in LA.
0:45:31 That is episode five 64 with Lenny Tim.
0:45:35 Fascinating episode, you know, relatively low startup costs, relatively quick to break
0:45:36 even.
0:45:37 And then it’s, then it’s gravy.
0:45:42 And then four 28, you know, one of the episodes I refer people to most often these, this is
0:45:47 a Steve Nadremia with his portable hot tub rental business and not really that portable,
0:45:51 but like portable compared to a, you know, a fixed, you know, hot tub that’s not going
0:45:54 anywhere, delivering these things in his pickup truck.
0:45:59 And I think he had like 25 or 30 of them really, really cool creative episode on the side from
0:46:00 his teaching job.
0:46:05 So four 28 on the hot tubs, five 64 with Lenny on the mobility scooters.
0:46:07 But big thanks to Gary for sharing his insight.
0:46:11 Big thanks to our sponsors for helping make this content free for everyone.
0:46:15 You can hit up side hustle nation.com/deals for all the latest offers from our sponsors
0:46:16 in one place.
0:46:19 Thank you for supporting the advertisers that support the show.
0:46:20 That is it for me.
0:46:21 Thank you so much for tuning in.
0:46:25 If you’re finding value in the show, the greatest compliment is to share it with a
0:46:26 friend.
0:46:27 So fire off that text message.
0:46:28 Hey, check this out.
0:46:30 Maybe we should do this in our area until next time.
0:46:31 Let’s go out there and make something happen.
0:46:35 And I’ll catch you in the next edition of the side hustle show hustle on.

0:00:01 (upbeat music)
0:00:04 100,000 bucks hosting a local workshops
0:00:05 as a side hustle, what’s up, what’s up?
0:00:08 Nick Loper here, welcome to The Side Hustle Show.
0:00:10 Because you’re nine to five, may make you a living,
0:00:12 but you’re five to nine, it makes you alive.
0:00:14 Today, I wanna share a unique side hustle idea
0:00:17 and that’s hosting local classes or workshops.
0:00:19 Maybe it’s not as scalable as building
0:00:20 an online course business,
0:00:22 but there’s a whole lot less competition.
0:00:23 It’s gonna be easier to get your first customers
0:00:25 and you can still make great money.
0:00:28 In fact, my guest has made over $100,000 in sales,
0:00:29 doing this on the side from her day job
0:00:33 over the last couple of years from 100Kartist.com,
0:00:36 Chloe Wyn Stanley, welcome to The Side Hustle Show.
0:00:38 – Hi, Nick, thanks so much for having me.
0:00:40 – I’m excited for this one, stick around,
0:00:41 we’re gonna cover how to come up
0:00:43 with your workshop topic or idea,
0:00:44 how to market the thing,
0:00:46 how to get those first students in the door
0:00:48 and how to potentially scale it up
0:00:50 so it takes less of your time.
0:00:51 Now, if you’re new to the show, welcome.
0:00:52 Thank you so much for tuning in.
0:00:55 This is the show that deconstructs
0:00:57 realistic legit ways to make extra money in your spare time.
0:00:58 If that’s what you’re looking for,
0:00:59 you’re in at the right place.
0:01:01 Nobody has more experience in this space.
0:01:03 We’ve been doing it every week since 2013,
0:01:05 over 600 episodes to choose from.
0:01:06 And while I would love to have you binge
0:01:09 on the entire catalog, that entire archive,
0:01:11 I wanna invite you instead, before you do that,
0:01:13 create your own eight to 10 episode personalized playlist.
0:01:16 It’s a little extended sampler platter, if you will.
0:01:17 It’s all super easy.
0:01:19 All you gotta do is go to hustle.show,
0:01:21 answer a few short multiple choice questions
0:01:22 and you’ll get that curated playlist.
0:01:24 You can add directly to your device,
0:01:24 you can learn what works
0:01:26 and then you can go out and make some more money.
0:01:27 That’s at hustle.show.
0:01:29 And Chloe, I wanna start with,
0:01:30 how’d you come up with this idea
0:01:32 for these little craft workshops?
0:01:35 – So it kind of just grew progressively.
0:01:40 Like in 2021 in New Zealand, we were in COVID lockdown
0:01:42 and so we were like staying at home.
0:01:44 And so a lot of people seem to be like turning
0:01:46 to indoor crafts and things like that.
0:01:48 I started a terrarium business,
0:01:49 which didn’t really go anywhere.
0:01:53 And then after that, I gave Polymer Clay a try.
0:01:55 Initially, I was making Polymer Clay earrings
0:01:57 and selling them online.
0:02:00 So I was like the only person in New Zealand making them.
0:02:03 And I realized that people,
0:02:05 they were happy to spend money on jewelry,
0:02:06 but they also really wanted to just learn
0:02:08 how to make it themselves.
0:02:10 And I think particularly coming out of COVID,
0:02:12 people really wanted to get out of the house.
0:02:15 And so I was able to host people.
0:02:18 I had a studio in Christchurch, which is in New Zealand.
0:02:22 It grew from there over time from serving five people
0:02:23 to eventually bringing on staff
0:02:26 and serving 40 people in one workshop.
0:02:28 So it really grew in that respect.
0:02:30 – So it sounds like it started as a hobby.
0:02:31 – Yeah.
0:02:33 – I can mess around with this Polymer Clay.
0:02:34 I can make some jewelry.
0:02:35 I can make some earrings.
0:02:37 Like a fun little outlet if I’m stuck at home.
0:02:39 And having some success selling them online,
0:02:40 is this Etsy?
0:02:41 Is this through your own site?
0:02:43 – No, I had my own website
0:02:46 and I would just advertise on Facebook.
0:02:48 And that’s how I reached customers.
0:02:51 After that, I was attending markets, craft fairs
0:02:52 in New Zealand to sell them.
0:02:56 But I just realized that I could make way more money
0:02:58 from hosting people for workshops
0:03:00 than I could just by selling the earrings.
0:03:03 Like the profit margin for one pair of earrings
0:03:06 versus a whole workshop was just like so much more.
0:03:09 And for a similar amount of work as well,
0:03:11 because it’s still a lot of work to make the earrings.
0:03:16 So if I’m just like hosting 20 people at the same time,
0:03:20 I’m making a lot more within just like two hours of my time.
0:03:23 So it just made more sense in that respect.
0:03:24 – That’s so interesting.
0:03:26 Our friend who was selling on Etsy 10 years ago,
0:03:29 I found the same thing to make these really nice looking,
0:03:30 you know, baby blankets.
0:03:32 She’s like, I’m gonna have to charge $100 for this thing
0:03:34 to make it worth the time that I have into it.
0:03:37 And people could go buy the same thing for $12 a target.
0:03:38 Like it’s a really tough sell.
0:03:41 But you turn around, teach people how to make their own.
0:03:44 Okay, now I can do it for five, 10, 40 people at a time.
0:03:46 And now this starts to become an entertainment type
0:03:48 of business more than,
0:03:49 an education type of business,
0:03:52 more than a kind of a done-for-you product business.
0:03:53 – Absolutely, yeah.
0:03:56 Like the experience is what people sign up for.
0:03:57 That’s what they pay the money for.
0:03:59 And so many people, a lot of the time,
0:04:01 they wouldn’t even really care about what they made
0:04:02 at the end of it,
0:04:04 because they’re just there to have fun with their friends.
0:04:06 – Yeah, there was one in our old town,
0:04:09 and it was like a sip and paint type of thing.
0:04:11 They did a ton of group outings
0:04:14 and you know, girls night out type of stuff
0:04:16 or a company team building where it’s like,
0:04:19 oh, you got your wine and you got the artist leader
0:04:21 in front is telling you step by step
0:04:22 how to recreate this famous painting.
0:04:24 And you know, people are having a great time.
0:04:25 Sounds like something similar.
0:04:27 So these first five people, how did they find you?
0:04:29 How did you find them to show up for their workshop?
0:04:32 – I just advertised again on Facebook for that.
0:04:35 I just found that I got good results
0:04:37 from just advertising to people there
0:04:39 on Facebook for the local event.
0:04:41 And at the start, I had five people
0:04:42 just because I was like finding my feet.
0:04:43 And I was really like,
0:04:45 I having a lot of imposter syndrome at that point
0:04:48 because I was like, you know, I’m not a professional artist.
0:04:51 I just started learning polymer clay like three months ago.
0:04:53 Why would these people wanna come and learn from me?
0:04:54 – You’re nervous.
0:04:55 Are people gonna really show up?
0:04:57 – Yeah, like, are they gonna like,
0:04:59 I’m not gonna like, you know, know what I’m doing really.
0:05:02 But again, like my friend attended that workshop
0:05:03 and she was just really encouraging.
0:05:06 Like I charged people $30 New Zealand dollars,
0:05:07 which was like a tiny amount.
0:05:10 And she was like, you know, you have to like value yourself
0:05:12 and value your time.
0:05:15 And that’s how I worked up to eventually charging people
0:05:18 like $100 New Zealand per person.
0:05:21 And just like, yeah, actually like valuing my skills
0:05:23 and my time and knowing that, you know, like,
0:05:25 I’m not a professional, but I’m like good enough
0:05:27 to be able to teach these people and teach them well
0:05:29 and make sure that they have a good time.
0:05:30 – Very good.
0:05:32 So you secure the studio space and say here,
0:05:34 we’ve got a venue for this workshop.
0:05:36 And you put the word out on Facebook and say,
0:05:39 at this time, at this place for 30 bucks, come on in.
0:05:40 We’ll teach you how to make this jewelry.
0:05:42 We’ll teach you how to make these earrings.
0:05:44 And lo and behold, people bought tickets for it.
0:05:45 – Yeah, yeah.
0:05:48 And it was quite funny because like I said at the start,
0:05:49 like I tried a terrarium business,
0:05:52 like I’d tried many different businesses over the years
0:05:55 and none of them had gained traction the way that this did.
0:05:57 So it was just kind of like a surprise to myself
0:05:58 because I wasn’t used to it.
0:06:00 Like I wasn’t used to putting an idea out there
0:06:02 and actually having people pay money for it.
0:06:03 So that was like a nice change.
0:06:06 I was like, oh my goodness, I finally found something
0:06:07 where like I actually can make money off of it
0:06:09 and I’m not just losing money
0:06:10 because I’ve lost a lot of money
0:06:13 on little small creative ventures over the years.
0:06:16 So it was just a nice feeling to actually have something
0:06:17 that was like hitting the mark with people
0:06:20 and they were obviously responding to it.
0:06:23 – Yeah, it’s really rewarding to have that first little taste
0:06:25 of attraction and validation
0:06:27 from strangers on the internet,
0:06:28 even if one of them is your friend
0:06:30 or first or second degree network.
0:06:31 – Absolutely, yeah.
0:06:35 – But it’s like, I put this out, people bought it.
0:06:37 So after this first one,
0:06:40 I imagine you’re trying to collect positive reviews,
0:06:43 feedback, what did you like, what didn’t you like,
0:06:44 and then going back,
0:06:45 well, shoot, we can do this again next weekend
0:06:47 or trying to find that.
0:06:49 I mean, that seems like maybe the challenging part of this
0:06:52 is they got to be constantly either coming up
0:06:55 with a new craft, a new project to market to the same people
0:06:57 or I got to kind of refill that lead bucket
0:06:59 of new prospects, new customers.
0:07:02 – Yeah, because I’m kind of like,
0:07:04 I have interest in a lot of different things.
0:07:07 I was able to just like think of like a handful
0:07:11 of different crafts and just like kind of cycle through them.
0:07:13 So, you know, over like a couple of months,
0:07:16 there might be like three or four different things
0:07:17 that will pop up and I’ll do it.
0:07:19 And then I won’t do it again for a few months
0:07:23 just to kind of give the interest a chance to refresh.
0:07:27 And I found that with the body positive polymer clay workshops
0:07:28 that I was doing for adults,
0:07:31 that had good traction for like maybe six months
0:07:35 over the summer period in one city in Christchurch
0:07:37 where we have about 500,000 people.
0:07:39 It’s not a huge city.
0:07:41 It’s not a huge pool, but there was enough.
0:07:44 And it’s also like a really niche crafting experience.
0:07:47 Like it’s not gonna appeal to everybody.
0:07:50 And so I think I had good success with that
0:07:51 for an initial six months,
0:07:54 but then I definitely noticed interest petering out.
0:07:56 And so that’s when I started going to different cities
0:07:57 in New Zealand.
0:07:59 And so in New Zealand, we have like three main cities.
0:08:02 We’ve got Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch.
0:08:05 Wellington has a similar population to Christchurch
0:08:07 around 500,000 people.
0:08:11 Whereas Auckland has about, I think 1.5 million.
0:08:15 And so I found Auckland was just like my golden goose
0:08:17 for doing regular workshops.
0:08:21 And so I ended up flying to Auckland,
0:08:23 which is yeah, the biggest city in New Zealand.
0:08:25 And I would do lots of workshops there
0:08:28 just because the population was so much bigger.
0:08:32 And it’s also, it wasn’t too expensive for me to fly there.
0:08:34 I found that it was worth,
0:08:36 like that’s where I made a lot of my money.
0:08:39 It was from doing trips out of the city.
0:08:41 Once I noticed that kind of like interest
0:08:45 was like petering in my hometown, yeah.
0:08:46 – Yeah, interesting.
0:08:46 Yeah, it’s worth it.
0:08:50 If the market is saturated or we’ve tapped out here,
0:08:52 well, let’s take it, take the show on the road.
0:08:53 We can go someplace else.
0:08:55 – Yeah, and that was quite fun.
0:08:57 And it was nice to realize that, you know, I could do that.
0:08:59 Obviously it depends on the craft
0:09:01 and not all crafts would be as portable,
0:09:03 but with the materials that I had
0:09:04 for Polymer Clay workshops,
0:09:05 it just worked really well.
0:09:07 Like I just chuck everything in a suitcase
0:09:09 and it just takes up half a suitcase.
0:09:12 So it’s like very easy to take it around with me
0:09:14 and just go all over the country if I wanted to.
0:09:16 – Were those people in Auckland
0:09:18 still finding you through Facebook ads?
0:09:19 – Yeah, yeah.
0:09:22 So I just stuck to that because it was also like,
0:09:25 I’d cast out a net and I’d only need to catch, you know,
0:09:29 40 people for one workshop out of a whole big city
0:09:31 if I was doing like the really big workshops,
0:09:33 which I would do in Auckland.
0:09:37 So it was like, my advertising spend was like 10%
0:09:38 or something of my,
0:09:41 like my return on investment was really good for that
0:09:44 because the nature of the workshop as well was so unique.
0:09:47 So like there was no competition for it.
0:09:49 And so I’d find that it was just like really affordable
0:09:51 for me to advertise it on Facebook.
0:09:52 – Okay.
0:09:54 Like were you able to find an affordable venue
0:09:55 to host 40 people?
0:09:57 – Well, I would just use community centers really.
0:10:01 So I would just hop on like a governmental website
0:10:05 that managed all of the community venues in the city.
0:10:07 And I would just choose from one of those.
0:10:09 And so it would end up being maybe like
0:10:12 between 30 to 50 New Zealand dollars per hour,
0:10:14 which was quite reasonable compared to like,
0:10:19 if I was going for like a private venue or an art studio,
0:10:22 it would be probably maybe in the two or $300 mark.
0:10:25 – I want to say I’d come across somebody who was doing
0:10:29 in person, like local business SEO workshops.
0:10:30 And he’s like, oh, I just rent the meeting room
0:10:31 at the library.
0:10:35 It’s either free or it’s like $10 deposit,
0:10:36 just to make sure that you actually show up,
0:10:37 that you’re serious about it,
0:10:40 invite all these local businesses in.
0:10:42 And you know, you charge money for the workshop,
0:10:44 but they probably had an agency on the back end was like,
0:10:46 okay, if you don’t want to do it yourself,
0:10:48 like you could hire us to take care of it for you.
0:10:49 It was like really interesting.
0:10:50 – Yeah.
0:10:53 – Kind of the double, double dip type of business model.
0:10:54 So we’re talking arts and crafts,
0:10:56 but here’s something that could work in any number
0:10:58 of different niches trying to get, you know,
0:11:00 get people to show up in person
0:11:02 ’cause it seems less competitive,
0:11:04 just trying to get on their radar in the first place.
0:11:05 – Yeah, for sure.
0:11:06 Like at the start, I didn’t do it too much,
0:11:09 but I did freelance writing workshops as well.
0:11:10 So like not crafty at all,
0:11:13 but one of my backgrounds is in creative writing.
0:11:17 And so I did some freelancing workshops like that as well,
0:11:18 which were quite popular.
0:11:20 So that was like, I guess, yeah,
0:11:23 the one like kind of non-crafty one that I did.
0:11:26 But I didn’t do as much just because the profit margin
0:11:27 was lower on it,
0:11:29 but it was also like it was low stress.
0:11:31 Like it didn’t require anything.
0:11:33 It just required me being there and talking
0:11:34 and maybe having some printouts.
0:11:37 Like it wasn’t like I didn’t need materials and stuff.
0:11:39 So, so there are pros and cons
0:11:41 of all sorts of different activities.
0:11:42 – More with Chloe in just a moment,
0:11:44 including more marketing ideas that worked,
0:11:47 plus the tech she used for ticketing and registrations
0:11:48 right after this.
0:11:53 You know, when you discover a new binge worthy show
0:11:56 or podcast that you just have to tell your friends about it.
0:11:58 That’s kind of what it feels like when you discover
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0:13:08 Being an entrepreneur and being able to work remotely
0:13:09 definitely has its perks.
0:13:13 I’ve recorded podcasts everywhere from Vietnam to Italy,
0:13:15 drafted newsletters from Japan,
0:13:17 hosted mastermind meetings from Spain,
0:13:18 ended up being the middle of the night
0:13:20 to get to US business hours
0:13:23 and outlined courses in Mexico.
0:13:26 The common thread of all of these trips though is Airbnb.
0:13:29 We love being able to get exactly what we’re looking for
0:13:33 in a place to stay and have a more local experience
0:13:36 than staying in some giant hotel chain.
0:13:37 And you know me, I’m always thinking about
0:13:40 the next side hustle idea, the next income stream, right?
0:13:42 And one that’s at the top of the list
0:13:45 is hosting our place on Airbnb while we’re traveling.
0:13:47 That way the house doesn’t have to sit empty.
0:13:49 We could use the income to help pay for the trip.
0:13:52 And we’ve heard from several successful Airbnb hosts
0:13:53 on the show.
0:13:55 And what’s interesting is a lot of them started
0:13:57 with almost that exact strategy,
0:14:00 running their place or even a spare room
0:14:01 while they’re out of town.
0:14:03 Taking inspiration from that,
0:14:06 you might have an Airbnb right under your nose.
0:14:08 In fact, your home might be worth more than you think.
0:14:12 You can find out how much at Airbnb.com/host
0:14:15 that’s Airbnb.com/host
0:14:17 to find out how much your home is worth.
0:14:21 I’m curious about the Facebook ad itself
0:14:23 and you’ve probably tested a bunch of different versions,
0:14:27 but if you recall like the best performing one,
0:14:28 like a picture or headline,
0:14:30 can you give us a taste of what worked?
0:14:32 – Yeah, it was definitely like
0:14:35 when I was doing the adults only workshops
0:14:37 because it’s just something so different.
0:14:40 And even though it’s niche and wouldn’t appeal to everybody,
0:14:41 it’s still different enough
0:14:43 that it would catch people’s attention.
0:14:47 So I’d say that definitely the ads that had like,
0:14:50 you know, catchy phrases or like double entendres
0:14:53 or puns or things like that performed a lot better
0:14:56 than just like, hey, I’m doing this crafty thing
0:14:58 and you should come, it’s gonna be fun, bring your friends.
0:15:01 Like it needs to be a little bit more like out there.
0:15:04 I think using fruit emojis and stuff like that.
0:15:06 – Yeah, I’m just starting to put this together.
0:15:09 So if you can charge up to 100 bucks per session,
0:15:11 you can have 40 people at a time
0:15:13 and now you’re at $4,000 in revenue.
0:15:15 Oh, my ad spend was 10% of that.
0:15:17 So now I’m gonna call it 3,500.
0:15:20 I spent 100, 200 on the venue
0:15:22 and you know, maybe a little bit on materials.
0:15:24 Like you’re bringing in food and beverages.
0:15:25 Like it’s gotta be imagined.
0:15:27 The rest of it is pretty good margin.
0:15:28 – Yeah, yeah, it is.
0:15:31 And I also got better over time
0:15:33 at like figuring out where to get my materials
0:15:34 from and stuff.
0:15:36 Like it just made so much more sense
0:15:39 to kind of source my materials in bulk from overseas
0:15:42 because that just served the end goal
0:15:45 of like being able to support myself off of this venture.
0:15:48 – Was it something that you ended up doing every weekend
0:15:49 or every month?
0:15:50 Like what was the cadence?
0:15:51 – There was definitely a period.
0:15:54 Like I’d find that the best time was over summer
0:15:57 because people were out and about
0:15:58 and they wanted to be doing things.
0:15:59 People would come to a workshop
0:16:01 and then they’d go straight off
0:16:03 to like party in the city afterwards.
0:16:06 And so that was definitely something that was more popular.
0:16:08 It had more appeal over the warmer months
0:16:11 and the winter months were probably the hardest.
0:16:15 And so sometimes I would just end up like taking a break.
0:16:18 So I’d maybe do it like two or three workshops
0:16:20 every weekend for like a few months
0:16:22 and then I’d take a break for a few months
0:16:25 just to kind of like recharge.
0:16:26 – Yeah, well, that’s the beauty of doing it
0:16:27 as a side hustle too.
0:16:29 It’s like, this is all bonus.
0:16:30 It’s all extra income.
0:16:32 Anyways, so that makes sense.
0:16:33 – Yeah, yeah.
0:16:35 And I just work to my own schedule
0:16:37 and can like have that flexibility.
0:16:39 Like I don’t work when I don’t want to.
0:16:40 And so that was really appealing as well.
0:16:43 Like I have a young daughter and around that time
0:16:46 like I did just want to be spending a lot of time with her
0:16:48 and then just work on the weekends
0:16:48 doing the workshops.
0:16:50 So that worked really well for our family.
0:16:53 – Does Facebook have a built-in ticketing tool
0:16:56 like inside their events add functionality
0:16:59 or does this have to go through Eventbrite
0:17:00 or some other ticketing software?
0:17:02 – I think that they do, but I would always,
0:17:05 like I’ve always just had my own website.
0:17:07 I just use Squarespace because I really love Squarespace.
0:17:09 It’s just so easy to use
0:17:13 and it’s so easy to make attractive looking web pages.
0:17:16 And so I just sell my tickets through there.
0:17:18 But when I’m recommending for other people
0:17:20 to start their own workshops,
0:17:23 if they’re not sure that they want to invest a lot of money
0:17:27 into things like ticketing, into their own website,
0:17:31 I do recommend things like Eventbrite and Humanityx
0:17:33 and things like that where the platform
0:17:36 might just take a small percentage of their revenue,
0:17:38 but then they don’t actually have to have their own website.
0:17:41 So they could just run ads through Facebook
0:17:43 and then connect, have the link
0:17:45 and just go directly to Eventbrite.
0:17:47 So that they don’t actually have to have a website.
0:17:49 That’s usually what I’d recommend for people
0:17:51 who don’t know if they want to keep doing it.
0:17:52 – That makes sense.
0:17:55 I’ve used Eventbrite for kind of meetup ticketing.
0:17:56 In the past, just, hey, look,
0:17:58 I gotta make a restaurant reservation.
0:18:01 I can’t have people just RSVP-ing willy-nilly
0:18:03 ’cause it’s free, there’s a $5 buy-in
0:18:05 to make sure you’re serious, it’s gonna show up.
0:18:06 I’ll put it towards the group tab
0:18:09 and that was made really easy.
0:18:12 The other potential benefit of an Eventbrite
0:18:16 or of a meetup.com is a certain segment of the audience
0:18:20 might be using those sites to find events near them.
0:18:22 Is there a marketing angle to a meetup
0:18:23 or to an Eventbrite?
0:18:25 – I think so, yeah.
0:18:27 And so I never did it myself,
0:18:30 but there’s a website in New Zealand
0:18:32 that’s quite popular called All Events.
0:18:34 I mean, I think it’s global,
0:18:35 but I wouldn’t actually contact them.
0:18:37 They would just find me
0:18:39 and they would find the events that I’m doing
0:18:41 and upload my event to their site.
0:18:43 And I think it’s similar to Eventbrite.
0:18:44 So I would accept,
0:18:47 it would refer them back to my website to book it.
0:18:51 So I did get some leads from that
0:18:53 and that’s kind of similar to being like
0:18:54 kind of on a marketplace of events
0:18:57 where people are just browsing in an area
0:18:59 on a specific date for an event.
0:19:01 And I think it definitely helps
0:19:03 to just kind of put your event out there
0:19:05 in as many places as possible.
0:19:08 And also there are like free options as well
0:19:09 by just like spreading the word
0:19:12 on like local Facebook groups and things like that.
0:19:15 I had a friend who used to do that for me
0:19:17 just to kind of help where she’d just like,
0:19:18 she’d know I’d have an event coming up
0:19:20 and she’d just like put them in the groups
0:19:23 that she was in on Facebook just to spread the word.
0:19:25 So that’s like a marketing advertising option
0:19:26 that’s more like budget friendly.
0:19:30 But I think, yeah, selling on places like Eventbrite
0:19:32 and Meetup make a lot of sense
0:19:35 because then you’re just kind of like in a catalog,
0:19:36 you know, of things where people,
0:19:38 they might not be like Google searching for you,
0:19:40 but they might just be on this website
0:19:42 looking for something fun to do.
0:19:45 – Yeah, I’m kind of doing a search for Kraft
0:19:48 just in and around Washington.
0:19:52 And there’s something called Murderino Kraft Night
0:19:53 going on in a couple of weeks.
0:19:56 I don’t know if there’s fabric stamping Kraft Night tickets
0:19:57 starting at $35.
0:19:58 – Right, yeah.
0:20:02 – I don’t know how many people would be using this site
0:20:03 in that way, this Eventbrite,
0:20:05 but it doesn’t hurt to syndicate over there
0:20:07 if incremental ticket sales.
0:20:08 – Oh, definitely, yeah.
0:20:10 Did you find, because this is kind of like a business
0:20:12 to consumer type of workshop,
0:20:14 but did you find there was ever an opportunity
0:20:16 for like group sales or, you know,
0:20:19 to bring in, you know, 10, 15, 20 people all at once?
0:20:20 Or is it primarily, you know,
0:20:23 onesie twosie Facebook ads type of sales?
0:20:26 – I think part of the reason why my like return on investment
0:20:29 with just advertising on Facebook was so good
0:20:32 was because people wouldn’t hardly ever come
0:20:33 to these events alone.
0:20:36 And so what I found was that I’d often get like,
0:20:39 you know, five ticket sales in one go
0:20:41 or like, you know, one person would like see the ad
0:20:43 and then they’d share it with their whole friend group
0:20:46 and then one by one, they’d all book it
0:20:48 or they’d just like make some arrangement
0:20:51 where one person would buy like bulk tickets for everybody.
0:20:55 So it was like rarer that I would get like a sale
0:20:56 of just like one ticket, one person
0:21:00 because it’s like the whole notion of it is the,
0:21:02 you know, the whole point of it is for you
0:21:03 to get your friends together and to come
0:21:05 and to enjoy time with them.
0:21:07 – That’s right, you got to find that one,
0:21:08 that one person is like trying to gather up
0:21:09 all their friends and be like, hey, come on,
0:21:11 we’re all, we’re all gonna go do this.
0:21:15 – Yeah, I didn’t have to like go out and like search
0:21:17 for people interested in private events.
0:21:20 They would just see my event and then contact me being like,
0:21:22 hey, I’ve got like a work function coming up
0:21:25 or I’ve got a bachelorette party coming up
0:21:27 that I need to plan for.
0:21:30 And so I would get additional events and gigs
0:21:33 through that as well without even really having to try.
0:21:34 So, so that was always nice.
0:21:36 – And because the events are, you know,
0:21:39 very time sensitive, like it’s happening this week
0:21:40 and then it’s not happening.
0:21:42 And then it seems maybe more difficult to,
0:21:45 to build like an organic SEO type of presence.
0:21:48 If somebody is searching craft workshops, Christchurch,
0:21:50 like are they going to find you
0:21:53 or is it just more, more seasonal?
0:21:56 – Like I’ve done SEO writing in the past,
0:21:59 but I never really focused on SEO for this business,
0:22:02 but I would often just get emails out of the blue.
0:22:05 Like I’m still getting them where people are still looking
0:22:09 for like private events in Christchurch, like in New Zealand.
0:22:11 And I’ll get an email out of the blue.
0:22:13 So I think that there must be something,
0:22:16 but that would also be like, you know, like you said,
0:22:18 it’s so dependent on the place.
0:22:20 If you’re servicing a certain area,
0:22:23 then I think it’s likely that you would come up in that area
0:22:26 just because that’s been my experience,
0:22:28 where, you know, people would just find me,
0:22:31 but it’s hard to evaluate that because as like,
0:22:33 I advertise every event.
0:22:34 – That makes sense.
0:22:36 Now, did you find that Auckland,
0:22:37 even with a bigger population,
0:22:40 like that started to kind of tap out after some time too,
0:22:42 and you got to go back to the drawing board
0:22:44 and figure out a different craft angle.
0:22:47 Like, are we going to create a new workshop from scratch?
0:22:47 What happens there?
0:22:49 – Not really, to be honest.
0:22:53 Like I think just because Auckland is so big
0:22:57 and I was doing so many different kinds of crafting.
0:22:59 Like I don’t think that it would have tapped out.
0:23:02 Like I’ve got a friend who’s doing candle workshops
0:23:05 at the moment and she’s about to go to Auckland soon.
0:23:08 And like the interest never really petered out
0:23:09 with the polymer clay earrings
0:23:11 because it’s just so popular at the moment.
0:23:16 So I think that if you’ve got a city that’s big enough
0:23:19 and you’ve got enough different ideas in the pool
0:23:22 to kind of cycle through them on like a, you know,
0:23:24 two or three month basis, like you do one thing
0:23:26 and then you give it a break for like two months
0:23:28 and then you try it again, something like that.
0:23:31 I think you’d be fine if the population
0:23:34 was like around the million people mark.
0:23:38 I think that that’s the kind of place I would go back to
0:23:41 more than like a smaller city
0:23:43 where I’d have to kind of like be more creative
0:23:46 or think outside the box to keep getting people to come.
0:23:47 Unless you’re just like to travel,
0:23:49 like I’m excited about the prospect
0:23:52 of just going to different cities all over the States,
0:23:54 just to like be, you know, tying in,
0:23:56 making a little bit of money with sightseeing.
0:23:59 So it’s like, you know, this could be paying my way
0:24:02 to just like travel all over the country, you know,
0:24:02 coming from New Zealand.
0:24:05 There’s a lot of places in the States that I’d love to see.
0:24:07 So it’s like, that’s exciting to me.
0:24:10 Just the idea of like traveling all over the place
0:24:12 and getting to see different places
0:24:13 and make money while I’m doing that.
0:24:15 Like that just sounds perfect.
0:24:17 – Yeah. And then there’s a sense of urgency too.
0:24:19 Like, hey, one night only, Chloe’s coming to town
0:24:20 and we’re going to do this event.
0:24:22 – Yeah. And I think that always worked
0:24:23 to my favor as well.
0:24:28 Like there was always kind of a sense of scarcity
0:24:31 because it was always a pop-up workshop, you know,
0:24:33 I was never there permanently.
0:24:36 And so people knew that if they wanted to do it,
0:24:37 you know, they should book it now.
0:24:38 – Got it. Got it.
0:24:40 Yeah. The last crafting episode we did,
0:24:43 it was in the context of after school activities for kids.
0:24:46 And what was cool was kind of the school
0:24:49 or the school district would help with the marketing.
0:24:51 If you, you know, became an approved vendor for them
0:24:54 and already several other after-school programs.
0:24:55 So it was likely just getting background checked
0:24:58 and kind of added to that roster of different offerings
0:25:01 that went out to the parents, but, you know, the kids,
0:25:03 and we’ve seen like Lego workshops
0:25:05 that neighbors have signed up for.
0:25:07 Kids are really into these like perler beads right now,
0:25:09 like tiny little plastic beads you iron on
0:25:11 to make different designs and stuff.
0:25:12 – Okay. Yeah.
0:25:15 – There’s like lots of different angles where this could go.
0:25:18 Now, did you find there’s a repeat customer?
0:25:20 Like people just become fans and we’re like,
0:25:22 “Oh, you’re doing, you’re doing something else.
0:25:23 “I want to come to that next workshop too.”
0:25:26 Or is it more often just one and done?
0:25:27 Like, “Oh, that was a fun little outing,
0:25:30 “but we’re not going to be like, you know, regulars here.”
0:25:33 – I would say like maybe 80% it was like people
0:25:35 who were like one-timers.
0:25:38 They would maybe come back for like a different kind of craft.
0:25:41 But I would say that it was more rare for someone
0:25:44 to just like become a die-hard fan and just keep coming back.
0:25:46 I mean, I did have those people.
0:25:48 And it would be nice because like everyone else
0:25:51 would kind of just be a face and I would see them once
0:25:52 and I’d never see them again.
0:25:55 But then, you know, you start to recognize like one name
0:25:55 that keeps coming up.
0:25:57 And so that’s always really nice as well.
0:25:59 So I did have some people like that
0:26:01 who just really loved, you know, coming out
0:26:04 and getting to know people and making friends.
0:26:07 Like say a lot of the time it’s just like a friend group
0:26:09 wanting to come out for something.
0:26:12 Maybe they’re like, yeah, they do like regular meetups
0:26:14 and stuff and they see my workshop for one of them
0:26:17 and they’re like, “Hey, we’ve got a meetup coming up
0:26:18 “this month and we need something to do.
0:26:20 “This is something that can work.”
0:26:23 So that’s when it’s just like you do need to be a bit creative
0:26:26 and figure out how to capture people’s interest
0:26:28 over and over again, yeah.
0:26:29 – More with Chloe in just a moment,
0:26:31 including how she removed herself
0:26:34 from having to show up and host every single workshop
0:26:36 and what she’d do differently if she had to start over,
0:26:40 plus how you might test out this idea with almost no risk,
0:26:42 all that and more coming up right after this.
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0:27:57 That makes sense.
0:27:59 Anything else on the tools and tech side
0:28:01 that has helped you run this thing?
0:28:03 – I use Canva a lot.
0:28:07 And so in my free guide for a 100K artist,
0:28:10 I give a rundown on the favorite tech that I use
0:28:12 just because I love it when there’s
0:28:15 like really reliable, great tech that’s free.
0:28:17 Canva is just like irreplaceable
0:28:20 for creating graphics and stuff like that.
0:28:23 – What are those tools that you’d be really bummed
0:28:24 if they went out of business?
0:28:25 Yeah, there’s a few.
0:28:29 – Oh yeah, like what would I even use?
0:28:31 I have this handful of tools that you use.
0:28:33 You know, use Squarespace if you want a website
0:28:36 or use like Eventbrite and Facebook
0:28:38 if you don’t want to have a website.
0:28:40 You know, use social media, use CapCut
0:28:44 if you want to make reels and stuff for social media.
0:28:47 Show footage of your workshops and stuff on social media.
0:28:49 And then yeah, definitely Canva.
0:28:52 – Yeah, I will link up all of those in the show notes
0:28:53 for this episode.
0:28:56 Also the free guide at 100Kartist.com.
0:28:58 And the interesting thing is here with any, you know,
0:29:01 any business that requires you to show up
0:29:04 at a specific time, a specific place
0:29:06 and like deliver the goods, like be the expert,
0:29:08 do the thing, that can be kind of hard
0:29:10 to remove yourself from.
0:29:12 But it’s something that you’ve managed to do
0:29:14 by hiring a workshop operator, you know,
0:29:16 and a fellow workshop host here.
0:29:19 Talk to me about the process of delegating
0:29:21 and kind of stepping back, stepping behind the scenes.
0:29:23 – I’ve historically not been very good at delegating.
0:29:25 Like I’m a little bit of a control freak
0:29:27 and I like to kind of be at the center
0:29:28 and just like managing everything.
0:29:30 But when it’s like workshops
0:29:32 and when you want to be traveling or like, you know,
0:29:35 if you want to be scaling, you do have to delegate.
0:29:39 And so I was quite fortunate in that a friend of mine
0:29:42 who’s also like, she has her own candle business.
0:29:44 And so she started running workshops with me.
0:29:47 I trained her in polymer clay workshops.
0:29:49 And it got to the point where she felt confident
0:29:53 and competent enough to be like, I can do some on my own.
0:29:55 You handle the backend and like getting everything
0:29:57 up on the website for it.
0:30:00 And I’ll be the one who actually does the thing physically.
0:30:02 And so that seems to be working out well for us.
0:30:04 And we’re in different countries at the moment.
0:30:05 And she’s doing that.
0:30:08 So that’s been a fun learning process for me
0:30:10 to just get better at feeling comfortable,
0:30:11 taking my hands off the wheel,
0:30:14 not being the person who’s there in person,
0:30:17 but knowing that the workshop is in good hands
0:30:19 and that my business reputation is in good hands.
0:30:21 And so there’s definitely ways.
0:30:24 I’ve had a lot of interest from local creatives
0:30:26 who want to host their own workshops,
0:30:28 but don’t really want to be responsible
0:30:29 for planning everything.
0:30:31 So it’s like, well, that worked out well for me.
0:30:32 Like I can do all of the planning.
0:30:35 And then you just, you know, be at the place
0:30:36 at the right time on the right day
0:30:38 and you deliver the service.
0:30:40 There’s definitely options for scalability in that respect.
0:30:42 And that’s kind of what I’m working on at the moment.
0:30:45 In addition to like the 100K artist coaching
0:30:47 is they’re just like growing and scaling
0:30:51 the workshop business and bringing on more creatives
0:30:54 on board to host more workshops
0:30:55 where I’m not actually there.
0:30:56 – Right, yeah.
0:30:57 You got to find, you know, how to clone yourself
0:31:01 in the top 50, 100 different cities around the place.
0:31:03 And just, okay, here’s the template.
0:31:04 Here’s the process.
0:31:06 Here’s what worked on Facebook.
0:31:08 You know, here’s how we go and find our venues.
0:31:11 It seems very repeatable
0:31:13 if it doesn’t rely on you
0:31:15 and your master of clay modeling.
0:31:17 Like other people could learn how to do that.
0:31:19 – Yeah, like it’s just,
0:31:21 it’s training people and making sure
0:31:23 that they have understanding of the workshop structure,
0:31:26 you know, like having a printout or something of like,
0:31:27 okay, this is what I do at this time.
0:31:29 And this is how it works.
0:31:31 And yeah, I think it can be very simple
0:31:33 when it comes to that point where you do want to
0:31:34 kind of take a step back
0:31:37 from hosting the workshops there in person.
0:31:39 And so that’s something that I am excited to do more
0:31:43 in the States as well is to like find people to train.
0:31:45 And so that my workshops can be happening
0:31:47 all over the country, even without me being there.
0:31:48 – Yeah, I think that’s really cool.
0:31:51 What surprised you the most over the last few years
0:31:52 of doing this?
0:31:53 You know, I mean, you’re dealing with the public,
0:31:55 like you ever get crazy people coming in,
0:31:57 like you’re opening yourself up
0:31:59 to any number of scenarios
0:32:00 that people showing up through that door.
0:32:03 – With the community venues that I’d use,
0:32:06 a lot of the time a security guard would be included in those,
0:32:09 like with, you know, local community centers
0:32:11 that I would get through the government.
0:32:13 And so that was like comforting, I guess,
0:32:15 because, you know, a lot of the time
0:32:18 I’d be like a woman alone at night at a venue,
0:32:22 like setting up, breaking everything down afterwards.
0:32:25 And so like, you do just have to be safe
0:32:26 and take safety into account.
0:32:28 I mean, people, a lot of the time,
0:32:30 alcohol would be involved as well.
0:32:33 Like I’d get an alcohol license and serve alcohol.
0:32:35 And so people can be unpredictable sometimes,
0:32:37 but I never had any bad situations.
0:32:39 I would have maybe sometimes
0:32:41 when some girls would drink a little bit too much.
0:32:44 But I mean, they’d be having a good time
0:32:45 and they’d be taken care of with their friends.
0:32:48 And it’s just a matter of not serving people
0:32:50 who are already drunk, like more drinks.
0:32:53 – Yeah, that sounds like that could be a regulatory
0:32:54 or a red tape kind of headache
0:32:57 to get a temporary liquor license.
0:33:00 – I found that in New Zealand, it was quite simple.
0:33:03 I guess once I’d done it enough times,
0:33:06 I figured out the best way to go about doing it
0:33:09 where they would almost make it quite easy in New Zealand
0:33:11 to do it where you just have to get
0:33:13 like a temporary liquor license.
0:33:15 That’s good for like a small event for one time.
0:33:18 And because my workshops were always quite small,
0:33:20 it was like, you know, it’s not like I’m throwing
0:33:23 a big three-day festival of, you know, like, you know,
0:33:26 it’s like a crafting thing for two hours
0:33:29 where I’m going to have like 15 people or up to 40.
0:33:32 When I’d have 40 people, I’d have like, you know,
0:33:33 there would be three or four of us
0:33:36 who were like overseeing the event itself.
0:33:39 Like I’d have a bartender on site as well.
0:33:41 – Yeah, well, that’s a potential extra income stream too,
0:33:43 if you’re selling wine at the event, yeah?
0:33:45 – Yeah, no, absolutely, yeah.
0:33:47 – Okay, at least discover the cost of the license
0:33:48 and the bartender.
0:33:49 – And it kind of helps.
0:33:51 I think if people feel a bit intimidated,
0:33:53 they’re like, oh, I’m not a creative person.
0:33:54 Why would I come to this event?
0:33:57 It’s like, if there’s wine being served, it’s like, you know,
0:33:59 I don’t have to be good at the crafting.
0:34:02 Like it can just be about catching up with my friends
0:34:04 because I found a lot of the people who would come,
0:34:06 they’d always be saying how they’re not creative
0:34:07 and stuff like that.
0:34:09 So it’s like, yeah, the target market are people
0:34:11 who don’t think that they belong.
0:34:14 And so I think a lot of the marketing can involve
0:34:16 like making people feel like, no, you do belong.
0:34:18 Like you can come and enjoy this
0:34:20 and it doesn’t matter that you’re not an artist.
0:34:23 Like that’s not a prerequisite for attending my workshop
0:34:23 and having a good time.
0:34:26 Like I’m not expecting you to be a professional artist.
0:34:29 I just want you to have a good time with your friends.
0:34:30 That’s the point.
0:34:33 – Isn’t that sad how the creativity gets stamped out of us
0:34:36 through adulthood or through education or whatever it is.
0:34:37 But you know, the old saying is, you know,
0:34:38 ask a group of first graders,
0:34:40 well, how many of you are an artist?
0:34:43 And all the hands go up and ask a group of fifth graders,
0:34:44 well, how many of you are an artist?
0:34:46 And it’s like a half or a quarter and you’re like,
0:34:48 what happened to you, you know?
0:34:50 – Yeah, I know, right?
0:34:52 Yeah. And that’s part of it as well.
0:34:56 Like I just, there are so many benefits to being creative.
0:34:59 Like, you know, there’s like art therapy is a thing, right?
0:35:01 And I’m not saying that I’m an art therapist,
0:35:04 but there’s definitely an aspect of like just providing
0:35:07 a service where people feel like they’re in a safe space
0:35:10 to express themselves and not be judged.
0:35:13 I think that kind of stuff just, you know,
0:35:16 it’s just good on so many different levels
0:35:19 beyond the just like, I’m here to have fun, you know?
0:35:22 It’s like, it’s actually, it can be really like, you know,
0:35:25 maybe a healing is using the word healing
0:35:26 is maybe too strong a word,
0:35:30 but it taps into those sorts of things for sure, I think.
0:35:33 – Yeah. And people are primed at an event like this.
0:35:35 People are primed to have a good time.
0:35:37 Like it’s supposed to be fun.
0:35:38 It’s supposed to be lighthearted.
0:35:41 It’s, you had a woman who was selling peaches
0:35:44 on a roadside stand and it was like,
0:35:46 people will pay almost whatever price.
0:35:48 They expect to pay more than the grocery store.
0:35:51 They’re primed for this, you know, wholesome support,
0:35:52 small business type of experience.
0:35:55 It’s like everybody’s going to have a smile on their face.
0:35:56 – Yeah, for sure.
0:35:59 – Now, if you had to start over anything that you do
0:36:01 differently, it seems like it’s gone pretty well
0:36:03 and now taking it on the road
0:36:06 and having other people run it on your behalf,
0:36:08 but anything you would do to accelerate things
0:36:08 or do differently.
0:36:11 – If I were to start over, I’d probably,
0:36:13 and like I don’t really do this too much anyway.
0:36:15 Like I don’t buy the materials for a workshop
0:36:17 unless I know it’s going ahead.
0:36:20 But at the start, like I definitely would just like jump
0:36:22 straight in without thinking too much about it.
0:36:25 And I’d maybe spend a lot, like a lot of money
0:36:28 on materials for a specific craft
0:36:29 and then never even do the workshop.
0:36:32 Like there were times when I bought materials
0:36:34 for like bath bombs and like soap making,
0:36:36 like I bought a lot of stuff.
0:36:40 And then I realized that like it was either gonna be
0:36:42 too difficult or like I wasn’t in,
0:36:45 like I didn’t enjoy the idea of it anymore.
0:36:47 Like I didn’t actually want to like alert,
0:36:48 like teach myself how to do it.
0:36:51 And like soap making just felt like,
0:36:52 you know, I’m not interested in soap.
0:36:54 Like I’m not of, I don’t sell soap.
0:36:57 I don’t have a, I don’t have experience in soap.
0:36:59 So like, yeah, there were definitely times
0:37:01 where it’s like I would buy materials
0:37:03 and not use them that sit in my garage
0:37:05 and go moldy after a year.
0:37:06 Like don’t do that.
0:37:08 Like if you’re starting out.
0:37:09 – Okay.
0:37:11 Did you have a rule of thumb where like,
0:37:13 okay, I had this idea for a new workshop.
0:37:16 I put it out there and maybe I sold a few tickets,
0:37:18 but I didn’t quite get the reaction that I wanted.
0:37:19 Like how long do you let it ride before,
0:37:21 or maybe I just need to tweak the targeting
0:37:23 or the messaging before you just pull the plug
0:37:25 and say, no, this is what it’s not gonna work.
0:37:27 – Yeah, and that definitely happened.
0:37:30 And I think for me, the point was like, you know,
0:37:34 if I’ve spent $200 on ads and I haven’t sold
0:37:36 out the workshop or I haven’t sold, you know,
0:37:38 made all my money back, that’s it.
0:37:42 Because I just had so many, like I’d had enough success
0:37:43 with the Polymer Clay workshops
0:37:45 and the adults only workshops that I knew.
0:37:48 Okay, if I’m gonna spend $200 on ads,
0:37:52 that’s gotta be like $2,000 in revenue.
0:37:54 And so if I haven’t met that, then I would just cancel it
0:37:57 and be like, okay, I’ve already lost $200.
0:37:59 I don’t wanna lose more money on this idea.
0:38:01 This idea is like, obviously it cannot compete
0:38:04 with the other ideas that I’ve had that have performed well.
0:38:05 So.
0:38:06 – Yeah, something is not right.
0:38:07 – Yeah.
0:38:08 That would be the mark where I’d just be like,
0:38:10 okay, no, I’ll just flag that idea.
0:38:12 I’ll just check it out and find something else.
0:38:13 – Very good.
0:38:15 We’ve got the craft business going.
0:38:17 You’ve got your partner running those things
0:38:18 while you’re on the other side of the country
0:38:20 or other side of the world, rather.
0:38:22 You’ve got 100Kartist.com
0:38:24 helping other people start this type of business.
0:38:25 Where do you wanna take it?
0:38:27 What’s got you excited these days?
0:38:28 – So I think at the moment,
0:38:30 seeing where things go with my friend
0:38:33 who’s running stuff for me in New Zealand,
0:38:36 like growing that business because that was my first,
0:38:38 like really successful workshop business.
0:38:42 And then also just growing my like local business here
0:38:45 in the States, where I’m gonna be traveling around,
0:38:47 doing pop-up workshops in the States.
0:38:49 Like I think that’s got me really excited
0:38:51 because I still consider myself an artist,
0:38:54 even though it hasn’t been my focus on the past couple
0:38:55 of months, like the past couple of months,
0:38:57 I’ve definitely been focused on making the course
0:38:58 for 100Kartist.
0:39:01 So it’ll be nice to just kind of get back to my roots
0:39:03 and just go back to crafting for a while.
0:39:04 But then also, you know,
0:39:06 if I happen to meet some people
0:39:07 who are interested in learning this,
0:39:09 then I’d love to talk to them as well.
0:39:12 Like I find the idea of inspiring other people
0:39:14 to try this really exciting because I know
0:39:16 that there are a lot of artists out there
0:39:18 who probably would like to make more money.
0:39:20 And it’s really easy to lose money
0:39:22 on your passion and on your craft.
0:39:24 And so that was my experience in the past.
0:39:26 And it’s not one that I want to repeat.
0:39:29 And I’d love to help other crafters
0:39:32 and creative people avoid that as well as much as possible.
0:39:33 – Yeah, and it could be crafting.
0:39:36 And I think this model works really well for crafting,
0:39:38 but it could be teaching any other kind of skill
0:39:40 that people would want to learn either for their business
0:39:43 or like in a group type of setting.
0:39:45 But we’ll bring our friends and we’ll learn how to,
0:39:48 I don’t know, to do survival skills or start a fire
0:39:51 or learn how to garden better.
0:39:52 Like there’s all sorts of different things
0:39:54 where it’s similar model could work.
0:39:57 – Yeah, that’s the beauty of it is that it could,
0:40:01 you could really turn anything into an experience
0:40:04 and have people be interested enough to sign up for it.
0:40:07 And so yeah, like you’re not limited to crafty experiences
0:40:10 at all, it can just be anything that you have an interest in,
0:40:12 that you’re knowledgeable in,
0:40:14 and that you feel like there would be people out there
0:40:18 who would also want to come out to a physical meetup
0:40:21 or even doing them online as well to reach more people.
0:40:25 Like there’s unlimited options, really,
0:40:27 if you are willing to let dig into it
0:40:29 and think about all the kinds of things
0:40:30 that you’d want to offer.
0:40:33 – Yeah, when the side hustle shih tzu was really young,
0:40:35 like we took him to this puppy preschool thing
0:40:38 through the local SPCA or something.
0:40:39 But that could have been a private thing,
0:40:41 somebody hosting their own little dog training thing,
0:40:44 like, oh, here’s how to teach your little dog to sit
0:40:45 or something, I love it.
0:40:48 Well, 100Kartist.com, check Chloe out over there.
0:40:50 Let’s wrap this thing up with your number one tip
0:40:51 for side hustle nation.
0:40:54 – If you have a good feeling about it, just go for it.
0:40:58 I think it’s so easy to just sit around on an idea,
0:41:03 make up excuses not to do it or to procrastinate on it
0:41:05 and don’t wait for the perfect time
0:41:07 ’cause there’s never gonna be a perfect time.
0:41:08 I think just throw your sleeves up
0:41:10 and just get in there and do it.
0:41:12 – Exactly, and one cool thing about this
0:41:16 is there’s almost no overhead until you sell tickets.
0:41:17 Then you have some cost of goods,
0:41:19 so you can go out and buy materials for this thing.
0:41:20 But you can go find a venue for this,
0:41:22 go find a date and a venue,
0:41:23 and oftentimes that’s gonna be refundable,
0:41:26 like, okay, pick a date, two weekends out.
0:41:28 Okay, on this time, at this date, we’re gonna do the thing.
0:41:30 We’re gonna do this workshop on whatever topic that you choose
0:41:33 and maybe put down a little deposit on that location,
0:41:34 maybe you don’t.
0:41:35 And then you got two weeks to go out
0:41:36 and see if there’s any demand for it.
0:41:39 And if there’s not, then you just cancel the venue
0:41:42 and say, okay, well, go try a different idea.
0:41:44 And if there is, now you’ve all of a sudden validated it
0:41:47 with real dollars and say, okay, I guess we’re doing this.
0:41:48 And maybe we could do it again,
0:41:49 maybe it turns into something else.
0:41:51 So that was one of my big takeaways,
0:41:53 like the really low risk model here
0:41:56 that could translate to something repeatable,
0:41:58 that could translate to something repeatable
0:41:59 in different geographies,
0:42:00 that could translate to something online
0:42:03 that maybe there’s demand for, but really cool there.
0:42:04 – Yeah.
0:42:07 – And the other thing that I liked was you mentioned,
0:42:08 you know, I tried a bunch of different businesses.
0:42:10 I tried selling the stuff online,
0:42:13 I tried selling terrariums, I tried to,
0:42:15 and not everything worked.
0:42:17 But one thing that has come up over and over again
0:42:20 on the show is the idea that opportunities become visible
0:42:22 once you’re in motion.
0:42:24 And the interesting thing here was like, you know,
0:42:25 I could sell these things, you know,
0:42:28 one off through an online store
0:42:29 or I could teach other people how to do it.
0:42:31 And they have no interest in selling.
0:42:32 They’re not trying to make a business out of it.
0:42:34 It’s just like a get together with friends
0:42:36 and learn a craft and have this activity,
0:42:38 this, you know, entertaining evening.
0:42:40 And then that turned into the business.
0:42:42 And then now other people start asking you,
0:42:43 well, shoot, how are you doing this?
0:42:44 How are you traveling around making this money?
0:42:47 And now that has led to 100K artists.
0:42:48 Opportunities become visible once you’re in motion,
0:42:52 really common recurring theme on the side hustle show.
0:42:54 So I’m glad we were able to touch on that.
0:42:56 The after school crafts workshop,
0:42:58 if you are in that artsy craftsy niche,
0:43:00 or if that’s your personality, that’s what you like to do.
0:43:02 That’s episode 289 in the archives.
0:43:04 Encourage you to go and check that one out,
0:43:05 especially if you’re like working with kids.
0:43:07 And other than that, if you’re new to the show,
0:43:09 you’re wondering what to listen to next.
0:43:12 I want to encourage you to go to hustle.show
0:43:14 and build yourself a personalized playlist.
0:43:15 Of course, we’d love to have you binge
0:43:17 on the 600 plus episode archives,
0:43:19 but you know, for a more curated experience,
0:43:21 hustle.show is the place to go.
0:43:23 Just a few short multiple choice questions.
0:43:25 And then you’ll get that custom curated
0:43:27 personalized playlist that you can add to your device.
0:43:29 You learn what works and you go and make some more money.
0:43:31 Big thanks to Chloe for sharing her insight.
0:43:32 Big thanks to our sponsors
0:43:34 for helping make this content free for everyone.
0:43:38 As always, you can hit up side hustle nation.com/deals
0:43:41 for all the latest offers from our sponsors in one place.
0:43:42 Thank you for supporting the advertisers
0:43:43 that support the show.
0:43:44 That is it for me.
0:43:46 Thank you so much for tuning in.
0:43:47 If you’re finding value in the show,
0:43:49 the greatest compliment is to share it with a friend,
0:43:50 fire off that text message.
0:43:53 Hey, we should totally start a workshop on, you know,
0:43:53 whatever the topic is.
0:43:55 So until then, until next time,
0:43:57 let’s go out there and make something happen
0:43:58 and I’ll catch you in the next edition
0:44:00 of the side hustle show.

0:00:03 This is $1,000 flips.
0:00:06 It’s one thing to be able to source thrift store or garage sale items
0:00:09 and make five, ten, fifty bucks, a hundred bucks per flip.
0:00:12 But it’s another thing entirely to be able to do that consistently
0:00:14 with big, big profit items.
0:00:15 What’s up? What’s up?
0:00:17 Nick Hulper here. Welcome to The Side Hustle Show
0:00:19 because there is profit everywhere, if you know where to look.
0:00:22 Now, this is the show that helps you uncover those profitable ideas
0:00:25 by shining the light on how other people are getting it done.
0:00:29 And one of my all time favorite profit finders is back in the studio
0:00:31 for the first time since 2018.
0:00:34 If you can believe that makes a full time living from part time work,
0:00:37 buy and low and sell it high from fleamarketflipper.com
0:00:40 and Flipper University, Rob Stephenson.
0:00:41 Welcome back to The Side Hustle Show.
0:00:43 What’s up, Nick? I’m so excited to be back.
0:00:45 We always love chatting with you.
0:00:48 So thank you so much for inviting us back to talk to you today.
0:00:50 I am pumped as well.
0:00:52 We’re going three rounds with Rob today,
0:00:56 counting down some of his best/most profitable/most memorable flips
0:01:00 with the criteria that they made over $1,000 in profit.
0:01:01 It’s not about who sells the most stuff.
0:01:04 It’s about selling the right stuff with high margins.
0:01:05 This is something that I can be about.
0:01:07 Round two is donate a business idea
0:01:09 and stick around for the triple threat in round three.
0:01:12 This is a marketing tactic that’s working right now for Rob or his students
0:01:13 in Flipper University.
0:01:17 This is a new or new to him tool that him and his business partner, Melissa,
0:01:21 are loving right now and his favorite book from the last 12 months.
0:01:23 I want to start off with these $1,000 flips
0:01:26 because you guys consistently are able to find these items.
0:01:29 Where on the one hand it’s like, why would anybody let it go?
0:01:30 If it was really worth that much,
0:01:32 why would somebody be letting it go for way less than that?
0:01:34 But you do it over and over again.
0:01:37 I think we first recorded in 2014, 2015.
0:01:39 You’ve been doing it long before then and ever since.
0:01:42 So maybe kick us off with these like ambulance stretchers.
0:01:44 This was last year’s big win.
0:01:45 Absolutely.
0:01:47 And a lot of people think that these scores that we find
0:01:49 are once in a blue moon or a needle in a haystack.
0:01:52 And we have done it time and time again.
0:01:55 Last year, our totals were $92,000 for the whole year
0:01:56 with only 46 items.
0:01:58 We only sold 46 items the whole year.
0:02:00 Average just a little over $2,000.
0:02:01 But the important part is the profit.
0:02:05 And we’re over $73,000 in profit on that $92,000 gross.
0:02:06 So, so, so cool.
0:02:08 We’re able to do it year in, year out.
0:02:09 And we just keep doing it back to back to back.
0:02:12 So you can do, anybody can do it when you know what you’re looking for.
0:02:13 Yeah.
0:02:15 Now, the stretchers that Nick is talking about,
0:02:17 which was an amazing, amazing flip for us.
0:02:21 One of my contacts that I met at the local flea market,
0:02:23 I met him, I don’t know how many years ago, five, seven years ago.
0:02:27 I got his phone number and then we do deals outside of the flea market all the time.
0:02:30 He comes into great, great items that he actually throws my way.
0:02:34 And he came up with 12 stretchers that he got from one of his contacts.
0:02:36 And he sent me a picture of him and I was like, oh, those look cool.
0:02:38 I think I can make a little bit of money on them.
0:02:41 I showed Melissa and I said, hey, he wants $2,200 for this.
0:02:45 And that’s pretty high for our, I mean, I don’t have a very high threshold
0:02:49 that I like to invest in a lot of money out on top of the items that we’re doing.
0:02:51 I just don’t, I don’t feel comfortable investing a lot of money.
0:02:55 And this was definitely on the top of it, but $2,200 for 12 of them.
0:02:58 I bought them, I told Melissa, she told me not to do it.
0:02:58 Yeah.
0:03:00 And I said, I really have a good feeling about this.
0:03:03 And we actually bought those $2,200 and we sold them.
0:03:04 I think Melissa wrote it down for me.
0:03:09 I think $35,000 we made on those 12 stretchers that we sold.
0:03:10 Yeah, that’s just crazy.
0:03:12 And he was making money on the deal too.
0:03:15 So there’s like even opportunity at the wholesale level, basically,
0:03:17 to find other people like you.
0:03:18 Absolutely. Yeah.
0:03:19 He always is making money on us.
0:03:23 And then we’re actually taking it to a nationwide or a global market.
0:03:25 And that’s how we’re able to make our money is because the majority of the stuff
0:03:27 that we sell, we’re just bringing it to a bigger market.
0:03:32 So $2,200 worth of investment into $35,000 worth of sales.
0:03:34 And that’s just one example.
0:03:36 But that was a big chunk of the revenue for the year, for sure.
0:03:37 Yeah, absolutely.
0:03:39 And I was super excited when I got those.
0:03:42 But still, we are able to find a lot of other stuff.
0:03:44 We really hone in on these high profit items.
0:03:45 That’s what we really love.
0:03:46 We have three kids.
0:03:47 We have a growing family.
0:03:50 And we want to be able to spend time with my wife and our kids.
0:03:51 And this is what allows us to do it.
0:03:55 I mean, you throw this up on eBay and all of a sudden they’re worth, you know,
0:03:59 so much more just because you knew there was some inherent value in them
0:04:00 way beyond the $2,200.
0:04:03 So the cool thing about eBay is they’ll give you an actual record
0:04:05 of the last 90 days in sales.
0:04:08 So when he sent me the picture of them, they were yellow stretchers.
0:04:09 And I jumped on.
0:04:10 I saw what the brand was.
0:04:12 It was a striker jumped on to eBay.
0:04:15 I checked out what they had sold for in the last 90 days.
0:04:19 And I didn’t know the exact model, but I had a stretcher and I had striker
0:04:20 and I knew kind of what they looked like.
0:04:23 I jumped on and looked at the active listings and the sold listings
0:04:26 and saw that I was going to be able to make money, which we sold one
0:04:30 for double what I paid for the whole lot of 12 of them.
0:04:31 So that just gives you an idea.
0:04:34 But there’s always a way to do the research before you go out the money.
0:04:37 Yeah. So who bought up like other like EMT, like ambulance companies
0:04:38 or like hospitals?
0:04:42 It’s funny, I sold one to Puerto Rico.
0:04:46 And I think the majority of the people who bought them were transportation
0:04:51 companies that had ambulances or they redid ambulances for transportation
0:04:53 companies that were they go and pick up patients and stuff like that.
0:04:55 So I feel like that is who we sold them to.
0:04:58 But the first ones that I sold, I sold way, way too cheap
0:05:00 because I was trying to recoup my investment back.
0:05:03 Some guy locally wanted four of them and I sold them for way too cheap.
0:05:05 I think I the first four I sold since he bought four of them.
0:05:07 I think I sold them for like fifteen hundred dollars a piece.
0:05:10 OK, but still recouped my whole investment on those first four.
0:05:12 And then I started asking a little bit more money.
0:05:13 We made a lot more money on the other ones.
0:05:15 Yeah. OK. Interesting.
0:05:19 So this was just through a contact of yours by showing up at the local
0:05:23 flea market, telling people what you do, the kind of stuff that you’re looking for.
0:05:25 Yeah. So somebody I met, he had cool items.
0:05:28 It wasn’t like the first week that I found him.
0:05:30 It was more of I had gone consistently to the flea market.
0:05:35 Back when we started our business, I went consistently every Saturday and Sunday morning.
0:05:39 And I started finding those vendors that were doing or selling the kind of items
0:05:40 that I liked. Yeah.
0:05:43 And then I started creating relationships after I saw them week after week after week.
0:05:45 And then I started creating that contact with them afterwards.
0:05:48 Yeah. And the contrast here is these one off.
0:05:52 We’ve called them random items, these niche specialty items,
0:05:57 sometimes commercial equipment where there’s absolutely people who can make it work.
0:06:01 You know, making 10, 15, 20 bucks a flip on Poshmark and stuff like that.
0:06:05 But the volume that you need to make up for one stretcher sale in this example
0:06:08 is quite a bit more work.
0:06:11 He’s like, yeah, there’s going to be a little bit more logistics in packing
0:06:12 and shipping something that’s larger.
0:06:15 But I think the argument is going to be made that it’s it’s more worthwhile,
0:06:18 at least, you know, versus, you know, throwing a throwing an article of clothing
0:06:20 in the mail and making that 10 bucks.
0:06:23 So next one on this list I have is a turbo chef commercial oven.
0:06:24 Tell me about that one.
0:06:26 So this is a really cool story as well.
0:06:29 We were traveling when I found this turbo chef on.
0:06:32 I believe it was offer up was the app that I was on.
0:06:37 And it was in Salt Lake City, somewhere up there, somewhere a long way away from us.
0:06:39 We were traveling and I found this from the hotel room.
0:06:41 We actually got in the hotel for the night.
0:06:44 I’m laying down in bed and I’m trying to source in the area.
0:06:47 So in the next morning, hopefully I could go pick something up.
0:06:48 This is your version of doom scrolling.
0:06:51 Like, what else, what’s for sale nearby?
0:06:52 Yes. So I’m doing that.
0:06:55 I’m laying in bed trying to go to sleep and I’m looking and I find this turbo chef
0:06:59 and the guy had, I believe it was, he might have been asking like $650.
0:07:01 I don’t remember exactly what he was asking for it.
0:07:03 I reached out and asked him if he would take $500 cash.
0:07:07 And the problem was when I reached out to him, he didn’t write back for me.
0:07:08 And we were only in that area for that night.
0:07:11 The next night we were going further west, but he reached out to me
0:07:15 like a couple of days later and we were already over in California or Idaho.
0:07:18 But when he wrote back, he did say, yes, he would take $500.
0:07:20 So I said, hey, we’re coming back through.
0:07:22 And it was another three or four days.
0:07:22 Would you be available?
0:07:25 And then I set up the appointment and on our way back, I met up with him.
0:07:28 And when I got there, he said that he had three of these.
0:07:32 Now, my problem was I only had $800 in cash on me.
0:07:35 And this guy was just meeting me to do this delivery.
0:07:36 And he had three more.
0:07:39 And I said, by chance, if I took two, would you go $400 a piece on them?
0:07:41 And he said, yes, I will.
0:07:42 And I’ll go back in right now.
0:07:44 And he brought it out on a cart.
0:07:45 The first one out on the cart, he was waiting for me.
0:07:46 He helped me load it into the truck.
0:07:49 He took the cart back in and got the other one.
0:07:53 So I ended up getting two of these bad boys and we paid $400 a piece for him.
0:07:54 So $800 total.
0:07:58 And then we sold them on eBay for $7,500 and then $10,000.
0:07:59 Wow, incredible.
0:08:03 I think the favorite part is that, like, you were turning all of this, you know,
0:08:07 family road trip time into, like, business mileage right off.
0:08:10 Like, oh, I’m sourced it over here, even if I’m halfway across the country.
0:08:15 And now was able to score some inventory while we’re there, paid for the whole trip.
0:08:15 And then some.
0:08:18 Yeah, that’s one of the things that we’ve really kind of turned the corner on
0:08:21 is how can we make every trip that we do?
0:08:23 How can we pay for it by flipping and get some right off
0:08:25 because of what we’re doing on the trip?
0:08:27 We were just down in the keys, man, it was probably a month ago.
0:08:29 Beginning of August, we go down for lobster season.
0:08:32 And on the way back, I wanted to be able to pay for our trip.
0:08:33 So I looked for something.
0:08:35 I found an oven for $120.
0:08:36 We actually just sold it.
0:08:38 I shipped it out last week and we sold it for $3,000.
0:08:43 So that’s kind of my game is when I travel, what can I find that I can buy
0:08:46 while we’re out and then I can bring it back and sell it and pay for the trip?
0:08:49 Yeah, as long as you’ve driven to the trip, you have some means to, like, bring it back.
0:08:51 Yeah. And our business, I always have the means.
0:08:53 So I’ll either take a trailer or I’ll take an exchange.
0:08:56 I take something knowing that I might be able to find something
0:08:57 and then I’ll bring it back with me.
0:09:00 I guess the same question is, like, people are letting go of this stuff
0:09:01 just because they don’t want to.
0:09:07 They don’t either know how relatively simple it is to sell on eBay or they don’t.
0:09:08 They just don’t want to deal with it.
0:09:11 And we did a recent episode with a guy who was doing like a similar business
0:09:13 with what he called like junk land parcels.
0:09:17 And it’s like they have title issues or they have maybe they don’t have sewer
0:09:20 or maybe they need some sort of variance or easement or something to, you know,
0:09:21 make the plot buildable.
0:09:23 He’s like, I’ve been doing this for decades.
0:09:24 I don’t mind dealing with City Hall.
0:09:27 I go through that red tape or, you know, to 10 X my money.
0:09:30 But he’s like, I tried by from what he called don’t wanters.
0:09:31 They don’t want to deal with it.
0:09:32 Maybe they inherited it.
0:09:36 They just add they let it go for way, way, way less than it’s worth.
0:09:38 Yeah. And the same thing, exactly.
0:09:43 I also feel like one of the big common denominators for us is people are
0:09:45 selling in the local market.
0:09:47 So where I’m buying something, it’s typically on Facebook Marketplace.
0:09:50 That’s only going to reach that local market to where, you know,
0:09:53 in Facebook Marketplace, a larger item, they’re only going to show it within,
0:09:57 you know, 10, 15 mile radius, sometimes more.
0:10:00 But for the majority of you’re only going to reach, depending on the app,
0:10:04 maybe 25, 40, 50,000 people have the opportunity that are shopping
0:10:07 for that exact item to where when you get it and throw it onto an app like eBay,
0:10:11 that’s got over 130, 235 million registered users.
0:10:13 You just have a bigger pool of people looking for that specific item.
0:10:15 So you can sell it quicker and ask more money for it.
0:10:19 Yeah, I’ve been in the same boat where it’s like, I don’t want to bother
0:10:20 with shipping this.
0:10:24 So I know that I’m limiting myself to, you know, whoever happens to see it on
0:10:25 Marketplace, but come take it away.
0:10:26 I need it out of the garage.
0:10:28 You know, maybe somebody else made some money on that.
0:10:29 And that’s how a lot of people are too.
0:10:30 They just want to get rid of it.
0:10:31 They’re going to be done with it.
0:10:34 And that’s where we swoop in and we will go the extra mile
0:10:35 to actually make the extra money on it.
0:10:38 Fair enough, fair enough, especially if the returns are there.
0:10:42 Like in, like in these cases, the other thing that that showed up
0:10:47 while I was trying to dig up some of your best flips was this autoclave.
0:10:49 And I had to even look up like what this is.
0:10:54 It’s some sort of like scientific cleaning, like sterilization type of device.
0:10:58 Yeah, that was another one from the same guy that I got the stretchers from.
0:10:59 Sold me the autoclave as well.
0:11:02 I believe I paid 100 or 120 bucks for that.
0:11:06 And if I’m not mistaken, it was around three to $5,000 that we sold it for.
0:11:10 But same deal, this guy who gets paid that I met at the flea market,
0:11:13 created the relationship with, he gets paid to clear out businesses.
0:11:15 Businesses go out of business for whatever reason.
0:11:16 They get rid of equipment.
0:11:18 They get rid of a lot of stuff and he goes in and gets it.
0:11:20 And then he snaps a picture, sends it to me.
0:11:22 And I’m able to buy it from him where he’s making money.
0:11:24 Typically the stuff that he gets is free.
0:11:28 It’s all free what he’s getting because he’s getting paid to get rid of the items.
0:11:31 And that was the deal with this autoclave is I got it from him, put it on eBay.
0:11:34 We actually shipped it out and we made some really, really good profit on that.
0:11:41 Yeah, my notes say $100 acquisition price into $5,000 or $5,500 in sales price.
0:11:44 Minus out eBay fees, minus out shipping, or I don’t know, do you tack on shipping?
0:11:47 It didn’t seem like this was a huge, huge item.
0:11:48 Yeah, it was heavy though.
0:11:52 It was a size of a large microwave, if you think of it about that size.
0:11:53 But it was heavy and I don’t know.
0:11:57 It’s a commercial piece of equipment that they put in tools like operation tools
0:11:59 and stuff to sterilize them.
0:12:00 That’s what it was.
0:12:01 I didn’t even know that.
0:12:03 All I knew was the name of it, like I told you from the beginning.
0:12:06 I’m not the smartest guy, not the smartest crane in the box.
0:12:09 I know the name, the model, and then I do all the research to see what it’s worth.
0:12:12 And when he gave me the name, now this guy that sends me pictures,
0:12:14 he takes a picture of the name, the model.
0:12:17 He knows that’s what I need to make a decision on if I’m going to buy it or not.
0:12:18 But yeah, this one, it did go on a pallet.
0:12:23 So actually was shipped on a pallet, but we made from $100 to $5,500 absolutely.
0:12:27 And eBay fees are pretty, I mean, when we actually do the whole breakdown,
0:12:28 we tell everybody how much we pay eBay.
0:12:32 We tell how much shipping and all that stuff is for everybody who watches in on our stuff.
0:12:37 And eBay fees typically are about 13% until they cap that at $2,500.
0:12:43 And then after $2,500, it drops down to, I think it’s like 2.3 or 2.7% for everything over $2,500.
0:12:46 So when I’m selling some of these items that are $7,000, $10,000, $20,000,
0:12:50 they actually bring the fees way, way down and makes it that much easier
0:12:51 for us to be able to sell them on their platform.
0:12:53 Yeah, that’s kind of crazy.
0:12:55 What was the most expensive thing that you’ve ever sold?
0:12:56 This is a really cool one.
0:13:00 So, and it was another one at the top of the bracket that Melissa.
0:13:01 Melissa is my wife, if you don’t know.
0:13:04 But Melissa, it made her very uncomfortable for this one.
0:13:09 And I told her I knew the profit was there, but it was an actual parking lot tower.
0:13:11 Like a security watch tower.
0:13:12 Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.
0:13:17 Yes. So this thing raised in the air like 20 feet, 30 feet, something like that.
0:13:20 It was on a trailer, so you pulled it anywhere you want to do, you parked it.
0:13:22 Then you got inside of it, cranked up a generator.
0:13:25 It lifted you all the way up so you could see over the whole parking lot.
0:13:27 But we paid $5,000 for it.
0:13:29 And that’s a lot for me to spend on an item.
0:13:30 And I have to know that the return’s there.
0:13:33 But before I bought it, I looked at what the retail and I couldn’t find any comps.
0:13:34 Nobody was selling these.
0:13:36 I hadn’t even seen any other one for sale.
0:13:40 But the retail on this was like 125 or $135,000.
0:13:43 So I said, if I can get this thing for $5,000, I know I can make money.
0:13:46 And we sold it in less than 30 days for 25,000.
0:13:48 Wow. Wow. Yeah, that’s a nice, a nice ROI.
0:13:52 In a given month, what are you sitting on in terms of inventory?
0:13:54 Like, do you think about it in terms of turn rate?
0:13:55 Do you think about it in terms of like storage?
0:13:57 Like, where do I keep all this stuff?
0:13:59 Like, where am I going to put a parking lot security tower?
0:14:00 That’s not going to fit in my garage.
0:14:02 Like, where am I storing this stuff?
0:14:06 Yeah. So what we do at the scale that we’re at now, that we do have to have a storage.
0:14:07 We have a storage facility.
0:14:11 I have a building, I believe it’s like 1,400 square feet.
0:14:13 So it’s not monstrous, but it’s big enough.
0:14:15 And I have some outside parking and stuff like that.
0:14:16 So you do have to.
0:14:17 And we grew into this business.
0:14:19 When I started the business, I lived in a duplex.
0:14:21 The only thing I did was I used my spare bedroom.
0:14:22 I had a spare bedroom.
0:14:23 That was my office.
0:14:24 That’s where I stored everything.
0:14:26 That’s where I created boxes.
0:14:27 That’s where I did everything.
0:14:30 But as we grew and I saw what the profits are, yes, we do have a warehouse that we have
0:14:31 stuff stored in.
0:14:34 I have places where I can park stuff outside, inside, whatever I need to do.
0:14:40 And yeah, typically we sit on $500,000 worth of inventory, but it’s not like somebody who
0:14:41 has a lot of smalls.
0:14:44 I mean, that is a lot, a lot of smalls in that inventory.
0:14:48 For ours, our average sale price, like last year, our average sale price was $2,000 per
0:14:49 item.
0:14:51 And some items are more and some items are a little bit less.
0:14:54 But on average, that’s kind of what we go with.
0:14:55 That’s not your acquisition cost.
0:14:57 That’s like your expected resale value.
0:15:02 On gross, that’s what we kind of, on what we sold last year, we did $92,000.
0:15:04 And that was in 46 items that we sold.
0:15:05 So it was just over $2,000.
0:15:08 But like I said, and profit-wise, after eBay fees, after shipping, after everything we
0:15:13 paid out, it was still over like 70, I think it was 73,000 in some change on the profit
0:15:14 side of it.
0:15:15 Yeah.
0:15:20 So you could source nothing for years and slowly sell down this thing and still have
0:15:23 several hundred thousand dollars worth of profits there.
0:15:24 Absolutely.
0:15:25 I’m really good at finding deals.
0:15:27 And sometimes the deals might need a little thing.
0:15:28 They might need something.
0:15:30 So I’m really good at finding and buying them.
0:15:32 But I’m not the greatest on getting them listed.
0:15:38 So I do have probably $300,000 worth of stuff that is sitting in my warehouse or sitting
0:15:43 in my garage, I have a detached garage as well, that I have not got listed yet for whatever
0:15:44 reason it is.
0:15:45 But that’s money that’s not making me money.
0:15:46 Yeah.
0:15:49 That’s, nobody’s going to find it if it’s not, if it’s not online.
0:15:50 But that’s the challenge.
0:15:54 It sounds like, and kind of a common challenge, like I love the treasure hunt component of
0:15:55 it.
0:16:00 I love the thrill of making that sale, but then like the photography component, the writing
0:16:05 the product description, some measurements, even sometimes the seller or the buyer interactions,
0:16:09 especially Facebook marketplace is the worst, like where, you know, just so many random bots,
0:16:10 I don’t know.
0:16:12 I assume they’re bots who just ask you, is this still available?
0:16:15 The pain that goes into it, but the pain is where the profit comes from.
0:16:20 So the next one that I have on my list is these Air Force floodlights from like Cold
0:16:25 War era floodlights, like looking for, like searchlights, looking for planes.
0:16:26 Yeah.
0:16:27 This was a really cool one as well.
0:16:31 So if you haven’t found the like thing with our story is I love weird stuff.
0:16:35 I love stuff that nobody else sees value in for whatever reason, or yeah, that’s what
0:16:36 I really, really hone in on.
0:16:37 I try to find stuff like that.
0:16:43 We bought six of these huge spotlights and when I say huge, the light itself was probably
0:16:48 six foot tall and then it sat on a military trailer, just a beast of a light in it, the
0:16:49 light bulb.
0:16:51 It’s not like a normal light bulb that you would think of.
0:16:55 It actually had a hole, a tube going through the light mechanism itself and it would run
0:16:58 radiator fluid through it to cool it down.
0:17:00 This is how bright these things are.
0:17:04 You were not allowed to turn these on within a 10 mile radius of an airport.
0:17:05 That’s how bright they are.
0:17:06 Oh my gosh.
0:17:07 But did they work?
0:17:08 Yes, they did.
0:17:09 So they absolutely worked.
0:17:13 You had to have a special generator since they were, I don’t quote me, I’m not a hundred
0:17:17 percent sure, but I think they were manufactured in the 70s, 60s, or 70s.
0:17:21 They had military generators that were on a different frequency.
0:17:23 That was the only thing that could run them was that frequency.
0:17:25 So you had to have a generator to do it.
0:17:28 The first guy that we sold one to, he actually had the generator, he brought it down.
0:17:33 He cranked the sucker up and we saw like the bat, the bat light.
0:17:37 This thing just went to heaven on how bright it was, but it was insane how bright it was.
0:17:39 So to give you an idea, they used them in the war.
0:17:40 They got rid of them.
0:17:45 And then they actually, I think they either NASA bought them or somehow NASA got their
0:17:46 hands on them.
0:17:50 And they used two on each side of the runway at NASA, a 10 mile runway.
0:17:54 And that’s how they lit up the runway for the space shuttle to come in and land or with
0:17:55 these lights.
0:18:00 And don’t ask me how they ended up at an auction that I was at, but they ended up at an auction
0:18:04 and we ended up paying, I think it was like 360 or $370 per light.
0:18:08 And then yeah, we sold, we were selling them, I think it was between $7 and $10,000 per
0:18:12 light when we actually, when we actually sold them, one went out to, if you’ve heard of
0:18:16 Burning Man, a guy out there bought, I think the first one went out there and then he bought
0:18:17 a couple more after that.
0:18:21 So yeah, just a crazy, crazy story, but really, really cool item that we got to come in contact
0:18:22 with and then get it to somebody.
0:18:23 All right.
0:18:25 So I’m hearing local auctions.
0:18:30 I’m hearing contacts at the flea market, offer up Facebook marketplace, finding a guy who
0:18:34 gets paid to clean out businesses where they go out of business, like all of these different
0:18:40 sourcing methods and then looking for those bigger, bulkier items that other people are
0:18:45 a little bit hesitant to touch, but you know, there’s got to be some inherent value there
0:18:46 to the right buyer.
0:18:47 Absolutely.
0:18:48 I mean, you hit the nail on the head.
0:18:52 All these different places were able to do it and we’ve just been doing it for so long.
0:18:56 I’m looking for those unique items that a lot of people won’t say, Hey, I’m going to throw
0:18:57 that on a pallet.
0:18:58 I’m going to ship it.
0:19:00 A lot of our items do do that, but a lot of them also go in boxes.
0:19:04 So we still ship them FedEx or UPS, but it is, it has to be that right item.
0:19:05 Yeah.
0:19:09 And we’ve heard from people who really have honed in on a flipping niche, like I focus
0:19:16 on shoes and maybe even specifically like men’s dress shoes, flipping used cell phones.
0:19:21 And we’ve talked about like flipping domain names and it’s like everybody’s got a niche
0:19:26 and if there’s a way to describe your niche, it’s just big, big profitable stuff.
0:19:27 Absolutely.
0:19:30 We’re looking for those big, big items that yeah, we can turn around and make a profit
0:19:31 on for sure.
0:19:35 This comes to mind here on this $1,000 plus lip list.
0:19:39 I know we’ve talked about the bus wash in the past, does that one qualify?
0:19:40 Absolutely.
0:19:44 So we actually sold two bus washes, bought one locally at an auction and then on a road
0:19:48 trip, I think it was two or three years ago on the way back from a road trip, our last
0:19:54 stop was the outer banks and we actually found a bus wash while I was in the hotel again.
0:19:56 And I think it was the last night we were there.
0:19:59 I found a bus wash, got it for $500.
0:20:01 This thing was like brand spanking new.
0:20:02 We had to actually drive home.
0:20:05 I had an enclosed trailer, so I had to drive back home, outer banks.
0:20:09 Yeah, I think if I’m not mistaken, it was like 10 hours from us, but the profit was
0:20:10 there on this bad boy.
0:20:14 So I went home, I got an open trailer, we came back up the next weekend.
0:20:17 I secured the deal with a guy, I came back up, picked it up the next weekend, paid $500
0:20:21 and sold it for, that one was $14,500 that we were actually able to sell it for.
0:20:22 Oh my gosh.
0:20:25 Yeah, I’ll take a 10 hour road trip.
0:20:26 Okay.
0:20:30 And because you’d sold a previous one, you’re like, oh shoot, I know I could do it again.
0:20:31 Fascinating.
0:20:33 Any other ones that make sense to highlight here?
0:20:37 A smaller one that I just sold a week and a half ago is a Panini press.
0:20:42 We were at the flea market about a month ago, maybe a little less, and I was walking down
0:20:44 the aisle and Melissa goes, hey, look at that over there.
0:20:47 And I had already seen it because I usually pick up stuff really, really quickly.
0:20:50 And I was like, yeah, it’s a Panini press, but I thought it was a cheaper one.
0:20:53 I thought it was, you know, one of the ones that you can get off brand and $300 or something
0:20:54 like that.
0:20:55 And she goes, check it out.
0:20:56 I pulled it up.
0:20:57 It was a star brand.
0:20:58 I forgot the model that it was.
0:20:59 Yeah.
0:21:02 It was like, they’re $2,500 to $3,000 new.
0:21:03 And I was like, whoa, that’s a good deal.
0:21:05 And he was only asking $50 for it.
0:21:07 So I was like, ah, that’s a great deal.
0:21:08 Let’s go back and talk to him.
0:21:11 I offered him $40 and he said he would take $45 for it.
0:21:12 I didn’t plug it in or anything.
0:21:13 I asked him if it worked.
0:21:14 He told me, yes, he guaranteed it worked.
0:21:16 So he paid him $45 for it.
0:21:19 And then we sold it within like two weeks and sold it for $1,500.
0:21:21 That’s another one that, yeah, we’re looking for those.
0:21:22 That was not very big.
0:21:23 It went into a box, shipped it.
0:21:25 I believe that was FedEx that I shipped it with.
0:21:26 But yeah, we see those.
0:21:28 I mean, those are not that hard to find.
0:21:30 $1,500 bucks for a Panini press?
0:21:31 Yes.
0:21:35 Like my 20 year old George Foreman is still working just fine.
0:21:36 I don’t know.
0:21:37 But that’s crazy.
0:21:41 So being able to do it over and over again, those deals are out there.
0:21:44 It’s just a matter of kind of making yourself available and open to them.
0:21:45 And I love, oh, I found it.
0:21:49 Well, it’s just, you know, scroll in marketplace, scroll it off or up, sit in the hotel room.
0:21:52 So much more profitable than just dinking around on TikTok or something.
0:21:53 Yeah, absolutely.
0:21:54 It’s so much fun.
0:21:55 I’ll give you one more real quick.
0:21:56 This is a quick one.
0:21:58 It’s a soft serve ice cream machine.
0:22:01 And I don’t think I told you this last time we had talked because it’s been quite a few
0:22:02 years since we have talked.
0:22:06 I found an ice cream, a soft serve ice cream machine on offer up that a lady posted for
0:22:07 free.
0:22:09 When I messaged her, I saw it after it came on offer up.
0:22:12 I was like, it was like five minutes and I messaged her and said, I can come pick it
0:22:13 up right now.
0:22:14 She messaged me back and sent me the address.
0:22:16 I jumped in, got my trailer, went and picked it up.
0:22:21 We sold that for $8,500 and she gave it to me for free and she told me there’s nothing
0:22:22 wrong with this.
0:22:23 Wow.
0:22:24 That’s not anything about power.
0:22:28 It was three phase and her ice cream shop didn’t have three phase act accessible to
0:22:29 them.
0:22:32 So that was why she bought it in haste and then she couldn’t use it and she’s like,
0:22:33 I don’t want to deal with it.
0:22:34 It’s big.
0:22:36 Just somebody come and pick it up and get it out of my shop.
0:22:37 That’s what we did.
0:22:38 So we picked it up for free.
0:22:41 Didn’t pay a penny for it and actually sold it for $8,500.
0:22:42 So these deals are out there.
0:22:43 You just have to be looking for them.
0:22:48 In a case like that, do you go back to her afterwards and like sprinkle a couple of Benjamins
0:22:49 in the tip jar?
0:22:50 It’d be like, hey, thank you.
0:22:53 Thank you for, you know, paying our bills for the next couple months.
0:22:54 Yeah, absolutely.
0:22:55 We try to take care of it.
0:22:59 And most of it has some like a property manager who calls us and gives us stuff as well that
0:23:03 somebody moves out and they ask us if we want the items inside the house or something like
0:23:04 that.
0:23:06 Whenever we do that, we always try to take care of people who take care of us or we give
0:23:08 them a gift card or something like that.
0:23:11 Just to show them our gratitude, thank you for thinking about us and stuff like that.
0:23:12 So absolutely.
0:23:14 It never hurts to be over generous with people.
0:23:15 Totally.
0:23:16 Well, make sure to follow along.
0:23:20 Robin Melissa, some of my favorite follows on Instagram because they’re posting stories
0:23:23 like these all the time, source, you know, creative ways to source while they’re out
0:23:28 on family road trips, you know, turning these vacations into write offs and finding creative
0:23:30 ways to offset the costs, even pay for these.
0:23:33 Hey, this was a profitable trip for us now.
0:23:36 Instead of most people taking time off and having that cost them money.
0:23:40 So I love all these stories and I know you’ve got, you know, we could feel hours of airtime
0:23:45 with all of those, but we’re going to be right back with Rob for rounds two and three, including
0:23:49 donate a business idea right after this.
0:23:54 You know, when you discover a new binge worthy show or podcast that you just have to tell
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0:25:08 Being an entrepreneur and being able to work remotely definitely has its perks.
0:25:14 I’ve recorded podcasts everywhere from Vietnam to Italy, drafted newsletters from Japan,
0:25:17 hosted mastermind meetings from Spain, ended up being the middle of the night to get to
0:25:22 US business hours and outlined courses in Mexico.
0:25:25 The common thread of all of these trips though is Airbnb.
0:25:30 We love being able to get exactly what we’re looking for in a place to stay and have a
0:25:34 more local experience than staying in some giant hotel chain.
0:25:38 And you know me, I’m always thinking about the next side hustle idea, the next income
0:25:39 stream, right?
0:25:44 And one that’s at the top of the list is hosting our place on Airbnb while we’re traveling.
0:25:45 That way the house doesn’t have to sit empty.
0:25:50 We could use the income to help pay for the trip and we’ve heard from several successful
0:25:52 Airbnb hosts on the show.
0:25:56 And what’s interesting is a lot of them started with almost that exact strategy, running their
0:26:00 place or even a spare room while they’re out of town.
0:26:04 Taking inspiration from that, you might have an Airbnb right under your nose.
0:26:07 In fact, your home might be worth more than you think.
0:26:15 You can find out how much at Airbnb.com/host, that’s Airbnb.com/host to find out how much
0:26:18 your home is worth.
0:26:23 All right, we’re back with Rob from fleamarketflipper.com for round two, donate a business idea.
0:26:26 This is something that you might start yourself if you had more time.
0:26:28 This is something that auto exists in the world.
0:26:30 This is something you think listeners could start and run with.
0:26:33 So Melissa and I have recently got into pickleball.
0:26:36 We play almost every single night in our local town that we’re in.
0:26:37 They congregate.
0:26:38 There’s like 70 people there.
0:26:45 I totally would start a e-commerce pickleball swag, whether it’s shirts, paddles, grips,
0:26:46 balls.
0:26:51 I feel like this pickleball has been around for decades, but it is taking the country by
0:26:54 storm just with how many people are playing it and how much more we’re seeing of it right
0:26:55 now.
0:26:58 And I think it is going to be kind of like the next bubble for sports is pickleball.
0:27:02 So that is exactly what I would do if I had more time, I would open up an e-commerce store
0:27:04 and really start leaning into this sport.
0:27:07 Is there that much equipment involved like you got a couple of paddles, you got a couple
0:27:08 of balls?
0:27:09 I feel like you’re set.
0:27:10 Or is there that surface level?
0:27:14 Nick, you got to go once you’re serious about this, like there’s way more.
0:27:16 You don’t have to have a lot of stuff and you don’t have to have a lot of expensive stuff.
0:27:21 We started out with paddles from Walmart and they are like $20 or $30 paddles.
0:27:27 Slowly as we started getting better and upgrading to $100, $200 paddles, it is night and day.
0:27:30 How much better your game will get with the right equipment.
0:27:31 Really?
0:27:32 Yes, absolutely.
0:27:35 I loved it because I had this paddle that was worn down to almost nothing.
0:27:39 And then I jumped in and played with somebody’s like $200 paddle and I was like, what have
0:27:40 I been waiting for?
0:27:41 This is ridiculous.
0:27:45 How much the difference is on different carbon fiber and graphite paddles, they make all
0:27:46 different types now.
0:27:50 It’s not a lot of stuff, but there is still paddles, gloves, a swag where you’re having
0:27:51 shirts and shorts.
0:27:55 And there’s a lot of stuff that you can enter into it and really, you know, go after people
0:27:56 in this market.
0:28:00 I had no idea you could go that high end on a pickleball paddle.
0:28:05 And so maybe that’s the play, like if you’re going after the $20, $30 Walmart paddle type
0:28:09 of people, like that seems really crowded, that seems really, really competitive race
0:28:10 to the bottom.
0:28:13 But if you’re going after the $200, $300 paddle people, like all of a sudden, hey, similar
0:28:16 to the flipping business, I don’t have to make that many sales to make it interesting,
0:28:17 to make it worthwhile.
0:28:18 Yeah, absolutely.
0:28:22 And that’s the biggest thing is in not just one area, I feel like showing people that
0:28:25 you have a lot of different things for the pickleball community.
0:28:29 I feel like that’s where you can actually go in and I think it would be something that
0:28:30 would kill it, a business that would kill it.
0:28:35 I came across one, I think it was called the Dink or Dink, like it was like a pickleball
0:28:40 newsletter business where it had kind of risen the rising tide of interest.
0:28:42 They said, hey, we’re going to follow the piggyback principle.
0:28:46 We see that this is a rising tide of interest and we want a part of this trend, right?
0:28:50 So we’re going to ride this trend and maybe still are doing really, really well with their
0:28:52 pickleball newsletter.
0:28:55 And so this is one of the broader, you know, even if it’s not pickleball, like for people
0:28:56 tuning in.
0:29:00 And what else do you see around you that has just a rising tide of interest that you could
0:29:02 somehow capitalize on?
0:29:06 Could you be the person that sells shovels into that gold rush instead of, you know,
0:29:08 being the prospector yourself?
0:29:13 We had, and we recently reared this episode with Russ Perry from Design Pickle.
0:29:17 And we first recorded, it was 2017-ish, 28, I don’t remember.
0:29:21 And he was like, because of the name tie-in, well, we’re a design pickle, we run this
0:29:22 design agency.
0:29:26 We sponsored this little like up-and-coming national championship in this little sport
0:29:27 called pickleball.
0:29:30 And he’s like, maybe you’ve heard of it, maybe you haven’t, but, you know, it’s gaining
0:29:32 a little bit of popularity, gaining a little bit of traction.
0:29:33 So we wanted to be like the title sponsor.
0:29:34 Who knows if this is going to pay off.
0:29:38 And I was like, when we reared that episode this year, 2024, we’re like, hey, you know,
0:29:40 I wonder how much that sponsorship costs now.
0:29:43 I wonder if they’ve kept that going over the course of several years, because obviously
0:29:46 there’s a ton more interest in pickleball now.
0:29:47 That’s awesome.
0:29:48 All right.
0:29:54 So donate a business idea, the pickleball, e-com, swag, and equipment type of store there.
0:29:55 And I like that.
0:29:59 So the broader, broader idea would be find a gold rush, you can sell some shovels into
0:30:02 obviously pickleball is big gold rush going on right now.
0:30:03 Round three is the triple threat.
0:30:07 And we’re going to start off with a marketing tactic that’s working for you right now.
0:30:09 This could be on the flipping business side.
0:30:12 This could be on the flipper university side.
0:30:13 What do you see?
0:30:14 What’s working for you these days?
0:30:15 Yeah.
0:30:20 So on our coaching aspect of our business, we use a software called ClickFunnels.
0:30:24 And ClickFunnels has a 2.0 version that they’ve been upgrading and getting really into.
0:30:27 And it’s amazing what we’re able to do on the marketing side of our business for the
0:30:28 coaching business.
0:30:31 So we use it every day with all the stuff that we do emails, marketing and all that kind
0:30:34 of stuff that’s been amazing for our business, amazing help.
0:30:38 Anything specific that has changed over the last six or 12 months with that new tool in
0:30:43 terms of customer acquisition or blow or what, how are you using it?
0:30:48 They just opened up inside the software of 2.0, the affiliate portal to where it will
0:30:52 make it that much easier for us to be able to communicate and work with affiliates in
0:30:53 our coaching business.
0:30:54 Okay.
0:30:56 So that allows you to tap into affiliate marketing.
0:30:59 If you’re not familiar, I know we’ve talked about it on the show in the past, but from
0:31:02 the affiliate side, this is helping other people sell their products and services.
0:31:06 Now, from the business owner side, from Rob’s standpoint, this is, well, how can I recruit
0:31:08 an army of performance-based sales agents?
0:31:10 I don’t have to pay them until they make a sale.
0:31:14 And when they do, I’ll just pay them a commission on everybody they referred to me.
0:31:18 So kind of a win-win for all parties involved there or a low-risk marketing channel.
0:31:23 And so I’ll chalk that up as the marketing tactic that is working right now, this new
0:31:27 ClickFunnels-powered affiliate portal, which will allow you to go out and recruit some
0:31:31 affiliates that are personal finance adjacent, that are flipping adjacent, that can send
0:31:33 people your way and into your world.
0:31:34 Does that make sense?
0:31:35 Absolutely.
0:31:36 Okay.
0:31:38 So I’m going to put that down as the marketing tactics, affiliate marketing.
0:31:43 I’m going to assume ClickFunnels 2.0 as this new tool that you’re loving right now.
0:31:44 Yeah.
0:31:45 It’s amazing for us.
0:31:46 I’m not in the digital aspect of our business.
0:31:50 I’m more of, hey, I buy this, I pick it up, I sell it, I do that.
0:31:52 Melissa does the back in and she’s really amazing at it.
0:31:55 And she is absolutely loving all the features inside of 2.0 right now.
0:31:56 Well, very cool.
0:31:59 It’s been a long time since I’ve looked at ClickFunnels and maybe it had, maybe it was
0:32:00 due for a 2.0.
0:32:02 It was a little bit clunky in some ways.
0:32:06 So maybe this upgrade has addressed some of those issues.
0:32:07 So very cool.
0:32:08 ClickFunnels 2.0.
0:32:09 We’ll link that up in the show notes.
0:32:13 And last, but not least for round three is your favorite book from the last 12 months.
0:32:15 So this is the triple threat.
0:32:19 So I’m going to give you three books that have changed my life and our business.
0:32:24 Now, once it goes back to the actual owner of ClickFunnels, Russell Brunson, dot com
0:32:27 secrets, expert secrets and traffic secrets.
0:32:29 That’s his trilogy that he wrote in the marketing world.
0:32:31 They are amazing, amazing books.
0:32:33 I have listened to them many, many times.
0:32:38 I’m not a very dyslexic, so I don’t read very well, but I do listen to audiobooks while
0:32:40 I’m running, while I’m exercising all the time.
0:32:43 And I have listened to all of these books multiple, multiple times.
0:32:46 And every time I do, I get new golden nuggets out of them.
0:32:49 So if anything, these books are amazing in his trilogy.
0:32:52 I’ve got a couple of those on my shelf as well.
0:32:57 And maybe it was expert secrets where he talks about the perfect webinar structure.
0:33:00 And it doesn’t even have to be webinar or workshop, but it’s like, the big thing that
0:33:04 stood out to me was like, your audience is coming into these, into your world with some
0:33:10 preconceived notions about what is and is not possible, what they can and cannot achieve.
0:33:14 And it’s really your job as the business owner to really kind of like break down some of
0:33:18 those limiting beliefs and say like, no, you can make this happen.
0:33:23 And Jacques Hopkins from Piano and 21 Days have said the same thing, like your marketing
0:33:25 material needs to accomplish a couple of things.
0:33:28 It’s like, first of all, convince people that they can do the thing.
0:33:31 And secondly, that you’re the person to help them bridge that gap, that you’re the person
0:33:33 who can help them get there.
0:33:35 So that was one thing that stood out from expert secrets.
0:33:38 I know I’ve got a couple of these on my shelf behind me as well.
0:33:44 And Traffic Secrets was an attempt to be timeless in the age of social media algorithms
0:33:45 constantly changing.
0:33:49 So you kind of breaks down what do these platforms really want at the end of the day?
0:33:50 What do they want and value?
0:33:55 And how can you feed your content into those such that you go find people in their natural
0:33:57 habitat, find people where they already are?
0:33:58 Yeah, absolutely.
0:33:59 And they kind of break it up.
0:34:01 DotcomSecrets was his first one that he actually did.
0:34:05 And yeah, all three of the books they tie in together, they really, it is marketing.
0:34:08 It’s marketing genius for what he has written and put together in those books.
0:34:10 So absolutely amazing books.
0:34:11 Well, very good.
0:34:12 We will link those up in the show notes as well.
0:34:17 I’m sure there is a free plus shipping funnel that you can get yourself inserted into through
0:34:20 ClickFunnels or through Russell’s masterful marketing for all of those.
0:34:23 But we’ll link those up in the show notes for this episode.
0:34:26 FleaMarketFlipper.com, where you can find more about Rob.
0:34:31 Check out the free workshop, sidehustlenation.com/fmf, FleaMarketFlipper.
0:34:35 We’ll get you over there, their on demand workshop webinar on how to start your own
0:34:36 flipping business.
0:34:37 Big thanks to Rob for sharing his insight.
0:34:40 Thanks to our sponsors for helping make this content free for everyone.
0:34:45 As always, you can hit up sidehustlenation.com/deals for all the latest offers from our sponsors
0:34:46 in one place.
0:34:47 That’s it for me.
0:34:48 Thank you so much for tuning in.
0:34:52 If you’re finding value in the show, the greatest compliment is to share it with a friend.
0:34:56 So fire off that text message to that, you know, deal hunter bargain lover friend of yours
0:34:59 and say, Hey, you already love looking for this stuff.
0:35:00 Maybe turn that around.
0:35:01 Look, look for some of these profitable finds.
0:35:03 I’ll think you’ll get a kick out of this episode in any case.
0:35:06 Until next time, let’s go out there and make something happen.
0:35:08 And I’ll catch you in the next edition of the Side Hustle Show.

0:00:04 Here is an oldie but a goodie from the archives from the Side Hustle Show greatest hits collection.
0:00:09 Plus, stick around to the end for the where are they now time travel update on how Kate’s business
0:00:15 has changed and grown over the last few years. 70 bucks an hour from home. Here’s how one Side
0:00:20 Hustle Show listener is getting it done and how you can apply the same strategies to a business
0:00:27 of your own. What’s up? What’s up, Nick Loper here. Welcome to the Side Hustle Show because
0:00:33 everything is learnable. Today, I want to return to the Side Hustle idea of remote freelancing. That
0:00:38 is, what service can you provide that other businesses or individuals are happy to pay for?
0:00:44 My guest today is a longtime Side Hustle Show listener. She’s a mother of three and when
0:00:48 her youngest was starting preschool a few years ago, she all of a sudden found herself with an
0:00:54 extra nine hours a week. It wasn’t a ton of time, but in her words, she wanted to be a good steward
0:00:59 of that time and use it effectively. Kate Johnson ended up starting a virtual bookkeeping service
0:01:04 called Heritage Business Services and today she serves several monthly retainer clients
0:01:10 and targets a $70 an hour effective hourly rate. The important thing to note here is that while
0:01:16 Kate had taken some accounting classes in college, she’d never been paid to do accounting or bookkeeping
0:01:22 work. Her story illustrates that yes, you can learn valuable new skills. Yes, you can take action and
0:01:27 yes, you can see results. Stick around in this episode to hear how she landed her first clients,
0:01:33 why she decided to invest in her own education, and the surprising new Side Hustle all this work
0:01:38 has spun off. Notes and links for this one along with the full text summary of our call are at
0:01:45 sidehustlenation.com/bookkeeping. That’s all one word, double O, double K, double E. And one other
0:01:50 quick note here is you’ll hear Kate reference the course she took to get started, which is called
0:01:57 Bookkeeper Launch. You can check out a free preview of that course at sidehustlenation.com/BBL
0:02:03 for Bookkeeper Business Launch or check out Kate’s full review of it at bookkeepingsidehustle.com.
0:02:08 I’ll be back with my top takeaways from this chat with Kate after the interview.
0:02:13 We start this one off with what attracted Kate to bookkeeping in the first place? Ready? Let’s do it.
0:02:22 I was able to kind of discern that lots of small businesses are really good at their craft,
0:02:28 but they’re really bad at the behind the scenes stuff. And I have always been a great number two
0:02:33 person. My dream job when I was in my 20s was to go back and be the Chief of Staff for a Baylor
0:02:37 University president. And I never dreamt of becoming a president of Baylor. I wanted to be
0:02:43 that right hand, that person that was like able to keep it all in my head, able to really advise,
0:02:48 internalize all the data to help make decisions. So I thought that would be a good role to come
0:02:53 alongside a lot of these like really aspiring entrepreneurs, but who the last thing they
0:02:58 want to do is just kind of deal with the behind the scenes stuff. So that was all appealing to me.
0:03:03 I liked that I’d be able to work from anywhere. That was definitely marketed in the course that
0:03:08 I took with that this was going to be something that was all cloud based and being married to
0:03:12 someone in the Navy. Like I knew that I could not, I actually had a pretty heartbreaking experience
0:03:17 whenever I finally had to quit my brick and mortar job. The last one that I quit, I actually had to
0:03:21 quit too because of him. Yeah. Like, yeah, we’re up and moving again. Yeah. And that’s out of my
0:03:26 control. And I finally was like, I’m not doing that again. So that was all part of it. Yeah,
0:03:31 something virtual, something that can be done anywhere in the world, essentially. You never
0:03:35 know when the next, where the next move is going to take you. Exactly. Is this something that
0:03:41 a new person would need to take a course for? Or is this something that with a little effort,
0:03:47 you could self-educate through YouTube or through blogs or just through trial and error of doing
0:03:53 books? I don’t think you could learn through trial and error. You could learn on your own. Like,
0:03:58 if your spouse has a company and they’re willing to let you potentially run them into the ground,
0:04:03 that’s fine. But you’re really talking about people’s livelihoods here. And as I’ve been in
0:04:08 this industry and starting to, you know, I’ve advised a lot of other people about how to get
0:04:13 started. There are a lot of really bad bookkeepers out there. And just because you can maybe pass a
0:04:17 QuickBooks exam or take like know how to click around in a bookkeeping software that actually
0:04:22 doesn’t allow you to know the fundamentals of accounting. There are two very different things
0:04:26 like you need to know accounting and you need to know a bookkeeping software, which is those are
0:04:30 two different skill sets. You can have good accounting concepts and not know how to use
0:04:35 a bookkeeping software. So I like to distinguish those. And yes, there are ways to do that for
0:04:41 very cheap. There are some great resources on one of the best accounting ones. I always say
0:04:45 people need to start with learning accounting. There’s a free resource called accountingcoach.com
0:04:50 online. That’s not one that I’ve like personally gone through, but I know a lot of people who are
0:04:55 trying to bootstrap things and do that. I mean, people go to college and graduate school for
0:04:59 years and years to become excellent accountants. So I want to kind of put the fear in people
0:05:04 listening to this that this isn’t something that you’re going to learn in a week or a month.
0:05:08 Truthfully, like I still have to study accounting occasionally whenever I get a new
0:05:14 just issue with a client. When they bring on that first person on payroll, like how does
0:05:18 how do those journal entries work? That sort of thing. So I’m always having to continue learning
0:05:24 accounting, but there are ways to do it. And I pride myself actually on being able to help people
0:05:29 kind of learn how to do it on the cheap. I also think though that this is something that for a
0:05:34 very little bit of money, there are several different paths. If you really did want to
0:05:37 start a virtual bookkeeping business, there’s a lot of courses out there. A lot of them are bad,
0:05:43 so you can reach out to me and ask my opinion about that too. But there are more than one nowadays
0:05:48 that will tell you kind of from soup to nuts how to go about all through all the steps to get that
0:05:52 first client. But the only ones that I’ll recommend are the ones that say you have to have a strong
0:05:56 foundation in accounting first. All right. And I understand you’ve got reviews of several of these
0:06:02 over at bookkeepingsidehustle.com. Kate’s got 7,000 members in her bookkeeping
0:06:06 side hustle group on Facebook. So lots of different resources to kind of get yourself
0:06:11 educated if this is the path that you want to go down. I just want to want to look at this
0:06:16 through the lens of like, okay, here’s a specialized work from home virtual service-based
0:06:20 business, like whether people want to start bookkeeping or whether people want to start any
0:06:25 type of other home-based business. I think there’s going to be some parallels there. But in this
0:06:30 industry specifically, are there you mentioned like, oh, the QuickBooks exam or something like that?
0:06:36 Are there specific certifications that you need to be able to call yourself a bookkeeper?
0:06:42 So in America, no. I do know that they’re like worldwide, there are some countries that have
0:06:45 something that would be called, I don’t know the name of it, like some sort of bookkeeping
0:06:52 certification. But in America, anyone can sign up for QuickBooks and start doing bookkeeping for
0:07:00 people. So all the major software programs have a certification for their software. But again,
0:07:04 just because you can get certified in a software does not mean you know the accounting behind it.
0:07:08 So that’s one thing to keep in mind. But so I have the highest level of QuickBooks
0:07:14 certificate. I’m called a QuickBooks Advanced Pro Advisor. At one point, I was a zero advisor as
0:07:20 well. As someone who has grown deliberately, intentionally slowly, I recommend for people
0:07:26 who are wanting to do this with not 40 hours a week, but as a side hustle to pick one platform.
0:07:32 Zero is just as good as QuickBooks online in terms of being able to build a small business like mine.
0:07:36 And as we should note, that’s zero XERO online accounting software.
0:07:41 Yes, XERO. So those are the two that I kind of typically push people to. There’s also one called
0:07:45 Wave. It has a little bit less functionality, but it could be something that people use to start
0:07:50 their virtual bookkeeping business. But what I recommend is that you just start with one,
0:07:56 because accounting is accounting, but software can be completely different. And if you’ve got two
0:08:01 clients on QuickBooks online and two clients on zero, you’re not going to be able to command,
0:08:06 especially if you charge value pricing like I try to do. My implied hourly rate is able to go
0:08:12 up as I get better at the software. Okay. So value-based pricing, meaning you’re not charging
0:08:16 a set hourly rate for your retainer clients, okay? It’s just X dollars per month.
0:08:21 Exactly. And so when I spend time on the Stairmaster early in the morning, and I’m watching YouTube
0:08:26 videos that are like best QuickBooks keyboard shortcuts, for instance, those small business
0:08:29 owners, they’re not learning those shortcuts. That’s why the bookkeeping is so hard for them.
0:08:36 But I can rock and roll through my tasks quickly and study that, but it would be, you know,
0:08:40 the same keyboard strokes are not the same in those two softwares. That’s just an example.
0:08:46 So there’s some foundational stuff here. Just getting yourself educated, familiar with the
0:08:50 software and the software with the service is a really common business framework where it’s like,
0:08:54 hey, business owners buy this software. They don’t necessarily know how to use it. Or if you
0:08:59 can become an expert in it, it’s easy or relatively easy to find people who are using that and kind
0:09:04 of set up a service piggybacking on that almost. And it’s kind of funny. I was talking to Bench
0:09:09 this week, Bench.co, which is a pretty big virtual bookkeeping service. And they said,
0:09:15 this is one of the first services that a lot of business owners tend to outsource a hire help
0:09:20 for because exactly like you said, they didn’t go into business to become an entrepreneur.
0:09:24 And then also a bookkeeper on the side is like, they want to focus on their core thing. And so
0:09:30 that’s where it’s where Kate comes in. So tell me about those first client conversations like,
0:09:34 okay, you’ve gone through this course. You said, this is the side hustle for me. And then it’s
0:09:38 like coming up with the confidence to say, all right, I’m ready to go hunting for clients. Tell
0:09:44 me about that. All right. So I don’t necessarily recommend my start. I was also interested in
0:09:48 real estate investment at the same time as I was kind of considering this. And actually,
0:09:51 those were probably the, that was the, we were either going to like flip a property and I was
0:09:55 going to be like laying hardwood floors or whatever, you know, whatever, or I was going
0:10:00 to be doing this bookkeeping. So I was a member, I bought a cheap little membership to this once a
0:10:05 month real estate investor meeting. And they announced that they were, their speaker had
0:10:09 canceled and they were switching to a speed networking night. And it was my, I’d never done
0:10:14 a speed networking night ever, but I was like, I have to go. And I didn’t even have a business card.
0:10:21 I sat in the park and wrote my name and phone number on some post-it notes and went and,
0:10:25 and met, I don’t know, we had like five tables, like 10 minutes each. I don’t know if people
0:10:29 have been to these things. It was very organized and everyone had like 90, 90 seconds to talk.
0:10:34 And I got a bunch of business cards and I gave out a bunch of post-it notes. And I got a client
0:10:40 out of it. So that was how I got my first client. So I’m a very scrappy, bootstrappy type of a girl.
0:10:45 So part of me loves that story about how I got started, but if you have a week’s notice,
0:10:49 you can order something like off VISTA print and have a proper business card at least to hand out.
0:10:52 But it goes to show you, you don’t, you don’t need it getting started. You just have to have
0:10:57 the idea of the service in your mind. It’ll like, did you introduce yourself? Like, hey,
0:11:02 I’m Kate. I’m a virtual bookkeeper without having any clients or experience to have the
0:11:07 confidence to say that. So that’s, it’s hard. I basically said I’m a QuickBooks pro advisor.
0:11:12 Okay. I had passed the test. So that gave me at least something to say. It also helped that
0:11:17 I only could talk for like 90 seconds. So I probably, I don’t know, what’s the networking
0:11:22 advice, you know, talk about other people’s pain points, right? Right, right. I was probably
0:11:27 saying stuff like, I know that y’all know go, know how to go out and buy and sell houses and
0:11:30 that you hate your bookkeeping. And that’s what I do. So I said, I don’t know, I said something
0:11:35 like that. And I didn’t let myself get like hung up on my experience. I didn’t ever lie.
0:11:40 So don’t, definitely don’t ever do that. There’s a good chance that you’re not going to be fully
0:11:45 grilled on your experience. And one woman was willing to take a chance on me. I think I was
0:11:50 probably pretty honest with her. She was kind of a bootstrappy type of a gal. She still had kids in
0:11:55 high school, you know, flexible type of a gal. So she was, well, you sound like kind of like me.
0:12:01 I’ll hire you. That’s how that match worked. More with Kate in just a moment, including pricing her
0:12:05 work plus the other marketing tactics that helped land clients right after this.
0:12:12 Being an entrepreneur and being able to work remotely definitely has its perks. I’ve recorded
0:12:18 podcasts everywhere from Vietnam to Italy, drafted newsletters from Japan, hosted mastermind
0:12:24 meetings from Spain, ended up being the middle of the night to get to US business hours and outlined
0:12:29 courses in Mexico. The common thread of all of these trips though is Airbnb. We love being able
0:12:36 to get exactly what we’re looking for in a place to stay and have a more local experience than staying
0:12:40 in some giant hotel chain. And you know me. I’m always thinking about the next side hustle idea,
0:12:46 the next income stream, right? And one that’s at the top of the list is hosting our place on Airbnb
0:12:50 while we’re traveling. That way the house doesn’t have to sit empty. We could use the income to help
0:12:55 pay for the trip. And we’ve heard from several successful Airbnb hosts on the show. And what’s
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0:14:41 What happened after that in terms of getting access to their accounts and systems? There’s a lot
0:14:47 of security type of questions that come into play here. That’s another reason why I kind of do recommend
0:14:52 investing in a course because you can spend a week trying to answer those questions. How do I
0:14:58 get access to my client’s books? Or what is the secure way to have them sign an engagement letter?
0:15:04 All these bookkeeping softwares have accountant access that the client grants to you. She invited
0:15:09 me to her QuickBooks file and all that. I would have never known all that. I’m a really smart person
0:15:14 and there’s no way in the world that I would have known that’s how these things work. The nuts and
0:15:18 bolts you can just spend so long trying to figure out on your own. There’s always a way to figure
0:15:24 it out for free. There is nothing about this business that is rocket science, but as an
0:15:30 entrepreneur you have to kind of decide, “I only have this many hours and how am I going to move
0:15:35 most quickly to my destination?” That’s a good way to frame it. There’s always a way to figure it
0:15:41 out for free. A course accelerates that learning curve. I like that. Was this kind of initial
0:15:46 onboarding after this speed networking night? Was that done from your home and your client’s
0:15:50 home? Or was it like, “Hey, can I come to your office and look over your shoulder and we’ll get
0:15:56 all the access set up?” Yeah. I did everything wrong based on what the course said. She was local.
0:16:02 I’m a very extroverted person. I love the idea of being able to spend time with her. I was still
0:16:06 also considering real estate. In my mind I thought, “Wow, if I’m a real estate person’s bookkeeper,
0:16:13 I might learn how to invest in real estate too.” I actually did meet with her in person some,
0:16:19 but it totally wasn’t necessary. It just worked for my context. We started that summer before my
0:16:23 kids were in school. There was a couple of mornings where I actually did hire babysitter
0:16:28 because I just felt more confident being in person. I wasn’t quite as comfortable with the Zoom
0:16:35 meetings and all of that. I’m really comfortable with it now. What’s the actual work like if
0:16:40 expenses and receivables are all automatically pouring into this software or maybe they’re
0:16:45 not and that’s something that you’re setting up? What is the day-to-day responsibilities
0:16:52 of a virtual bookkeeper look like? There’s all kinds of levels. My whole business has been
0:17:01 built on a monthly flow. There is no client that I have that I have to work on any day of the
0:17:06 month. If I need to not work on them for a whole week, I can do that. There are some businesses
0:17:12 who can hire a virtual bookkeeper though who need someone every day. Maybe for two or three hours a
0:17:16 day you’re logging on. There are definitely people who have that type of a client and who want the
0:17:20 type of a client. For me, this wasn’t what I wanted. Is that just because of transaction volume?
0:17:27 Yes. Imagine someone who’s maybe paying a bunch of subcontractors every two to three days.
0:17:31 Imagine a company, maybe like a pest control company who’s got huge and they’ve got just
0:17:35 client after client and maybe you’re helping them, the people who haven’t paid, you may be
0:17:41 tracking that down. Yeah, transaction volume, payroll issues or paying contractor issues,
0:17:47 paying bills. You can kind of set all that up but it just depends on how large the enterprise
0:17:53 is. I deliberately kept clients that are not someone who’s going to need me every day. It’s
0:17:59 a very white collar job. I mean, you’re at a desk, you’re at a computer, you’re doing Zoom calls.
0:18:04 If all of that sounds terrible to you, then you’re not going to like it. If you need to be
0:18:08 like making furniture, you would hate this. You would absolutely hate it. Fair enough.
0:18:16 Yeah, you have to kind of have this accounting mindset or a love of math and numbers or I don’t
0:18:22 know. I would say details too. Love of details is probably even more so than math because the
0:18:29 computer software definitely handles all the math now. Very, very rarely am I doing math anymore,
0:18:32 although you would think I would. About 20 years ago accountants probably would but
0:18:37 it’s a lot more about the details than the math. Yeah, this sounds like perfect for me. I’m the
0:18:43 nerd who actually loves to do my own bookkeeping. Oh yeah? For this first client, this real estate
0:18:48 flipper, did you have a set price in mind? How did you figure out how much to charge for this?
0:18:53 Okay, so you’re asking me all the embarrassing questions. So again, not what is recommended
0:18:59 in the industry right now, but I did charge hourly. And again, I mean, there was a time when,
0:19:03 I don’t know, just been hard. It would have been hard to say this, but so I charged her $20 an
0:19:10 hour. So I charged hourly and I charged very low. And I was thrilled. My husband literally bought me
0:19:15 a bottle of champagne and we were going to meet our church Bible study where we have dinner.
0:19:20 And the very first time I got paid from her, he like made everyone like toast to me because we
0:19:24 were, he was so excited. And I mean, he just thought it was so cool. Like, oh my gosh,
0:19:30 I have a wife who like got paid for someone to do something professional. It’s a huge milestone,
0:19:37 for sure. Yeah, it was, it was so cool. And so I got paid $20 an hour. I love not tracking hours
0:19:45 now. I am quite certain that I will never have an hourly ongoing client again. She was, I had
0:19:50 one other one, but for me, like I just, I would pass on that client if that’s how the client was
0:19:57 wanting pricing. One off engagements like a project or a training, like I said earlier, I’m currently
0:20:03 charging 70 for that. But I’ll just say like the way my business has grown, I have gotten to the
0:20:09 mindset. I got my mindset back from having just been like a mush brain stay at home mom for so long
0:20:14 that I am valuable, that I do have a skill set that most of these businesses really, really don’t
0:20:20 know how to do their own bookkeeping. So they need me or they’re better or not. And I do have a couple
0:20:24 clients who could do their own bookkeeping, but they can make way more money going out and doing
0:20:28 their actual business for those hours they would spend doing their bookkeeping. So it’s, I’m doing
0:20:33 something really valuable. And after two and a half years, I’ve gotten to a better like mental
0:20:39 place about that. So every client kind of my pricing strategy has just aimed for making more
0:20:46 each new client. So that second client, I made more, I did not, I made much more than $20 per hour.
0:20:51 But even though that doesn’t take away from how excited I was to make that first $20 an hour after
0:20:56 having made $0 for six and a half years. Right, right, right. There is something to that. And I
0:21:00 think Abby Ashley, who runs the virtual savvy, and she talked about this in her virtual assistant
0:21:04 business too, like I started off at this rate. And then for the next client, it was a little bit
0:21:09 higher for the next client was a little bit higher. And it’s a way to gain experience and to level
0:21:17 up and to just as your confidence grows, your income can grow as well. Do you have a fixed price
0:21:21 for everybody who comes to you? Or do you kind of like create a custom monthly package now if
0:21:26 somebody approaches you today? So custom monthly package. And I try not to overthink it. The course
0:21:32 that I took had like a pricing calculator in there. And it’s all like people try to like beat
0:21:37 this value pricing drum. I think it’s a little bit of a sham. I think it really ultimately is all
0:21:42 back down to that hourly rate that you want to make. And even this calculator is built on that.
0:21:47 It’s this Excel thing. And but at the top, the very top number is like, what’s your desired
0:21:53 hourly rate? And then it’s, it’s guessing based on like number of transactions. And is there weekly
0:21:58 payroll versus monthly payroll? And I kind of tries to factor all that in to where then we
0:22:03 think that on the average month, this is about how long it’ll take. And so if you want that hourly
0:22:07 rate, this is what you need to charge. And some months, yeah, some months you have to work more
0:22:14 on a client, some months maybe not. So it works out. Okay. And that’s $70 an hour is the ballpark
0:22:19 that you’re aiming for at the moment. That’s what I put in there right now. Okay. And that’s important
0:22:26 to note. If your alternatives are geek economy stuff, low level administrative stuff, like it’s
0:22:31 a way to really level up your earning power. But on the flip side, you gotta know what you’re doing.
0:22:37 So there’s straight off there always a high value service, higher skilled service. So going from
0:22:40 you know, this first client to the roster of clients you have today, what else worked to
0:22:46 market the business? So I did want to share a couple of things. I did get a client by a company
0:22:55 called Paro, P-A-R-O. I think it’s paro.io. And they are kind of like a dating site for bookkeepers
0:22:59 and small businesses. I mean, not really. It’s like a matchmaking site. So I interviewed with
0:23:04 them and I had to pass this actually pretty hard test. I had to send my family out of the house
0:23:11 for like five hours on the Saturday. And it was this timed exam where you pretend to be a bookkeeper.
0:23:15 They had said that this like simulation, but I got in and then they have their whole sales team
0:23:21 whose job is to go and sign the small businesses. One of my early clients was with them. So that’s
0:23:29 one way to get a client, especially if you realize that you want to work virtually, but maybe you’re
0:23:35 not fully invested in the concept of being an entrepreneur. And a lot of accountants are not.
0:23:39 A lot of people who have the skill set that would make them a great bookkeeper means they’re a
0:23:45 terrible business owner, but they make a great bookkeeper. So don’t worry about going to networking
0:23:50 meetings. Don’t worry about having a website. Don’t worry about posting on LinkedIn and all
0:23:55 this other nonsense. And you’re like, if I had six clients from Perot, yeah, I’m not going to make
0:24:00 as much because Perot obviously has to keep their doors open and take a cut, but you can make a
0:24:06 decent wage. That’s an option. I think, did you ever interview someone from Belay, Nick?
0:24:10 I know, I know Brian and Shannon, but I have not done that. Okay. I wasn’t sure if you interviewed
0:24:16 them or not, but Belay is another option. They have bookkeepers on their staff that they’ll,
0:24:21 you know, kind of loan out to businesses all around the world. So that’s kind of one way.
0:24:24 Okay. Did you end up onboarding with them? With Belay? No, I never even tried.
0:24:30 Okay. I think there are become, there’s also more and more. So QuickBooks Live is another program.
0:24:35 So QuickBooks just in the end of 2018 launched its own bookkeeping service. I think they like
0:24:40 put up an ad in the Super Bowl maybe too. So they’re taking bookkeepers instead of just being
0:24:44 a software company. Now they’re actually an accounting and bookkeeping company. A small
0:24:49 business owner can subscribe to QuickBooks and they’re going to get a, immediately start getting
0:24:54 marketed to, “Hey, do you need help? We have a team of bookkeepers.” And they pay a decent wage.
0:24:59 I think their average wage right now is like in the $20 to $25 range, which is, I mean,
0:25:05 not too shabby if, you know, fits your family’s lifestyle and your goals and you just, you’re
0:25:09 supervised by someone. So you don’t have the pressure of like, “Well, if I make a mistake,
0:25:12 who do I, or if I don’t know what I’m doing, I don’t have anyone to ask.” I mean, that’s kind
0:25:16 of terrifying. Luckily the course that I put kind of has my, that’s my support system when I don’t
0:25:22 know what to do. It came with like actual, very, very experienced accountants who I can
0:25:28 fall back on. But so QuickBooks Live would be another like, that’s kind of a gig economy,
0:25:32 part-time virtual job, but not full-blown entrepreneurship. And then if you want to
0:25:38 just keep going down the entrepreneur path, my best way is just people that I know. So,
0:25:43 you know, that game like Six Degrees to Kevin Bacon, like that’s how I think all my clients
0:25:48 pretty much have been. If not someone that I know, it’s like someone that I know knows that person.
0:25:53 And I just try to tell as many people as I can that I have this business and it has just kind of
0:25:58 worked for me. Once I got a website, I finally built a website about a year and a half into my
0:26:02 business. So like heritagebusinessservices.com is where I, once I built that, it’s just a
0:26:08 little simple four-page website. I felt a lot of confidence grow in my marketing and I was able to
0:26:13 say to people, “Hey, I’m a virtual bookkeeper. Check out my website.” And it just made me feel
0:26:18 a lot more legit. Sure. Yeah, exactly. It’s not something that you need in the early days,
0:26:22 but it is something that can make you feel more official, make you feel more legit down the road.
0:26:28 But I like how you were able to validate this thing with a paying customer before business
0:26:32 cards, before getting a logo, before getting a website. It’s just like, no. Yeah, I don’t have
0:26:36 a logo at all. I still don’t have a logo. Yeah, you don’t need that stuff. You don’t need that stuff.
0:26:42 Okay. With the website, were you able to add it to Google local, Google my business,
0:26:46 like trying to get local clients, curious how the website eventually helped you aside from
0:26:51 this confidence factor? So I think I probably could have done that, but I have not done that.
0:26:56 No, I don’t have a find me on Google. I don’t think. If people are searching like Virginia
0:27:00 Beach Bookkeeper, they’re probably not going to come up. And that’s just because I’ve taken
0:27:05 the approach of, I really do think it’s going to be someone that’s like not too many degrees away
0:27:10 from me. I think my third client was from the elementary school pickup line, where we parents
0:27:15 have to go in to pick up our kids. Okay, okay. He was one of the dads of like one of the older
0:27:22 kids at the school. And that’s how it’s worked for me. So I haven’t put a lot of effort into,
0:27:27 I mean, there’s no SEO for my website. What was the conversation like with that dad?
0:27:32 He was just like, Hey, what do you do? No, it was that easy. So our school has pizza Friday,
0:27:36 and that’s what like parents are encouraged to come. And he would come occasionally. And I just
0:27:40 ended up sitting by him. And I don’t know. I’ve probably been in the school about a year and a
0:27:45 half at that point. So I recognized him. And I don’t know. I just like, I try to be socially
0:27:50 adept. That’s kind of it. I don’t know. Maybe he, I think he might have been wearing like a badge
0:27:54 to get into a business. So I was asking him about his business. And then it turned out that he had
0:27:59 this extra nonprofit that he was responsible for. And so it was for the nonprofit that he said he
0:28:04 needed a bookkeeper for. Oh, okay. So once I had that business mindset on, I was just like looking
0:28:10 for places to turn the conversation to that direction, if that makes sense, without being annoying.
0:28:13 Yeah, a couple of different options, obviously the in-person networking stuff,
0:28:19 your six degrees of separation, who do you know, who did they know? And just being up front saying,
0:28:23 like, this is, this is what I do now. This is something I can help out with going down the
0:28:29 route of the QuickBooks Live or the Para or the Belay, like going where larger companies already
0:28:34 have a network of bookkeepers that they’re referring out to clients. So it’s like going where customers
0:28:39 are already shopping. That’s one way to do it. And then, you know, finally there’s this whole
0:28:44 level of online marketing and, you know, trying to find complete stranger type of clients that I
0:28:50 imagine you get to down the road. But the important thing to notice here, it doesn’t take a ton of
0:28:54 clients to make a meaningful business out of this. Exactly. I don’t want a lot of clients.
0:29:02 Where do you see this going? Like, are you happy with where it’s at? Are you trying to
0:29:05 grow to have a team of bookkeepers underneath you? What’s the future hold?
0:29:10 Yeah, maybe I jump the gun by saying I don’t want a lot of clients. Although, I think I actually
0:29:14 don’t want a lot of clients. There are definitely ways that you can take this business down that
0:29:20 path. But for me, my next step is to probably outsource some of the monthly work. And I’ve
0:29:27 actually done that. So I’m allowed to say that I have just in 2020 brought on a subcontractor for
0:29:32 two clients. And that’s just such a cool, amazing milestone. I feel really great about it. It’s
0:29:38 working out well. It’s something you can test slowly. And that’s a good model, I think, if anyone
0:29:43 is trying to grow or maybe they get a client that they’re not confident in. Like, you know,
0:29:50 if a client has inventory or maybe they have foreign currency or, you know, kind of a little
0:29:58 bit more varsity type of counting, bring them on and hire a really experienced, slightly nerdy
0:30:05 accountant who loves that stuff. And they’ll be able to do a lot of the work and you can still
0:30:09 share in the revenue of that client. Right. This is one way a service business becomes a little
0:30:14 bit more time leveraged, a little bit more passive when it’s like, hey, I don’t have to be the one
0:30:19 laying the bricks anymore. Yeah. And another reason I’ll say that I’m not interested in being huge
0:30:25 is because kind of as you mentioned at the very, very beginning, I have found that I have a unique
0:30:31 skill set and interest in kind of encouraging other people to become bookkeepers. So my bookkeeping
0:30:38 side hustle work where I’m helping people get started and go, I’m loving and I’m passionate
0:30:44 about. And there’s a lot of people like me who are, what held was I was like 32, had a kid,
0:30:48 had a couple little kids feeling like drowning a little bit. I mean, I love my kids very,
0:30:53 very much. But just like, where did my brain go? And there’s lots of moms out there who are kind
0:30:58 of like me. And they like, man, if I could just have just a little bit of kind of that old self,
0:31:05 it’ll help me even be the better mom. And I love being able to have my kids see me work. I like
0:31:09 them hearing them say like, my mommy does accounting or my mommy does quick books. I think
0:31:13 they say that they don’t really kind of, but I love that. And for years, I didn’t, I didn’t
0:31:18 really have that and not every mother needs that. But for me, it was, I found a good balance, I think.
0:31:22 Yeah, I love it when the kid, you know, asking our kids like, Oh, what does daddy do for work?
0:31:28 I don’t know. He talks to people. What does mommy do for work? Oh, she takes pictures of people or
0:31:32 is like, Oh, she’s not taking pictures today. Oh, laboratory. Yes. She’s at the laboratory today.
0:31:36 So I love it. It’s like, it’s awesome to try and instill that in the kids too at an early age.
0:31:44 I love this because it illustrates so many of like the side hustle show themes, especially the part
0:31:49 about the kind of entrepreneurial physics of the opportunities become visible once you’re in motion
0:31:56 and an entrepreneur in motion stays in motion. So bookkeepingsidehustle.com is an example of
0:32:01 working in public in a lot of ways. Like, here’s my experience in doing this. Here’s how you can
0:32:07 get involved too. And I understand it started almost by accident on a basis of a Facebook thread.
0:32:14 Yes. So I think it was about September of 2018. Now it’s about 18 months ago. I was in a Facebook
0:32:20 group. It was ChooseFI was the name of the group, which is just a financial, like a personal finance
0:32:24 kind of a group. And lots of people in that umbrella are going to be wondering about like,
0:32:28 there’s two levers you can pull to increase your expenses or increase your income. And so
0:32:32 lots of people ask like, how do I increase my income? And someone had posted something about
0:32:36 accounting or that they were an accountant and they needed to make more money. And I just chimed
0:32:41 in that I do virtual bookkeeping and just serve a few clients that I’m able to do it during the
0:32:46 cracks of my day. And the thread kind of grew. A lot of people were interested, but it kind of got
0:32:50 too much. And someone suggested, Hey, why don’t we just make a small Facebook group and you can
0:32:53 answer all of our questions at once and kind of be done with it instead of me just kind of being
0:32:56 pulled all over. And I was feeling generous and wanting to answer people’s question, but it was
0:33:00 going to make it more efficient to do that. So I thought, I didn’t know about creating my own
0:33:05 group. I had no idea what to do, but I figured it out. And you stood out in the thread because
0:33:11 you weren’t pitching a network marketing scheme. No, no, no. Oh gosh, no, I was just saying, Oh,
0:33:15 yeah, like here’s the QuickBooks Pro Advisor site where you can get your certification or, you know,
0:33:19 whatever. I don’t know what I said, but we moved. I’m guessing it was probably 10 or 15 people to
0:33:25 this private little Facebook group answered some questions. And I wish I knew exactly how it happened,
0:33:31 but now there’s 7,000 people in it. And by accident. Yeah. Well, so all I would do is every once in a
0:33:35 while, I would say a lot of my military spouse groups too, I would like ask career question,
0:33:38 I’ll say, well, I’m a virtual bookkeeper. And if you want to learn more, I have a Facebook group
0:33:42 where we talk about it. And then I finally like actually gave the group a proper name. I probably
0:33:46 didn’t do that for like six months or some things that people could actually find me. You can like
0:33:53 change the name of the group. And then I don’t know, people were really taking my advice and kind
0:33:57 of running with it and people were having success. So yeah, then I started a blog because the only
0:34:01 reason I started the blog was because I was answering the same question over and over because
0:34:05 this isn’t rocket science. It’s like learn accounting, learn a bookkeeping software,
0:34:09 figure out how to set up a business and then go get a client. But everyone has the same questions
0:34:13 and I kind of got tired of answering, how do you become a QuickBooks Pro Advisor? So I just made
0:34:19 it like a YouTube video about screencasting me like pretending to sign up for a QuickBooks account.
0:34:23 So then I could answer those questions over and over and I enjoy it. I like it. I like seeing
0:34:28 people succeed. Yeah, I even created a, tried to write a book this year. I did write a book
0:34:31 in January, just called the Bookkeeping Side Hustle Guidebook.
0:34:34 Yeah, or just knocked it out in January. No big deal.
0:34:39 Yeah. Well, I just, I don’t know. I know how to tell people how to do it. So I wrote it down
0:34:43 and I have that and it’s all about actually taking action and-
0:34:46 Is the book on Amazon or is it through bookkeepingsidehustle.com?
0:34:52 Yeah. So bookkeepingsidehustle.com, I think it’s backslash bookkeeping guidebook,
0:34:56 but I have a link on the main homepage. I just sell it on my Shopify store and it’s just an ebook
0:35:00 download because the important part of the book is it’s very actionable. So when it talks about
0:35:05 getting your QuickBooks Pro Advisor certification or your zero certification, I have a link like in
0:35:09 the ebook. So as you’re reading the content, you’ll be able to jump to like the next thing
0:35:14 you need to watch. Or if you want to watch a lot, I have a lot of YouTube videos I recommend people
0:35:19 listen to by a lot of like really, really expert people and the links right there. So
0:35:23 I don’t know that I’ll ever make it a hard copy because the linking functionality is so important
0:35:28 because there’s a whole lot of people who know a whole lot more than I do about how to do this.
0:35:33 I just have, I would consider myself probably the best expert at being like the hub of it all.
0:35:40 So that’s my role in it. And I can point you to the true, true, true accounting experts or
0:35:45 software experts. I think it’s awesome. I think it’s really cool what you built and then
0:35:50 by spreading the word, you’ve opened up another income stream, which can be even more time leveraged.
0:35:55 Really, really inspiring stuff, Kate. Thank you. All right. So bookkeepingsidehustle.com is where
0:36:02 you can find Kate’s home base. Be sure to jump in the bookkeeping side hustle group on Facebook,
0:36:06 if this is a side hustle that interests you specifically. But again, think of the broader
0:36:12 parallels for any type of home based service type of business where you can find clients,
0:36:17 how you can gain the skills and expertise you need to get started, and really go from there.
0:36:22 So again, Kate, thank you for joining me. And let’s wrap this thing up with your number one tip
0:36:29 for side hustle nation. So I thought about this. I want to say with this particular side hustle,
0:36:36 we really need to have the long view in mind. So if you need $1,000 next week, don’t do this.
0:36:43 If you would like to have $1,000 a month in a year or in retirement as you’re traveling in your RV,
0:36:48 this could really be the perfect side hustle. So think about learning a new skill. Think about
0:36:52 taking the time that it takes. Maybe actually take a couple of junior college accounting classes,
0:36:57 do what it takes. But knowing that you can kind of craft this life that you want and you could
0:37:03 grow it as big or as small, scale it as quickly or as not quickly once you have the foundation
0:37:07 as much as you want. So that’s my number one tip that this is a really great side hustle
0:37:12 with the long view in mind. I like it. Thanks for sharing that. Nick, can I ask one more thing?
0:37:19 I did want to say I did create a discount code for the book. So SNH 30 off SNH 30 off. That would
0:37:24 be my number two tip. If you get this little ebook, it costs hardly anything at all. You’ll
0:37:28 spend an hour reading it and you’ll know quickly whether this is for you or not. All right, very
0:37:32 good. We will link that up in the show notes for this episode. Thank you for that. You’re welcome.
0:37:37 All right. Once again, this is Kate Johnson from bookkeepingsidehustle.com. Thank you so much
0:37:39 for joining me and we’ll catch up with you soon.
0:37:47 All right. Here’s hoping you drew some inspiration from Kate’s story in this episode.
0:37:52 I loved her attitude about being a good steward of her time and how even just a few hours a week
0:37:58 combined with intentional action can build a meaningful extra income stream. She essentially
0:38:04 followed the framework of learn, connect, and earn. And there’s no reason that you can’t do the same
0:38:11 in any skill under the sun. And by being excited about her side hustle and spreading the word,
0:38:16 like telling people what she does, that led to this whole bookkeepingsidehustle.com project
0:38:22 in the Facebook group. Lots of good stuff in this one. Be sure to hit up sidehustlenation.com/bookkeeping
0:38:27 for links to all the resources mentioned and the full text summary of our conversation.
0:38:31 All right. We’re about to do a little time travel and check in with 2024, Kate,
0:38:34 and see what the business looks like today right after this.
0:38:40 Lots of scrappy side hustlers start their business with just their personal phone number.
0:38:44 And I love that. But at a certain point, you can’t be limited to just your cell phone and
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0:39:40 you go to openphone.com/sidehustle. That’s O-P-E-N-P-H-O-N-E.com/sidehustle for 20% off six months.
0:39:45 That’s openphone.com/sidehustle. And if you have existing numbers with another service,
0:39:51 OpenPhone will port them over at no extra charge. Hey, it’s no secret. Starting a business can feel
0:39:55 really hard and growing a business even harder. How are you going to reach more customers? How can
0:40:00 you do it when budgets are tight? How can you maintain the quality of your products and services
0:40:04 as you scale? Well, there’s a great podcast that can help out with all of that. It’s called
0:40:09 This Is Small Business. This Is Small Business is full of practical insights that you can apply
0:40:14 to your business right now and it answers so many of those kinds of questions that
0:40:19 all entrepreneurs have, like how to build your marketing strategy, how to use email lists to
0:40:24 increase revenue, tips to accelerate small business growth, and tons more. A couple recent
0:40:29 episodes I think you might like are episode 61 on marketing, networking, and audience building,
0:40:35 and episode 63 on how to build your business with a small budget. Both of those are filled
0:40:40 with practical, actionable tips to move your side hustle forward so you can reach your goals.
0:40:44 So go ahead and follow This Is Small Business, an original podcast from Amazon,
0:40:50 wherever you listen to podcasts. All right, Kate, welcome to 2024. I’m so glad to have you back.
0:40:56 Give us, to the extent that you’re comfortable, the state of the business, the monthly client,
0:40:59 load, ballpark, revenue numbers, whatever you’re comfortable sharing here.
0:41:04 Sure. I’m so glad that you asked me to come back. Yes, so business is going good. It’s different.
0:41:10 I’ve relocated with the Navy. My husband’s in the Navy. Since the last time we talked,
0:41:16 I’m in a new town and the cool thing about my business is I’ve been able to keep it. So let’s
0:41:22 see. The biggest update of all on the actual client side is that I have niched in a specific
0:41:27 bookkeeping software. I chose Fresh Books. I didn’t think I was going to be able to stand out
0:41:32 in kind of like the larger American QuickBooks world. I thought it’d always be a pretty small
0:41:36 fish in a big pond. And so I thought I want to build something kind of non-traditional anyway.
0:41:41 So I picked a software that was big enough for me to find a lot of plenty clients, but
0:41:47 where accounting professionals weren’t necessarily saturated that market. So I serve Fresh Books
0:41:54 clients exclusively. All of my marketing and all my clients are inbound from my YouTube tutorials.
0:42:00 So I create accounting tutorials for a smaller software and people find me because they found
0:42:04 me on YouTube because they were trying to solve some problem. Yeah, it’s really cool.
0:42:10 Wow. There’s lots of cool stuff going on here. So relocated, but hey, I’ve got a location independent
0:42:14 skill. I’ve got a portable business. My toolbox has wheels, right? I can take the show on the road.
0:42:18 You’re niched down. Say, hey, maybe it’s going to be better to be a big fish in a smaller pond than
0:42:23 be a small fish in a big pond. Like, you know, if QuickBooks is the market leader or one of the
0:42:28 big, big players in the bookkeeping space, like, well, that’s a little crowded for a little me.
0:42:33 But what if I carved out a name and a space for myself in Fresh Books? And this is interesting
0:42:39 because Fresh Books kind of builds itself as like solo operator service provider type of businesses,
0:42:44 like, you know, young freelancers, you know, typically, like my impression was like DIY type,
0:42:48 like, you don’t need a bookkeeper if you have our software, but you’re finding that that people
0:42:52 still need some help with it. So 100% everyone thinks they can do their own accounting and
0:42:57 then like no one does. And also even, even, even if they really do, like they’re good at whatever
0:43:03 it is they do. And so the smarter business owners, I think, do realize, hey, it’s worth it to invest
0:43:07 a little bit in getting some help. And it’s interesting that you say it’s for DIYers. So
0:43:11 the biggest thing I do is actually not monthly client work, which I think if I think your listeners
0:43:14 are probably going to get, you know, if they’re interested in bookkeeping, they’re going to get
0:43:19 ads for programs that will help them get like a monthly client type of a business. I have switched,
0:43:24 I really like to teach. And so I do a lot of one on one training. And that’s the perfect fit for
0:43:28 Fresh Books because some people do have pretty simple accounting, and they just need a couple of hours
0:43:33 of information about how to use the software before they go on their own and then maybe call
0:43:38 me again later in the year for a check in. So that’s one thing I do. And then the other thing I do
0:43:44 that’s not traditional accounting firm work is I am sure I wanted this concept of like selling one
0:43:50 to many or like subscription to myself. I have an office hours model. And so it’s a pretty low price.
0:43:55 It’s for DIYers. But then they have a bookkeeper in their back pocket once a week for an hour.
0:44:00 And so my thought is, how do you scale bookkeeping services where I’m not having to click in the
0:44:06 software, we’ll let the client do the work. And so that’s another thing that I sell on my services
0:44:10 page on my website, Tuesday afternoon office hours, and people join that, but they’re their own
0:44:15 bookkeeper. And that’s another kind of funky angle I’ve taken. And it’s working out well. And I’m
0:44:19 proud of it. And I think I’m helping a lot of people like these people need help, but they can’t
0:44:25 afford to outsource their bookkeeping, right? So that’s another just a funky angle I’ve taken.
0:44:31 Okay, that is an interesting one. What do you charge for that? 69 a month for that. And I kind
0:44:36 of don’t have any responsibilities after, except for the goal, you know, yeah, just got to show up
0:44:40 and do this weekly kind of Q&A. That’s an interesting because well, it’s like, that’s what you’ve
0:44:44 shifted away from this like monthly recurring client base, like, that’s what’s appealing to this
0:44:47 business is like, well, if you’re as long as you’re in business, you’re going to have books,
0:44:50 you’re going to need bookkeeping. And so it’s a very sticky type of service is saying, oh, no,
0:44:55 I pivoted away from that to do more of this one on one training. But in doing so, did I just,
0:44:58 you know, hurt myself from the recurring revenue standpoint, like, well, here’s a creative way
0:45:04 to add it back in kind of a monthly membership model. Yeah. And the thing about it is it really
0:45:09 became even when I niched in fresh books, at that point, I was still thinking monthly clients were
0:45:14 the way. But the truth is like, I’m just not built that way. And there are people who are built that
0:45:18 way. And so I think I have a much more teaching spirit. I don’t like like, not really communicating
0:45:23 with my clients that like, I want to, I want to help people learn like how to excel in their
0:45:26 business. And I was finding that the bookkeeping clients I got, even though they were maybe,
0:45:31 you know, I was charging them $300 a month for their books, I didn’t think I was like
0:45:35 really coaching them that much. Maybe that was my problem. But it was like, I did the books,
0:45:38 I sent them the reports. Lots of times, they didn’t want to talk to me because I did what
0:45:41 I was paid to do. And they could have called me and asked me questions, but they didn’t want it.
0:45:46 So I don’t know, there’s pros and cons. My personality is like not a typical
0:45:50 accountant. I didn’t grow up in an accounting firm. And so everything about my business has a
0:45:55 little bit of a twist to it anyway. But lots of people will still like that monthly recurring,
0:46:00 like larger client that you’re responsible for. But I don’t want a busy season in January when
0:46:05 bookkeepers have like this crazy busy season, like not my problem. These people like, I’ll help you,
0:46:13 but you’re your own bookkeeper. Did you find there was an industry or type of client where the
0:46:18 service really resonated with? Like was there, there was an itching down on the software side and
0:46:22 say, okay, well, we can piggyback on the popularity of the FreshBooks tool. But like, was there any
0:46:28 further niching of like, well, we do FreshBooks, but for freelance writers or something like that.
0:46:33 So there’s probably room to do that. I just haven’t been able to pull that off. I’ve thought about,
0:46:37 maybe I could get a client like one of the members of the group to like take me to an industry
0:46:41 conference. That’s kind of like the opposite. What if I went to like the Salesforce consultant
0:46:45 industry conference? Because one of my guys is like a big Salesforce consultant, you know,
0:46:49 then I could just be the Salesforce FreshBooks bookkeeper. But I haven’t done that. I haven’t
0:46:54 executed on it. I take anyone who FreshBooks is good for. So FreshBooks has forced me to niche,
0:46:58 kind of, because FreshBooks is so limited in who it serves.
0:47:03 Yeah. Talk to me about the YouTube strategy, because this is one that we’ve seen over and over
0:47:09 again. If I can create the tutorial content, if I can create the Q&A content, the comparison
0:47:13 content on YouTube for these certain tools, I don’t need to go viral. I don’t need a ton of views.
0:47:18 But if somebody is watching this video, and I’m looking at some of the, this is the Fix Your
0:47:24 FreshBooks YouTube channel, closing in on 2000 subscribers. So it’s not nothing, but it’s not
0:47:30 huge. And we see videos on topics like FreshBooks versus QuickBooks or getting started with
0:47:36 FreshBooks or FreshBooks versus Wave. And these kind of very specific titles that have a tendency
0:47:40 to show up in search, people are looking, you know, for this exact information, that’s a pretty
0:47:44 well qualified lead if they’re watching to the end of this video. Yeah. So actually the ones,
0:47:48 those comparison videos that you’re talking about, those are probably not where my leads are. My
0:47:53 leads are actually from the really like a more obscure, nerdier, slower views that you might
0:47:57 not even be seeing on like my home screen yet, because people need to know how to like issue
0:48:04 a client refund or how to, you know, how to split an expense, like really small, small things.
0:48:08 But yeah, but like legit question is that users of the tool may have. They don’t know how to use it.
0:48:14 And so literally, like if they watch to the end of the video, they love me. And so that is the
0:48:19 strategy because no one is going to watch those videos who doesn’t need me. And by the time they’re
0:48:23 done with this five minute nerd fest, they’re going to say, I got to call Kate. And that’s what
0:48:27 happens. They watch, they watch my videos. And I don’t even tell them who I am really until the
0:48:31 end, because I just know that if they get to the end, I’m in there. I’m their girl. Is there a
0:48:36 call to action at the end, like a book, a consultation call or sign up for XYZ service?
0:48:42 Yeah, I have a pre just like discovery call is the typical thing of a weekly checklist they can
0:48:48 download at the end of the year. One time I made like a year end checklist video. So there are
0:48:54 some calls to action, but really it’s just like heritagebusinessservices.com. And they can book
0:48:58 a 15 minute call from there, but I don’t even always have to say that they like they’re desperate
0:49:03 for me by the time they’re watching these videos. Just solve my problem, make the pain go away.
0:49:07 Exactly. And you’re right, it doesn’t take a ton of views to build a business on the back of that.
0:49:12 I think that’s really cool. Well, any other updates for us? I know you have the bookkeeping
0:49:17 side hustle.com, what you call the accounting influencer side of the business, anything new
0:49:20 and different and exciting over there? Yes, I do have a community called the bookkeeping side
0:49:25 hustle community. It’s grown, it’s largely on Facebook, but I would say I’d even probably
0:49:30 less active in that group Nick than I was when I talked to you the first time. I’ve switched to a
0:49:36 pretty consistent writing every other Saturday on sub stack. So I have a bookkeeping side hustle
0:49:41 newsletter and I basically am building in public. That’s that’s how I serve that audience of other
0:49:46 accounting professionals. I’m telling people the good, the bad and the ugly of what it has,
0:49:51 what it’s like to build heritage business services, I make mistakes, I switch software for
0:49:56 invoice, like all the things and I’m just telling people my processes and wins and losses and that
0:50:01 community is going great. I love it. It’s like my labor of love and I have been doing it for a
0:50:05 long time. I mean, I don’t want to do it more often than I’m doing it, but I’m doing it twice a
0:50:11 month and I have ads on there now. And so like your content and like the way you think has inspired
0:50:16 me so much to think about, okay, I’m in this industry. What else can I do to start making some
0:50:21 money? And I’m not, I’m comfortable writing. I had an audience and so let’s see if we can monetize
0:50:27 that. So like there’s four advertisers for each edition and there’s, you know, some affiliate
0:50:32 revenue as a part of that as well. And I do that and love it. And I’m helping people like bookkeeping
0:50:36 changed my life and changed my family’s like financial trajectory from being a military
0:50:41 spouse with no job, having a portable business. And I want to, by building in public, if it helps
0:50:47 some people get even a little bit of what I’ve gotten, I want to be able to offer that to people.
0:50:51 Well, we’re happy to link up the sub-stack newsletter in the show notes for this episode as
0:50:55 well. This is, you know, free ad supported newsletter or they’re like paid tiers here too.
0:51:00 So I haven’t turned on payments in sub-stack. Nope. Everybody’s free. I’m kind of raging
0:51:04 against the email machine. Like I think of sub-stack as like almost like a blog where people don’t
0:51:08 even have to subscribe to read it. The whole archive is like there. So I’m often answering
0:51:11 questions like in my Facebook group, if someone asks a question, I remember, oh yeah, I wrote
0:51:15 about that in April. I can go grab that link and say, oh, here’s that answer to your question.
0:51:20 Or here was my experience. And I really like it to be more like a blog. It happens to get emailed
0:51:23 if you’re subscribed. Even if you’re not subscribed, please read it. And I don’t have to clutter your
0:51:29 inbox. Yeah, I like this call of kind of, you know, it takes a lot of extra effort to do this
0:51:34 build in public thing, but it builds so much trust and credibility with the people who are
0:51:39 following along to be like, oh, she’s just, you know, one or two steps ahead of where I’m at.
0:51:46 And it builds that relationship and credibility of, you know, people will start to buy the things
0:51:50 that you recommend. We’ll start to sign up for your consulting services, join your memberships.
0:51:54 Like there’s lots of benefits of doing that in exchange for that kind of like, well,
0:51:56 I’m not getting paid to do any of it in the very early days.
0:52:01 Well, and I’ll say like, I still think like the sky’s the limit, like even on the influencer side
0:52:06 and on the real firm side, like one day, these are going to connect like in my, in my mind,
0:52:12 the vision I see is I’ll sell fresh books courses to accounting pros, like fresh books is getting
0:52:18 better. More accountants will want to use that software. And so I’m the expert, like 100% in
0:52:23 America, I have seen the most fresh books files than any accounting professional and I’ll be equipped
0:52:29 to start doing course sales or paid webinars to, you know, convert your QuickBooks desktop
0:52:31 client to fresh books and people will pay for that.
0:52:35 Yeah, you comfortable sharing like what the pie chart looks like in terms of like, well,
0:52:40 the heritage business services side be like the business client servicing side versus the,
0:52:44 you know, influencer side between the newsletter sponsorships, the affiliate revenue over there.
0:52:49 Yeah, sure. So I use a building software in my bookkeeping business called Ignition and it
0:52:53 predicts what I’m going to like make for the year based on any recurring stuff I have. And so for
0:52:58 this year I might make, I think I’m going to make probably between like, I bet I’ll make about 80 to
0:53:04 90,000 in client services. Like I do real accounting, y’all, for real, for real. But then I would say
0:53:10 the bookkeeping side hustle side is, you know, it kind of bats at that level. So I’m making a great,
0:53:13 I mean, an amazing, amazing income doing actual technical work.
0:53:15 So it’s about 50/50 at this point?
0:53:16 Yes. Wow.
0:53:22 I mean, I like transparency. So my newsletter ads are $600 for the title ad and about, well,
0:53:27 there’s two different tiers for the classified ads, but either 120 or 200 for that. And then
0:53:32 there’s usually other like called actions that I recommend per newsletter.
0:53:35 That’s like, how many people you got subscribed to this thing? That’s great.
0:53:36 7,000 to 8,000.
0:53:39 Oh my gosh. Am I ever undercharging for a newsletter spot?
0:53:43 But it’s real niche. It’s real niche, man.
0:53:45 It’s true. It’s so, it’s super, super niche.
0:53:46 Yeah.
0:53:50 So who, like you give me an example of a sponsor, who wants to get in front of this audience?
0:53:57 Accounting app vendors. So my audience is a lot of new entrepreneurial accounting pros.
0:54:00 So they might, they might be a 20 year CPA, right?
0:54:04 But they’re just now deciding to like do their own business side of it.
0:54:07 So there’s a lot of tech stack choices that happens for that person,
0:54:09 that person is choosing, how am I going to manage my practice?
0:54:11 What apps am I going to use to collect receipts?
0:54:15 And then there’s like people who serve bookkeeping professionals,
0:54:18 like people who want to build websites for bookkeeping professionals,
0:54:21 or people who sell courses to bookkeeping professionals, those are the advertisers.
0:54:25 Well, that’s incredible. I love the story. I love the progress that she made.
0:54:29 Hey, look, what we’re going to do, you know, between the client facing side and the, you know,
0:54:34 so-called influencer side, the building public side, we’re going to do over 150 grand this year.
0:54:39 And that whole second half is just the unlock of being able to put yourself
0:54:44 out there and kind of share your experience of doing this thing even early on.
0:54:46 I don’t have all the answers, but I’m going to learn as I go when I figure this out.
0:54:50 Super, super inspiring stuff. Anything else that you want to leave us with
0:54:52 before we wrap on this? Where are they now, Addition?
0:54:55 Yeah. So I’ll just say, this is maybe more on the influencer side.
0:54:58 I want people to know that I think bookkeeping is really hard.
0:55:02 And so, you know, if this inspires you and you know that you have that like
0:55:07 accounting bent inside of you, I have noticed that I think there are some people who think,
0:55:10 oh, bookkeeping should be easy or anyone can do it.
0:55:13 Or it’s kind of like maybe just a step above the secretary and it is not that.
0:55:17 And so that’s part of my message too. As I’m building in public, like,
0:55:22 holy crud, like payroll liabilities are like really hard to do.
0:55:26 And it’s someone’s livelihood, right? Like their books are really important.
0:55:29 So I just think of this as a very serious side hustle.
0:55:32 And I do work completely part-time. Last summer we moved to Texas.
0:55:34 I was like, I barely worked last summer.
0:55:37 Like I am part-time, but I’m serious about the business.
0:55:41 And so that’s the mentality that I want people to have if they love accounting.
0:55:44 Yeah, I appreciate you sharing that. You got to know what you’re doing.
0:55:46 Otherwise, you can really screw up somebody’s livelihood here.
0:55:47 Exactly.
0:55:51 Definitely appreciate that word of caution to what people getting into it.
0:55:54 But bookkeepingsidehustle.com is where you can find Kate.
0:55:57 We’ll link up the YouTube channel as well.
0:56:01 We’ll link up the sub-stack, heritagebusinessservices.com,
0:56:04 if you’re a FreshBooks user and need some help on that front.
0:56:07 Kate, thanks so much for stopping by, for sharing your insight,
0:56:10 for being willing to jump back on and give us this update.
0:56:13 Big thanks to our sponsors for helping make this content free for everyone.
0:56:17 You can hit up sidehustlenation.com/deals for all the latest offers from
0:56:19 our sponsors in one place.
0:56:22 Thanks for supporting the advertisers that support the show.
0:56:23 That is it for me.
0:56:24 Thank you so much for tuning in.
0:56:27 Until next time, let’s go out there and make something happen.
0:56:30 And I’ll catch you in the next edition of the Side Hustle Show.

0:00:06 A food tour side hustle turned into a $300,000 a year business.
0:00:08 What’s up, what’s up, Nick Loper here.
0:00:09 Welcome to The Side Hustle Show.
0:00:12 It’s the business podcast you can actually apply,
0:00:14 and I hope you’re hungry because we got a juicy one today.
0:00:17 My guests started a little weekend side hustle a few years ago,
0:00:21 giving local food tours in Mobile, Alabama,
0:00:25 and he’s since quit that old steel mill day job and built it into
0:00:27 a very comfortable full-time income from
0:00:30 inbillbitesfoodtour.com Chris Andrews.
0:00:32 Welcome to The Side Hustle Show.
0:00:33 Hey Nick, how are you?
0:00:35 I’m doing well and excited for this one.
0:00:38 Stick around, we’re going to learn how Chris got this thing off the ground,
0:00:41 how he’s removed himself from some of the day-to-day operations,
0:00:43 and how you might start something similar in your town.
0:00:45 But Chris, take me back to 2017,
0:00:48 the early days, the inspiration to start this thing.
0:00:49 How come it needed to exist?
0:00:52 A friend of mine did a food tour in Savannah, Georgia.
0:00:54 I had never heard of a food tour before,
0:00:58 and when she came back home and was telling us about
0:01:00 her experience of going to different restaurants,
0:01:03 and she did a tour of the city of Savannah,
0:01:06 and they went to different landmarks in the city,
0:01:08 and the tour guide was talking about the landmarks.
0:01:10 That was all really, really interesting to me.
0:01:14 I’ve been a history buff ever since I was a kid, especially local history,
0:01:18 and I thought that’s absolutely what we need in Mobile, Alabama.
0:01:21 We’ve got 300 plus years of history in Mobile.
0:01:22 It’s one of the oldest cities in the United States.
0:01:25 And fantastic food.
0:01:29 There’s a great food scene that’s in downtown Mobile.
0:01:32 And so, I think just kind of capitalizing on that,
0:01:36 and that’s kind of how the food tour got started in Mobile.
0:01:38 Was anybody else doing it?
0:01:39 Like, it’s not a new concept.
0:01:41 No, nobody in Mobile was doing it.
0:01:44 At the time, I think mainly you would find food tours
0:01:47 in large cities around the country, in tourist places.
0:01:50 Of course, New York has probably got seven or eight of them.
0:01:53 New Orleans, which is about two hours from where I am.
0:01:57 They probably, again, have five or six food tour operators.
0:01:58 But no, nobody was doing this in Mobile.
0:02:00 And so, that was another big thing for me.
0:02:02 It kept me up at night thinking about it.
0:02:05 I was like, “Man, somebody’s going to do this eventually.”
0:02:06 OK.
0:02:09 And I’m not going to be able to live with myself if that person’s not me.
0:02:09 All right.
0:02:13 So, a little bit of a blue ocean here where the concept had been proven out.
0:02:15 It exists in other cities, but it doesn’t exist here yet.
0:02:17 So, hey, why not me?
0:02:18 Why don’t I go ahead and do this?
0:02:22 And we took a food tour in New Orleans last summer, and it was a blast.
0:02:26 Like, there’s a great group outing aside from just sitting in one spot.
0:02:29 And you get to mingle during the walks and learn a little bit of the history.
0:02:31 And it’s a fun time, so it makes a lot of sense.
0:02:35 And the interesting thing to me is Mobile doesn’t necessarily
0:02:37 strike me as a huge tourist destination,
0:02:40 but I guess you get some Gulf Coast visitors in seasonal traffic
0:02:41 and maybe spring breakers and stuff.
0:02:45 But it’s not a New York or an LA or Chicago or something like that.
0:02:45 That’s right.
0:02:47 Most people do not, yes, be honest,
0:02:51 they’re not planning their trip to Mobile like you would say New Orleans.
0:02:55 But what we have kind of got a little bit of a Gulf Coast niche.
0:02:58 You know, we do find a lot of people that take Gulf Coast trips.
0:03:03 And so they’re doing New Orleans, Coastal Mississippi, Coastal Alabama,
0:03:04 the Panhandle of Florida.
0:03:07 You know, a lot of people are doing that Gulf Coast trip.
0:03:07 Yeah.
0:03:11 And that’s worked out really well for Mobile and for our tour, especially.
0:03:15 We’ve had people from all 50 states, maybe 20 countries or so.
0:03:17 You know, it is really incredible when you kind of step back and look
0:03:19 that these are people that are coming to Mobile.
0:03:20 And yeah, it’s a hidden gem.
0:03:21 I don’t think there’s any doubt about it.
0:03:25 I would certainly compare Mobile’s food scene with some of the larger cities
0:03:30 that we compete with, like maybe Chattanooga or Asheville, North Carolina,
0:03:32 Savannah, Georgia, it’s a good food scene.
0:03:33 Yeah, very good.
0:03:34 Pump it up.
0:03:37 You’re going to have to check me on this because I’m betting by the end of the call,
0:03:39 I’m going to pick up a little bit of your draw.
0:03:44 When I used to live in Atlanta, I come home to Seattle for Christmas or Thanksgiving
0:03:46 and people be like, who are you?
0:03:49 Where did you, why do you have the southern accent all of a sudden?
0:03:52 I was like, hey, I’m talking to southerners all day long, all day every day.
0:03:56 It just starts to rub off, it just starts to flow.
0:03:58 So we’ll see at the end of the hour where I’m out with that.
0:04:00 It just happens, y’all just comes out.
0:04:01 All right.
0:04:03 So the idea is straight, hey, this needs to exist.
0:04:05 There’s nobody else doing it here.
0:04:07 What’s the first step in getting it off the ground?
0:04:10 The first step of getting it off the ground, I think, you know, of course,
0:04:13 for any side hustle is the fact that you’ve got to, I’m going to do this, right?
0:04:16 And not be denied that you’re going to do this.
0:04:16 Yeah.
0:04:20 But for, I think specifically for a food tour, it’s pretty simple because as
0:04:24 long as you’ve got a good website that functions well and a good booking
0:04:29 platform for your customers to book your tour on, that’s the hardest part.
0:04:31 And of course, you’ve got to make relationships with restaurants.
0:04:33 All that is very crucial.
0:04:37 You’ve got to be a very good communicator, communicating with these restaurants.
0:04:40 And restaurant owners do not like change, you know.
0:04:44 So if you’re going to tell a restaurant that we’re going to bring 12 or 14
0:04:47 people into your restaurant, they’re going to freak out.
0:04:50 So that’s where that communication is very crucial.
0:04:51 And for food tours, it does.
0:04:53 I mean, that seems like a good thing.
0:04:54 It seems like a win for the restaurant.
0:04:57 Like, hey, you know, this is hopefully incremental traffic,
0:04:58 incremental business for you.
0:04:58 That’s right.
0:05:00 But I guess they go to the worst case scenario.
0:05:03 Restaurant people are going to be glass half empty kind of people most for
0:05:04 the most part.
0:05:04 Yeah.
0:05:07 So they’re going to freak out a little bit, but that communication is where
0:05:09 you’re going to say, you know, no, we’re going to, we’re going to come to your
0:05:12 restaurant in the middle of the afternoon when you’re not as busy.
0:05:15 And we’re going to be there for 20 minutes.
0:05:18 You’re going to know ahead of time how many people are going to be there.
0:05:21 You know, we’re going to have a dish prepared ahead of time.
0:05:24 You’re going to know the kitchen is going to be very well prepared.
0:05:27 You’re going to know if we have any food allergies or any aversions.
0:05:27 OK.
0:05:29 And they’re going to execute it.
0:05:32 And we’re going to come in and what’s going to end up happening is if they
0:05:34 have a great experience, they’re going to go back.
0:05:37 I want to get back to the restaurants in a second, but any tools or software or
0:05:39 tech on that website, booking side.
0:05:43 Hey, we got to make it easy for people to book with us for our tour.
0:05:45 I use a platform called Fair Harbor.
0:05:49 It’s a very common booking platform in the tour industry and in the food
0:05:52 tour industry, they handle your ticketing, they handle your payments.
0:05:54 All that’s going to be in there.
0:05:57 They take a small percentage, but usually about 2.5 percent, something
0:05:59 like that is what they’re going to take.
0:06:03 And they also take a little bit of fees when the customer books.
0:06:04 OK, sure.
0:06:06 As far as payment processing and stuff like that.
0:06:07 Yeah. Got it.
0:06:10 So now we have a little bit of a chicken versus the egg problem where we put
0:06:11 the website up.
0:06:14 We now have a system that will allow customers to book with us.
0:06:18 But now we have to go to the restaurants first and kind of make these
0:06:22 asks or promises like, hey, I can bring you 10, 15 incremental people.
0:06:23 It’s going to be in off hours.
0:06:24 All going to be fine.
0:06:26 But at the same time, you don’t have those 10 or 15 people yet.
0:06:29 And to be able to do it consistently, like, what was that part of the equation?
0:06:33 That’s the scariest part about it, I think, you know, for sure that you have.
0:06:36 You’re making those promises, but at the end of the day, yeah, you don’t know
0:06:38 if those people are going to show up.
0:06:43 So I think simple actions for me would be just getting involved in the community.
0:06:46 You know, I think that would be the simple thing to do is to, you know,
0:06:49 go network and tell people about your idea.
0:06:50 Yeah, they’re going to look at you like you’re crazy.
0:06:53 If you’re in a smaller market, they’re, you know, if there’s no other food tour
0:06:57 in your town, they’re going to think, you know, that you’re crazy, but that’s OK.
0:07:03 And I think, you know, just a blast in social media and for the food tour industry.
0:07:04 We’re fine, man.
0:07:07 You know, we’ve got we’ve got food and restaurants.
0:07:11 And we’ve got stories to tell about our city that we’re passionate about.
0:07:17 That’s a good recipe in my mind for travelers and tourism.
0:07:18 Yeah, for sure.
0:07:20 And you can see that in the reputation that you’ve built in terms
0:07:25 of the online reviews and the testimonials that you have from happy customers.
0:07:27 Because, you know, it’s a fun thing to do.
0:07:30 And that’s kind of how we look at travel in a lot of ways.
0:07:32 Is what are we going to do in between the next meal?
0:07:36 Like, what’s the next excuse to go explore a new part of town, a new restaurant?
0:07:39 So it definitely checks everybody when they’re traveling there,
0:07:42 looking for the local spots, the local restaurants.
0:07:46 That’s what I love about a food tour as well, is it gives you an opportunity for our tour.
0:07:49 You get to go to five restaurants in a three hour span.
0:07:52 Yeah, that you may not otherwise get to go to while you’re, you know,
0:07:56 if you’re only in Mobile for 36 hours or sometimes less than that,
0:08:01 you know, you take a food tour and you get a chance to really dive into the into the cuisine.
0:08:06 And most food tours like ours, they’re partnering with the best restaurants.
0:08:11 Yeah, tell me about the first restaurant or two to say yes to you.
0:08:13 They were open to this concept.
0:08:20 I was scared to death and walked into a restaurant, had a meal and enjoyed it.
0:08:23 I knew the owner was working behind the.
0:08:26 It was kind of an open kitchen and you could see her working back there.
0:08:28 And I did go kind of a little tip.
0:08:32 I’ll say I went during a non peak time.
0:08:36 So let’s say like a Tuesday at one 45 or two o’clock, you know.
0:08:39 So when the restaurant is not that busy.
0:08:44 And so I asked to speak to the owner and I knew that she was very community minded.
0:08:47 Like, you know, she had what was good for the community in mind.
0:08:49 And so I thought that she was going to say yes.
0:08:53 That was so I was like, OK, this is going to be my easy win to approach her.
0:08:54 And so I did.
0:08:58 I asked to speak to her after our meal was finished.
0:09:01 And she came over and I told her about the idea and she was, I love it.
0:09:03 Yes, we’ll absolutely be a part of it.
0:09:05 So that that was my first win.
0:09:06 And that gives you it’s good.
0:09:08 It gives you that confidence to go to the next restaurant
0:09:10 and tell them the idea that you have.
0:09:14 And yeah, now you can name drop, you know, the name of restaurant number one.
0:09:17 Be like, hey, they’re already on board. Exactly. That was huge.
0:09:18 That’s a huge. That’s a good point.
0:09:22 So get those quick, easy wins and yeah, and go to the next restaurant.
0:09:24 So yeah, yeah, we’ve already got we’ve got, you know,
0:09:27 this popular restaurant down the street, this popular candy shop.
0:09:29 That helps your credibility.
0:09:30 OK, yeah.
0:09:33 And there’s some level of understanding that, hey, this is a startup.
0:09:37 If there are any bookings or nobody shows up for a few weeks, totally understand.
0:09:39 Right. It’s all it’s billed is all incremental for them.
0:09:43 Like, hey, you know, this is extra extra business, hopefully.
0:09:44 That’s right.
0:09:45 You know, that’s how we worked out.
0:09:47 Our pricing structure is on a per person basis.
0:09:51 And so if we have four people come, we’re going to pay the price
0:09:53 that we negotiate based off those four people.
0:09:57 Or if we have 14 people, you know, we’re going to pay based off the price
0:10:01 of 14 people. And so I think that’s a that’s a very viable business model
0:10:04 to for food tours. OK, got it, got it.
0:10:06 And I was going to ask about that revenue share.
0:10:10 So if you charge one of the sites had like $100 per per tour,
0:10:13 per booking for this three hour, five restaurant tour, you know,
0:10:15 how much of that goes to the restaurant other than that?
0:10:17 It’s just your your time walking around and telling stories.
0:10:18 Yeah, that’s right.
0:10:23 And I try to keep our food costs, try to keep it in that 40 percent range.
0:10:28 You know, where 40 percent of your of your ticket costs is your food costs
0:10:31 or drink costs. And then, you know, you’ve got a little bit of overhead there.
0:10:34 Hopefully, maybe no more than 20 percent of company overhead.
0:10:36 And so that’s kind of the structure that I usually try to go by.
0:10:38 And other than that, there’s very little fixed costs.
0:10:41 I mean, maybe pay upfront for hosting and software.
0:10:43 But other than that, it’s like, OK, if we booked 10 people,
0:10:45 then we can pay out the restaurant based on that.
0:10:47 But other than that, pretty low startup cost business. Yeah.
0:10:48 Very much so.
0:10:51 I think your website is going to be your biggest cost.
0:10:54 You know, if you’ve got somebody that can that can help you out
0:10:56 with with the with the website, that would be big.
0:10:58 That’s going to be your biggest cost, though.
0:11:03 And again, I think you’re you’re hosting your email platform.
0:11:06 So just a little bit of technology there.
0:11:11 You know, your your your email me email addresses, things like that.
0:11:14 So it’s a very low startup business.
0:11:17 That was something that was very attractive to me working at the steel meal.
0:11:20 I didn’t have to go out and get a big loan to start this business.
0:11:23 And so otherwise, I might not have started the business
0:11:25 that that was the case more with Chris in just a moment,
0:11:29 including how he got his first real bookings and how he’s collected
0:11:31 hundreds of five star reviews right after this.
0:11:38 Lots of scrappy side hustlers start their business with just their personal phone number.
0:11:38 And I love that.
0:11:42 But at a certain point, you can’t be limited to just your cell phone
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0:14:03 Yeah, and it’s important to know we’re talking food tours,
0:14:07 but you can fill in the blank with whatever kind of tour that you might be into.
0:14:11 If heard from guests on the show doing just walking tour, historical walking tours.
0:14:14 I feel like we’ve had, you know, haunted tour, you know, during Halloween,
0:14:18 especially maybe it was Austin where I did like a ghost tour or something.
0:14:20 I was like, this is interesting for me.
0:14:23 It’s a chance to see parts of the city and learn some stories
0:14:26 that I otherwise never would have known. We’ve had people do urban hiking tours.
0:14:31 We’ve seen a meditation experience type of tour we’ve done.
0:14:34 A friend of mine was doing like gratitude hikes, like, you know, unplugged,
0:14:37 you know, hey, leave your phone behind and we’re go out to the woods
0:14:39 and think about gratitude and stuff.
0:14:42 Any number of different niches where this kind of thing could work.
0:14:44 But then the question is, well, how am I going to get customers for that?
0:14:48 And so that’s going to where I want to go next is, OK, it’s one thing to,
0:14:50 you know, have a lot of the restaurants lined up.
0:14:52 It’s another thing to have the website lined up.
0:14:55 But it’s not necessarily if I build it, they’ll come type of thing.
0:14:57 It’s like, now I got to go out and market this.
0:14:59 You remember where the first customers came from?
0:15:03 The first customers were from social media and particularly Facebook.
0:15:08 We hit Facebook really hard again, you know, we’re tapping into, you know,
0:15:10 this is something bigger than our tour.
0:15:11 This is this is for the city.
0:15:15 We’re doing this to promote our city, to grow the food scene in our town.
0:15:18 And so we really hit Facebook hard.
0:15:22 Our first couple of tours, it was my family and friends, you know,
0:15:23 there’s no doubt about it.
0:15:26 And they were kind of the ones, the guinea pigs, I guess, you know,
0:15:29 kind of helping me work through the kinks of the of the tour.
0:15:31 But, you know, of course, that was a requirement for them was
0:15:35 to share their experience on Facebook and on social media.
0:15:40 And so, you know, one thing led to another and the community really embraced our tour.
0:15:41 Sure, sure.
0:15:43 And this was primarily organic or is this paid Facebook ads?
0:15:46 This was all organic, very few paid Facebook ads.
0:15:50 OK, we did actually did not see very much success from paid Facebook ads.
0:15:53 We found our results were better with organic content.
0:15:59 OK, and this is going to local groups or pages and trying to get in with those admins.
0:16:02 Or this is just like on your personal profile, like, hey, I’m starting this thing
0:16:04 and then having your friends do the same after.
0:16:08 Hey, we just took this tour with B and Bill Bates and it was awesome, that kind of thing.
0:16:13 It was primarily personal, social media pages and our friends and family who,
0:16:15 you know, man, they told everybody.
0:16:17 And so, yeah, the shares got out.
0:16:21 I think, you know, we had a really good social media strategy to highlight our food.
0:16:22 We highlight our restaurants.
0:16:24 We highlight people on the tours.
0:16:27 And, you know, when you do that, you’re going to get some shares
0:16:29 and you’re going to get some you’re going to get some organic content
0:16:31 that people are attracted to.
0:16:31 Is that true?
0:16:35 So it’s the old rule from was that book made to stick, maybe names, names, names.
0:16:39 You know, it’s this old small town newspaper and that was the editor’s rule.
0:16:40 Names, names, names.
0:16:42 You know, people love to see their names in print.
0:16:42 That’s exactly right.
0:16:45 Yeah, it’s amazing when you put up a picture of a group.
0:16:47 If they are in that picture, they’re going to share that.
0:16:51 Yeah, the same thing with the, you know, the restaurants that are being featured.
0:16:54 They have they probably have their own, you know, limited social
0:16:57 media following where, you know, they’re going to post that out on your behalf.
0:16:58 That makes sense. All right.
0:17:01 So the social media engine starts to spin.
0:17:04 And this is primarily locals at this point.
0:17:08 This is trying to get a critical mass is trying to get just a baseline
0:17:12 of feedback and test of audios and reviews to start to seed.
0:17:14 Are we thinking TripAdvisor at this point?
0:17:15 Are we thinking Yelp at this point?
0:17:19 Are we thinking, you know, how can we start to attract people
0:17:20 outside of our immediate circle?
0:17:21 That’s right. Yeah.
0:17:23 The first few weeks, absolutely.
0:17:26 I’d say the first three or four months, it was 90 percent of our people
0:17:27 that were coming were locals.
0:17:30 Mobile has a unique food scene because there’s about 50 restaurants
0:17:31 in the downtown area.
0:17:35 A lot of people that live in the suburbs are not familiar with all those restaurants,
0:17:38 you know, and so it gave an opportunity for people who live
0:17:42 in the suburbs of Mobile to come downtown and and visit
0:17:45 and be have their eyes open to these incredible restaurants.
0:17:49 We had no idea they were all here, you know, or some maybe some old favorites
0:17:51 that, you know, they visited many years ago.
0:17:53 And so there was a little bit of a connection there.
0:17:56 We really encourage people to leave reviews.
0:17:58 And that was huge, you know, like, again, you know, not just sharing
0:18:02 about it on social media and Facebook, but, you know, going on some of the
0:18:05 platforms, like you mentioned, TripAdvisor and Yelp and Google
0:18:07 and leaving five star reviews.
0:18:09 And so we really pushed those out.
0:18:11 Yeah. People left the five star reviews.
0:18:16 And so, yeah, you’ll see after a few months of of of gaining some of those
0:18:19 reviews that bumps us up in the algorithm of websites like TripAdvisor.
0:18:23 And and slowly you start to become, you know, one of the number one
0:18:27 or one of the highly ranked things to do in your town.
0:18:30 That opens up, like you mentioned, all the the tourists and visitors.
0:18:31 Yeah, totally.
0:18:36 Yeah. You’re closing in on looks like 300 TripAdvisor reviews as of as of
0:18:37 press time, as of the time of this recording.
0:18:39 And it doesn’t happen by accident.
0:18:42 And it’s just miles ahead of the next closest thing.
0:18:46 So do you remember if there was a specific ask or, hey, you know, scan
0:18:49 this QR code at the end of the tour and it’ll, you know, suit you straight over
0:18:51 there where you can say nice things about us.
0:18:53 You know, I’ve tried a lot of those things.
0:18:58 I’ve tried the QR codes and I’ve tried the even, you know, the paper,
0:19:00 you know, even business cards with a QR code.
0:19:04 I honestly, I have just found that if you just ask people to leave a five star
0:19:07 review, most of the time they really will.
0:19:10 And honestly, I think that that’s the best strategy.
0:19:14 If you really connect with somebody on a personal level and we get a
0:19:17 chance to do that in a three hour tour, walking tour at the end of that.
0:19:21 If you come away leaving them with an incredible impression of your city
0:19:25 and your genuine knowledge and passion that you’re showing, they’ll,
0:19:27 they’ll go leave that five star review.
0:19:27 Yeah, yeah, yeah.
0:19:30 That’s that Southern hospitality coming out.
0:19:32 Well, you know, I got to do right by this guy.
0:19:33 You know, he just spent three hours with me.
0:19:34 There you go.
0:19:39 The other component of this that I forgot to ask about is coming up
0:19:43 with a three hour history lecture and, you know, walking, talking in this building,
0:19:45 this restaurant, like this is significant.
0:19:49 Like you mentioned being a history buff, but that’s still like a lot of material.
0:19:53 Maybe, maybe it’s less difficult than it seems like it might be to come up with.
0:19:57 But that seems like a non-zero part of the equation, too.
0:19:58 Yeah, yeah, that’s huge.
0:20:03 And you do, you kind of, it can be a little tricky as well, because you want
0:20:06 to highlight some of the popular landmarks that are in your city.
0:20:09 Well, you got to hope there’s some restaurants near those landmarks as well,
0:20:12 you know, so that’s a key component.
0:20:17 But again, I’ve always been, I don’t know, my brain is wired differently, maybe,
0:20:18 but I’m a big history buff.
0:20:22 But I’ve also, I can figure out time very well, too.
0:20:27 So I don’t know, I’m really good at logistics and knowing exactly
0:20:30 when I can arrive at a certain place, how long it’s going to take me there.
0:20:34 I’ve slowly found over the years, not everybody’s like that.
0:20:36 Yeah, we’re going to walk from here to here.
0:20:38 We’re going to tell this story and we’re going to talk about this thing.
0:20:42 And then by the time that’s wrapping up, hey, you know, and here’s our next destination.
0:20:43 That’s right. Yeah.
0:20:48 So yeah, we’re looking for historic hotels, historic churches,
0:20:52 historic parks, historic streets, anything with a story, anything
0:20:55 with a good story about our city.
0:20:57 And of course, the restaurants themselves, they’ve all got stories.
0:21:01 You know, whether it’s the founder, maybe maybe one of them has been featured
0:21:03 on the Food Network or something like that.
0:21:04 That’s that’s common.
0:21:08 But then also, I think people are just as interested in the mom and pop
0:21:11 restaurants that have only been open for two years.
0:21:13 They’re interested in those stories as well.
0:21:14 So every restaurant has a story.
0:21:16 Yeah, OK, that makes sense.
0:21:19 And it’s like you get to study up on your on your history really street by street
0:21:22 to learn, you know, what to talk about, what’s going to be compelling.
0:21:25 I’ll say another thing to, you know, and it does sound intimidating.
0:21:29 And I tell my tour guides this all the time, you know, they are not going to remember
0:21:32 what year the Battle House Hotel was built.
0:21:34 They are going to remember how you made them feel.
0:21:37 And so kind of going back to what I mentioned earlier about when you really
0:21:41 connect with people and just kind of connect with them on the tour on a one
0:21:44 on one and personal level, they’re they’re going to remember that there.
0:21:45 That’s going to be their takeaway.
0:21:47 It’s not going to be the history.
0:21:51 It’s going to be the food, but mostly it’s going to be how you made them feel.
0:21:54 Yeah, that’s kind of what’s what stands out from the tours that I’ve been on
0:21:55 and the tour guides that we’ve had.
0:21:59 It’s like the level of excitement and you think you’d be talking about something
0:22:02 that in a different context would be like, who cares?
0:22:04 Like, why does this even matter?
0:22:07 But they’re like so into it that you’re like, well, now I’m into it.
0:22:09 Now I’m invested in this and it really does help.
0:22:11 So that’s yeah, that’s helpful to know. OK.
0:22:13 The social media ball is rolling.
0:22:16 The you know, we’re starting to collect a critical mass of reviews here.
0:22:20 We’ve got the the spiel down to get old, telling the same jokes,
0:22:22 telling the same stories, eating at the same restaurant.
0:22:25 Like imagine like I’m doing this every weekend and I know
0:22:29 this line is going to get a laugh, but it’s like it’s slowly killing me inside.
0:22:31 Or it’s like I’m getting paid to do it, so it’s all good.
0:22:35 No, it really doesn’t know the dynamics of the group are different every week, right?
0:22:36 You know, and I think that’s what’s kind of fun.
0:22:38 It gives you a little bit of butterflies before the tour
0:22:40 because you don’t know what that group is going to be like.
0:22:42 You don’t know where they’re going to be from.
0:22:43 You don’t know their story, right?
0:22:45 Like, yeah, once you start kind of connecting
0:22:48 and asking them where they’re from and hey, people love to talk about themselves.
0:22:51 And so if we can start connecting with those people,
0:22:54 they’re going to open up a little bit and they’re going to build your knowledge
0:22:57 and all that. It’s going to build their trust with them.
0:23:00 And so I think that makes it makes the dynamic different every time.
0:23:04 No tours ever the same. No two days are like there was this Jimmy Buffett line.
0:23:08 Somebody asked you every get tired of singing Margaritaville for 40 years.
0:23:12 And he’s like, honestly, no, you know, this song has paid the rent for decades.
0:23:13 So I never get tired of singing it.
0:23:15 That’s exactly right. That’s all right.
0:23:18 Yeah. Mobile native Jimmy Buffett, by the way, there you go.
0:23:20 That’s right. Gulf Coast. Cool.
0:23:23 Love it. Is there a minimum number of guests?
0:23:26 This was, you know, one of the I guess the pros and cons.
0:23:29 So one of the booking platforms that another guest mentioned is Airbnb
0:23:32 Experiences, where somebody books an Airbnb immobile.
0:23:35 That site is going to try and get incremental revenue by recommending
0:23:38 some of the things to do while you’re in town.
0:23:39 One of them is going to be Chris’s food tour.
0:23:42 But even if only one person books at the time.
0:23:44 Anyways, it’s recollection service.
0:23:47 Like the requirement was like, even if one person books, you got to go do the thing.
0:23:51 It’s like, I don’t know, I got to go do by three hours feel for one person.
0:23:57 Airbnb Experiences, they do have that requirement for us on our website.
0:23:58 I do have a two person minimum.
0:24:01 I mean, so if you book on our website, we will do the tour for two people.
0:24:05 And I’ve done plenty of tours for two people, especially in the middle of August.
0:24:08 You know, I can’t figure out why nobody wants to do a three hour walking tour.
0:24:11 When it’s a hundred degrees outside, I still haven’t figured that out.
0:24:16 Our marketing strategy is there may need some work, but I’ve given two person tours.
0:24:19 And, you know, as long as you’ve got your again, you know, I think that goes back
0:24:22 to what we talked about with your structure of your pricing model.
0:24:26 And so, no, I’m not making any money off a two person tour.
0:24:29 But I’m also going to make sure I’m not losing any money off a two person tour as well.
0:24:33 OK, are you still doing the bulk of the tours yourself?
0:24:36 You mentioned we’ve got some other tour guides here.
0:24:38 We’re going to give the script to and they can run with it.
0:24:42 I’ve slowly got a good, great team of tour guides.
0:24:43 I don’t give as many tours as I used to.
0:24:47 You know, in the early days, it was my wife and I given tours.
0:24:48 I was working at the steel mill.
0:24:51 And if I was off on the weekends, I would give those tours.
0:24:53 I had to work the weekends.
0:24:56 My wife would give the tours on those dates slowly.
0:24:59 But surely, you know, of course, we got burned out really quick.
0:25:02 I’ve got small kids at home and we’ve got a family as well
0:25:04 and other priorities, too, to tend to.
0:25:08 So we started hiring a couple of tour guides, you know,
0:25:11 and yeah, we gave them a script, told them to make it their own.
0:25:13 Don’t copy word for word.
0:25:16 Put your personality into the script and they’ve done that.
0:25:18 And that’s been a game changer for us.
0:25:21 We’ve I’ve got about six tour guides that lead tours right now.
0:25:25 Wow. And so, you know, they’re passionate as I am about our city.
0:25:26 They’re as knowledgeable.
0:25:30 And again, they’re I think the best thing about it is that they love people.
0:25:32 They love connecting with people.
0:25:33 That’s their greatest trait.
0:25:35 And so I’ll let them give as many tours as they want.
0:25:38 And if there’s a weekend that everybody happens to be off at the same time,
0:25:40 then I’ll go give it. OK, yeah.
0:25:44 So starting out, I mean, seems like a great weekend side gig where it’s like,
0:25:47 I can have that full time job because this is going to happen during off hours.
0:25:50 Anyways, you know, people taking the tour is probably going to be off work, too.
0:25:51 And so it makes sense.
0:25:54 You can be a small of a food tour operator as you want,
0:25:57 or you can be as large of a food tour operator as you want.
0:25:59 If you wanted to, you could do this on Saturdays only, Fridays,
0:26:01 or whatever day you chose to do that.
0:26:04 Or if your town has got the demand, you could do it every day of the week.
0:26:07 You know, it’s kind of it’s one of those things that that’s what’s
0:26:09 really fun about this industry, too.
0:26:11 Yeah, just block off the calendar availability.
0:26:15 Like there’s nothing going on on a Wednesday afternoon, so you can’t book that day.
0:26:16 That’s right. Yeah.
0:26:19 And if you know you’re going to be on vacation two years from now,
0:26:20 then yeah, go ahead and block that off.
0:26:23 But for us, you know, we’ve got a great team of tour guides.
0:26:27 And so there have been times where, you know, I get to go on vacation
0:26:29 and let the tour guides handle everything.
0:26:30 And that’s a great feeling.
0:26:33 Yeah, that’s really cool to be able to remove yourself from the delivery
0:26:35 logistics of it.
0:26:38 And I feel like that is where it could wear on people.
0:26:41 If I don’t have enough margin built in to hire somebody else to do this,
0:26:45 then I’m committed to spend it every Saturday night going out and doing this thing.
0:26:46 And if you love it, that’s one thing.
0:26:49 But it’s like, even if you do love it, it’s nice to have the option to step away.
0:26:51 Absolutely. Yeah.
0:26:54 More with Chris in just a moment, including taking the business full time
0:26:57 and the other marketing levers he’s pulling to keep this thing growing.
0:27:00 That’s coming up right after this.
0:27:05 Being an entrepreneur and being able to work remotely definitely has its perks.
0:27:09 I’ve recorded podcasts everywhere from Vietnam to Italy,
0:27:13 drafted newsletters from Japan, hosted mastermind meetings from Spain.
0:27:16 Ended up being the middle of the night to get to US business hours
0:27:19 and outlined courses in Mexico.
0:27:23 The common thread of all of these trips, though, is Airbnb.
0:27:26 We love being able to get exactly what we’re looking for in a place to stay
0:27:31 and have a more local experience than staying in some giant hotel chain.
0:27:34 And you know me, I’m always thinking about the next side hustle idea,
0:27:36 the next income stream, right?
0:27:40 And one that’s at the top of the list is hosting our place on Airbnb
0:27:41 while we’re traveling.
0:27:43 That way, the house doesn’t have to sit empty.
0:27:45 We could use the income to help pay for the trip.
0:27:49 And we’ve heard from several successful Airbnb hosts on the show.
0:27:53 And what’s interesting is a lot of them started with almost that exact strategy,
0:27:57 running their place or even a spare room while they’re out of town,
0:27:59 taking inspiration from that.
0:28:02 You might have an Airbnb right under your nose.
0:28:04 In fact, your home might be worth more than you think.
0:28:09 You can find out how much at Airbnb.com/host.
0:28:13 That’s Airbnb.com/host to find out how much your home is worth.
0:28:15 Hey, it’s no secret.
0:28:19 Starting a business can feel really hard and growing a business even harder.
0:28:21 How are you going to reach more customers?
0:28:23 How can you do it when budgets are tight?
0:28:26 How can you maintain the quality of your products and services as you scale?
0:28:29 Well, there’s a great podcast that can help out with all of that.
0:28:32 It’s called This is Small Business.
0:28:36 This is Small Business is full of practical insights that you can apply to your
0:28:37 business right now.
0:28:41 And it answers so many of those kinds of questions that all entrepreneurs have,
0:28:45 like how to build your marketing strategy, how to use email lists to increase
0:28:49 revenue, tips to accelerate small business growth and tons more.
0:28:52 A couple of recent episodes I think you might like are Episode 61
0:28:57 on Marketing, Networking and Audience Building and Episode 63
0:29:00 on how to build your business with a small budget.
0:29:03 Both of those are filled with practical, actionable tips to move your
0:29:06 side hustle forward so you can reach your goals.
0:29:09 So go ahead and follow This is Small Business, an original podcast
0:29:11 from Amazon, wherever you listen to podcasts.
0:29:18 Was there a revenue target or number of guests’ target where you felt
0:29:20 comfortable calling it quits at the day job and said, look,
0:29:21 this is going to be our full-time thing?
0:29:24 No, I don’t think there was ever a number.
0:29:28 If I had put a number on that, right, when you’ve got a family at home
0:29:30 and you’ve got small kids like I do, there’s never enough.
0:29:33 And so that day would have never come.
0:29:35 So no, I didn’t have a revenue target that I was looking for.
0:29:36 I don’t know.
0:29:38 It was kind of just the timing was just, it just worked out.
0:29:42 My wife, she got a job teaching elementary school.
0:29:46 And, you know, so that kind of took care of some of our insurance and benefits
0:29:47 that we needed for that.
0:29:49 And the timing was just right.
0:29:53 You know, I knew I kind of scaled the business as much as I possibly could.
0:29:58 The last few months of my job at the steel meal, oh, I was a bad employee.
0:30:00 They did not like me because I was always taking off.
0:30:04 I was always in the break room on the phone and the bathroom on the phone.
0:30:04 Right.
0:30:09 Like I had scaled it to as much as I could without getting fired.
0:30:10 Yeah.
0:30:14 And so I knew I believe in this business and I believe that, you know,
0:30:17 even as we sit here today, I believe that, you know, our business is going
0:30:21 to continue to grow and we’re going to continue to connect people to mobile.
0:30:23 And we’re going to grow mobile through our food tour.
0:30:24 And it’s exciting.
0:30:28 And it’s grown every year since that, starting as a side hustle into a full time thing.
0:30:32 It’s grown every year, you know, and we hit a course where we got a COVID story
0:30:34 just like everybody in 2020, you know, knocked us down.
0:30:40 But 2021, we were back, back with numbers that were greater than 2019, you know,
0:30:42 and those have grown every single year.
0:30:44 So, you know, I’m so thrilled.
0:30:48 Yeah. So a couple of ways to expand other, you know, number one is, you know,
0:30:52 getting in front of both more locals and more travelers, which sounds like you’re
0:30:56 doing through these different tour booking platforms like TripAdvisor and these,
0:30:59 like, you know, best things to do in mobile type of lists.
0:31:01 What else is going on on the marketing side these days?
0:31:04 You know, one of the things that we’ve kind of tapped into with our tour are
0:31:07 themed tours and you mentioned the Haunted Tours.
0:31:09 We give a Haunted Tour as well in the month of October.
0:31:10 OK.
0:31:12 That’s something that we’ve really tapped into.
0:31:14 Again, it brings out some of the locals.
0:31:19 And so if you’ve taken our traditional history tour before, you might come out
0:31:20 and take the Haunted Tour.
0:31:25 And we have Haunted Cocktails or, you know, Haunted-themed food and drink
0:31:29 during some of those tours where we want to make a visit by the graveyard
0:31:33 and telling some of the Haunted stories of mobile.
0:31:36 OK. And so that’s something that we’ve kind of tapped into.
0:31:40 We’re going to do probably nine or 10 themed food tours this year.
0:31:43 One of those is a Jimmy Buffett themed, you know, our native
0:31:46 Mobillion. Oh, I got to come to town. Yeah.
0:31:49 Jimmy Buffett talks about food a lot in a lot of his songs.
0:31:53 So we’re going to have a Jimmy Buffett themed tour where we talk about
0:31:57 some of his stories that he has growing up here in Mobile and also tying
0:32:00 that into the food that he talks about in some of his songs.
0:32:02 So we’re going to have a cheeseburger in Paradise. Love it.
0:32:08 You know, we’re going to have oysters and beer, some frozen concoctions
0:32:10 and all the good stuff like that.
0:32:14 So but again, the theme tours are great Christmas tours.
0:32:15 Those are Christmas themed.
0:32:19 We have Mardi Gras in Mobile and Mardi Gras theme tours.
0:32:22 So we’ve really tapped into that.
0:32:23 Again, it’s brought out locals.
0:32:26 That’s been the biggest thing that has distinguished us from.
0:32:30 I think a lot of other food tours is the fact that we have 70 percent
0:32:32 of our people are locals that come on our tour.
0:32:35 And I think a big reason is because of the theme tours.
0:32:37 Now, you’re also running the Port City Plate podcast.
0:32:40 Do you consider that a marketing channel for the business?
0:32:43 Is this just something something fun to do?
0:32:46 That is. I did start that as a marketing channel for the food tours.
0:32:49 You know, again, I’ve got these relationships with these restaurant
0:32:53 owners and people in our city who have these stories that, yeah,
0:32:55 we tell the story on the on the food tour,
0:32:59 but we get to really go in depth on their story on the podcast.
0:33:04 And it’s I would highly recommend a podcast for a food tour operator
0:33:08 because no one is going to say no to being on your podcast.
0:33:11 And you might have found that out.
0:33:16 And and that also helps with, you know, it helps build your credibility as well.
0:33:17 And it gives you stories.
0:33:19 I can, you know, some of the interviews that I’ve given,
0:33:24 I’ll turn that around into into the script of our tour.
0:33:27 And, you know, I’m always learning things about
0:33:30 that particular restaurant that I didn’t know through the podcast.
0:33:35 And so incorporating some of those stories back into the into the tour as well
0:33:38 has been so beneficial.
0:33:41 So now I can’t say that it’s a I don’t have a revenue number to give you.
0:33:45 I can’t say that that podcast has given me X amount of revenue.
0:33:46 Yeah.
0:33:51 But it has absolutely been beneficial for me in the community and for our tour.
0:33:51 Right.
0:33:53 Building relationships with restaurant owners.
0:33:56 Hard to imagine a downside to doing it other than just the time commitment.
0:33:57 That’s right. OK.
0:34:02 The other angle that another tour operator was using was kind of like for team
0:34:05 building events where it was like, you know, instead of going for these ones,
0:34:09 the 2Z tourists, you know, maybe it’s a family and you get five or six people
0:34:12 coming at once, but it’s still a lot of individual sales.
0:34:14 And sometimes I want to call you and ask questions.
0:34:18 And it’s like she found it was somewhat easier to make big ticket, you know,
0:34:22 50 person team building sales for some corporate office that happens to be in
0:34:25 town and needs something to do like you play around with that at all.
0:34:30 Absolutely. A quarter of our business last year was was strictly corporate
0:34:31 and team building tours that we had given.
0:34:35 And so we absolutely tap into that that if you’re working in an office,
0:34:38 you’re looking for something different than just going out to a restaurant.
0:34:42 And so the tour allows you to, you know, mingle with your group,
0:34:44 go to different restaurants, do something different.
0:34:49 I’ve also found that we’ve tapped into a company here called Airbus
0:34:52 and they build airplanes, you know, around the world.
0:34:54 They have a manufacturing plant in Mobile.
0:35:00 And Airbus has used us a few times for when they bring corporate clients down
0:35:04 from other parts of the world, they bring them here to Mobile and they take our tour.
0:35:08 And so it’s another way for somebody else to promote Mobile
0:35:12 outside of just maybe the Chamber of Commerce saying how great the city is.
0:35:16 You know, you get to these people, these executives get to come and take the tour.
0:35:19 And it’s again, it shows how, hey, Mobile is a really cool place.
0:35:21 We have a really cool history.
0:35:24 We’ve got great restaurants and it’s a thriving town.
0:35:28 And it makes them feel good about their decision to locate and do business in Mobile.
0:35:32 And do you do anything proactive to get on the radar of those corporate booking
0:35:36 travel coordinator type of people or is just by virtue of being number one
0:35:39 for like things to do in Mobile that they reach out to you?
0:35:40 It’s a lot of hard work.
0:35:43 I would say the number one thing is going back to what I mentioned at the very
0:35:46 beginning is going out and networking with people.
0:35:47 I absolutely recommend that.
0:35:49 I think getting your name out there.
0:35:50 But yeah, email.
0:35:52 That’s another big way that we kind of capitalize on that, too.
0:35:58 OK, email in terms of trying to find a decision maker, trying to find a contact
0:35:59 person at these companies.
0:35:59 That’s right. Yeah.
0:36:00 And so email marketing.
0:36:05 And so, yeah, we’ll even send out sometimes specific emails to our list of client,
0:36:10 our email list, who are potential team building tour guests.
0:36:15 And so we’ll send out a specific email to them specifically telling them
0:36:16 about the different options.
0:36:20 So, you know, yeah, when it comes to team building, we’ve given tours on trolleys
0:36:26 and we can do as much or as little as you want to do on a team building tour.
0:36:29 Is the email list primarily just existing customer base?
0:36:30 Or is there a reason somebody else would be on it?
0:36:33 Primarily, it’s an existing customer base.
0:36:34 My guess is it’s not huge.
0:36:38 So you kind of scrub that list for people who have, you know, a company
0:36:44 looking email addresses, be like, hey, you look like you took our tour last July.
0:36:47 Hope you had a great time, you know, open the door in that way.
0:36:50 Like, if you ever need a team building activity, you know, keep us in mind.
0:36:51 That’s exactly right.
0:36:51 Absolutely.
0:36:52 They’ll do that.
0:36:57 You know, a good little strategy that kind of came up with was I created a blog
0:37:01 and it was on our website best team building activities in Mobile, Alabama.
0:37:03 And it was, you know, it’s like a top 10 list, right?
0:37:06 And so if you search for team building in Mobile, that’s the number one thing
0:37:07 that’s going to pop up.
0:37:08 So we’ve got that on there.
0:37:12 And of course, you know, you click the link and send you an email right to me.
0:37:15 And we’ll start playing in that corporate tour.
0:37:17 Love it. Yeah.
0:37:19 That’s probably not a huge search volume, but very high.
0:37:21 A very well qualified traffic that does come through.
0:37:22 That’s right.
0:37:22 Very good.
0:37:26 So what’s a day in the life look like for you today?
0:37:29 Maybe maybe this weekend, for example, if you’ve got, you know, a dozen people
0:37:33 booked, but you got somebody else handling that tour, you’re answering the phone.
0:37:35 You’re doing the podcast.
0:37:38 Like, where’s where’s your time going if you’ve got other people doing
0:37:40 the actual logistic tour side?
0:37:44 Yeah, I still consider myself a solopreneur, you know, in a way,
0:37:46 because I don’t give as many tours this weekend.
0:37:49 For an example, we’ll give probably six or seven tours this weekend.
0:37:50 But I’m not going to give any of them.
0:37:51 Oh, how cool is that?
0:37:52 That’s that’s exciting.
0:37:53 Yeah, it’s fun.
0:37:57 You know, now, of course, you’re still responsible at the end of the day,
0:37:58 you know, and emergencies happen.
0:38:01 And so you’ve got to always you’ve always got to be on standby a little bit.
0:38:05 But at the end of the day, I think that communication with the restaurants
0:38:09 come in constant communication with the restaurants about our groups.
0:38:13 And if something is a little bit off schedule from our normal tour,
0:38:15 you know, they’re going to know about it ahead of time.
0:38:18 And so I think, you know, communicating with the restaurants,
0:38:22 communicating with the tour guides constantly and getting good people
0:38:25 that you trust. And I think that’s a good recipe for for me to be able
0:38:27 to handle a lot of the logistics.
0:38:31 I get to, you know, create these theme tours that I’ve talked about.
0:38:35 Like right now I’m working hard on our haunted tour season coming up in October.
0:38:38 And so, you know, it gives me a chance to plan that.
0:38:41 It gives me a chance to plan some of the team building tours
0:38:44 that we’ll do over the next few weeks as well.
0:38:46 So a lot of planning.
0:38:50 We’re roster of guides pulled from existing tour operators.
0:38:53 Like, were they were they doing this before either for themselves
0:38:55 or for another agency, another company?
0:38:56 And they’re just like, oh, I have capacity.
0:39:00 I can add on another tour or these like completely homegrown hires.
0:39:03 We’re like, look, we’ll teach you how to do how to lead these food tours.
0:39:06 It’s an incredible mix of people.
0:39:10 So I do have one person that was a tour guide for a duck boat
0:39:12 that she did a duck boat tour.
0:39:13 She was a tour guide for them.
0:39:16 Other than that, nobody else had really ever given tours before.
0:39:18 Now they were again passionate about our city.
0:39:20 One person is a retired school teacher.
0:39:26 One person actually took our tour as a visitor, loved it so much.
0:39:30 She moved here and reached out to me about taking tours
0:39:33 and told me that the reason that she moved here was because of the tour.
0:39:35 Now she’s giving tours for us.
0:39:38 And so I must have been sub-tour. Yeah, it is.
0:39:40 It’s an incredible mix of people.
0:39:44 Yeah, you never know where your your next great hire is going to come from.
0:39:45 That’s fascinating.
0:39:47 Anything else that’s surprised you along the way?
0:39:50 I never set out to quit my full-time job.
0:39:52 Certainly didn’t anticipate that.
0:39:54 That was never my plan.
0:39:57 It was just really just again, like I mentioned at the beginning,
0:40:01 a passion to talk about our history and to give those tours.
0:40:04 So, no, I never never would have imagined
0:40:08 starting a podcast or quitting my full-time job.
0:40:09 I even wrote a book.
0:40:12 I wrote a book called A Culinary History of Mobile that had never been written
0:40:17 before and just little things like that that have opened up so many doors
0:40:21 and avenues, it is surprising when you stop and think about it.
0:40:22 That’s fascinating.
0:40:25 We’ll have to link up the book in the show notes here.
0:40:27 Absolutely. Where do you want to take this thing?
0:40:30 Is there a geographic expansion play?
0:40:33 Like, oh, we’re going to take over the whole Gulf Coast.
0:40:36 Is there, I mean, there’s a limit to how many people are coming through town.
0:40:41 And I guess you got a decent chunk of the customer base that’s locals.
0:40:44 But then I got to imagine that taps out after a while.
0:40:45 Like, what’s next for you?
0:40:49 Yeah, we did expand to a neighboring city that’s called Fairhope, Alabama.
0:40:51 It’s a very small town.
0:40:54 You know, it’s a lot of boutique shops and great restaurants there.
0:40:59 And we did expand there and that tour is going really well, too.
0:41:00 And it’s growing.
0:41:02 But my plan is not to…
0:41:08 I don’t plan on having an empire of food tours along the Gulf Coast myself.
0:41:10 Going to franchise this thing, you know, world domination.
0:41:13 Yeah, I’m passionate about where I’m from.
0:41:18 I’m passionate about Mobile and Baldwin County, the area that I’m from.
0:41:20 And so that’s where my passion is.
0:41:24 So it would probably be I’d be doing those towns in injustice
0:41:27 to really expand and do that in some other town.
0:41:30 But what’s next for me, though, is I have started a course
0:41:33 and it’s called Food Tour Founders.
0:41:36 And so I want to give people who are interested in this niche
0:41:40 an opportunity to take my course and learn the lessons
0:41:44 and perfect the entire strategy of your business
0:41:46 and for people to do this in their food tour.
0:41:50 And I hope that, of course, my big goal would be to have not an empire,
0:41:53 but thousands of food tours around the world,
0:41:57 potentially, of people that have taken the Food Tour Founders course.
0:42:00 And that would be incredibly fulfilling for me.
0:42:04 Now, you can impact a lot of lives that way, both in the tour operators
0:42:06 and in the people going on those tours, wherever they travel,
0:42:08 because it is such a memorable experience.
0:42:12 The one that stands out to me is riding on the back of these motorbikes
0:42:16 in in Vietnam, and it just feels like you’re going to die.
0:42:19 Because there’s just wall to wall motorbikes in these packed cities.
0:42:24 And then you eventually the traffic lets up and you feel like you’re really
0:42:26 flooring it or, you know, and open it up.
0:42:29 You look over the girl’s shoulder and you see we’re going like 25 miles an hour.
0:42:32 Like, oh, gosh, it feels like we were flying now.
0:42:35 But it was such a unique thing and still talking about it 10 and 12 years later.
0:42:36 So that’s right. Yeah.
0:42:40 And there’s a great network of people, they take food tours everywhere they go.
0:42:43 Yeah. And so that’s that’s another I think a marketing
0:42:47 win for a food tour operator that is organically you’re going to have people
0:42:51 that are searching for food tours because there are a lot of great food tours out there.
0:42:53 And it makes an impact on you.
0:42:57 It makes a it’s there’s so many great operators that give great experiences
0:43:02 that people can trust that, hey, you know what, a food tour is a is a great
0:43:05 experience in a city because you’re going to eat at some of the great restaurants.
0:43:09 You’re going to learn about the unique food and the food that ties into the history.
0:43:13 Well, it’s something that we like to give as gifts to where it’s like, I don’t know what to get you.
0:43:16 But I know you’re going to this place this week.
0:43:19 And here here’s a gift certificate to this place or here.
0:43:22 We already booked it for you on Thursday night, you know, have a good time.
0:43:23 Yeah, it’s a great idea.
0:43:25 I don’t know as you get gift card traffic.
0:43:27 Absolutely. Yeah, we do.
0:43:29 We do. We have gift cards on our website.
0:43:33 And so, yeah, that does that has happened pretty frequently where maybe a relative might book
0:43:38 a tour or give someone a gift card for them to come to Mobile or something like that.
0:43:39 So that does happen pretty frequently.
0:43:42 Very good. Well, foodtourfounders.com.
0:43:43 This is brand new.
0:43:47 So you’d be a chance to be an early student of Chris’s.
0:43:49 If you go check that out, foodtourfounders.com.
0:43:51 We’ll link that up in the show notes.
0:43:54 Bienvillebytesfoodtour.com as well.
0:43:57 If you happen to be in or around Mobile, check them out.
0:43:58 Go take one of their tours.
0:44:02 Let’s wrap this thing up with your number one tip for side hustle nation.
0:44:05 My number one tip for side hustle nation is simple.
0:44:08 And it’s probably been said before, you know, just do it, step out there and do it.
0:44:09 Yeah, it’s scary.
0:44:13 It’s scary to think about the what ifs, especially when it comes to business.
0:44:19 I think for anybody, if you’ve got a passion, especially for food, for tourism,
0:44:21 I say, just do it and just do it.
0:44:23 Very good. Again, foodtourfounders.com.
0:44:25 You can find Chris over there.
0:44:27 Couple takeaways before we wrap up.
0:44:30 Number one is really this call to be a steward of the community, right?
0:44:33 It’s a relationships with the restaurant owners.
0:44:35 It is leading with this, hey, we’re fans of Mobile.
0:44:36 We want to get the word out.
0:44:39 This is a great place to eat, a great place to learn about the history.
0:44:41 And that excitement rubs off.
0:44:46 And it’s not we’re approaching this as like, you know, money hungry startup entrepreneurs.
0:44:48 That will come. And that is great.
0:44:52 That’s a byproduct of doing the first part of, you know, trying to build a product
0:44:56 that people really want and value, which I know you’ve done in this case.
0:45:00 The second thing is to build that marketing engine where now seven years deep into it,
0:45:04 it looks like you can’t search for things to do in Mobile and not come across Chris.
0:45:06 But it didn’t start out that way.
0:45:08 It started with friends and family, social media, organic.
0:45:10 Can you leave us a five star review, right?
0:45:12 And it starts to compound and it starts to compound.
0:45:16 And then we get the corporate booking tours and we start the podcast, you know,
0:45:20 integrate, then we expand all these different other, you know, themed tours.
0:45:22 And then we’re expanded to the nearby city.
0:45:25 And it seems like a lot starting out, but it was just a week inside hustle starting out, right?
0:45:30 It just I want to hammer that in that the marketing engine doesn’t have to be overnight,
0:45:33 but it can really start to compound as as you get into it.
0:45:37 So fascinating stuff looking around to see if there are any food tours nearby.
0:45:40 We’re out in the burbs, so probably probably less get around here.
0:45:44 But definitely lots of opportunities to do something in and around Seattle,
0:45:47 especially seasonal with the cruise traffic coming through.
0:45:52 Some makes makes a lot of sense if you are looking for something to listen to next
0:45:57 in this local tour niche, I’ve got some other episode recommendations for you.
0:45:59 Episode 370, we talked to Rob Patengalo.
0:46:03 He did a history tour, a walking tour in Washington, D.C.
0:46:09 And what was unique about his business was YouTube was the primary marketing strategy.
0:46:11 What was interesting about like YouTube is global.
0:46:14 Like it was like marketing a local business on this global platform.
0:46:17 Well, how it worked in his case was he was targeting common questions
0:46:20 that up and coming visitors to D.C. were going to ask like,
0:46:23 how does the metro work or, you know, what are the best things to do in the summer?
0:46:26 And so he creates these videos. Hey, I’m Rob.
0:46:28 I’m a local tour guide in Washington, D.C.
0:46:29 And here’s how to use the metro.
0:46:30 Here’s how our metro system works.
0:46:33 Again, super targeted audience and he’d get customers booking all the time.
0:46:35 I watched half a dozen of your videos.
0:46:38 And it’s so cool to meet you in person and so cool to book one of your tours.
0:46:39 We talked to Michelle Maddox.
0:46:43 She was the one doing the guided meditation on the Red Rocks in Sedona.
0:46:46 That was primarily through Airbnb experiences.
0:46:49 Again, tapping into these pre-existing marketing channels.
0:46:51 We called it the buy buttons theory, like, you know,
0:46:52 where are my target customers already doing business?
0:46:55 If they’re coming into town, they might be doing it through Airbnb.
0:46:58 Maybe there’s a strategic partnership through local hotels or, you know,
0:47:01 making connections with the concierge desks at various hotels in this case.
0:47:06 And the other one that comes to mind or the Michelle Maddox episode was number 347.
0:47:10 And then we had Alex Kennan in 193 way back in the archives.
0:47:12 She was doing the urban hiking tours in San Francisco.
0:47:16 Lots of bookings through those, you know, corporate team building stuff.
0:47:20 Plus, you know, through building up that reputation over years of putting in the reps
0:47:25 and getting those trip advisor reviews and showing up as a as a cool thing to do in town.
0:47:29 And she ended up getting a book deal with like mountaineers press or mountaineers
0:47:32 publishing like the urban, she like literally wrote the book on the urban hiking
0:47:35 just like you wrote the culinary history of mobile.
0:47:36 And if none of those appeal to you, that’s all good.
0:47:40 Hustle.show is where you can find a little two minute quiz
0:47:44 to get your own personalized playlist of the episodes that are most impactful for you.
0:47:47 You can do it on your mobile device to a few short, multiple choice questions.
0:47:49 And it’ll spit out that playlist for you.
0:47:53 Hustle.show is where you’ll find that big thanks to Chris for sharing his insight.
0:47:57 Thanks to our sponsors for helping make this content free for everyone.
0:48:01 As always, you can hit up side hustle nation dot com slash deals for all the latest
0:48:03 offers from our advertisers in one place.
0:48:04 That is it for me.
0:48:05 Thank you so much for tuning in.
0:48:08 If you’re finding value in the show, the greatest compliment is to share it with a friend.
0:48:10 She’ll fire off that text message.
0:48:12 Hey, we should totally start this in our town until next time.
0:48:14 Let’s go out there and make something happen.
0:48:17 And I’ll catch you in the next edition of the side hustle show hustle on.