Hey
guys, Rules For Rebels here with episode 3 of our new side hustle
series Rebels Hustle. Every Tuesday and Thursday we'll be covering a
different story of a real life Entrepreneur who started a side hustle
outside of their normal day job.
With
each of these stories we're going to be covering what inspired their
idea or how they thought of it, how they took action and made it
happen, and where that business is today.
For
anyone new, and to recap for everyone, a side hustle is typically
something you can start with little to no money, something you can
start outside of your day job, and something that isn't going to
require 40 hours a week or anything close to it. Whether you hate
your job and are looking for a way out, or whether you love your job
and are just looking for a little side income, everybody should have
multiple streams of income.
Last
Thursday we told the story of Max, a Scottish man who created a
set-it and forget-it affiliate marketing business using Amazon's
Associates program. This week we're going to discuss something even
more substantial.
Today
we're going to be talking about Sarah, a woman who started a custom
printed Candy heart business. What's really cool about this business
is
1. It
didn't even start as a business, it started with her just wanted to
get some gifts for coworkers and
2.
This business which today is a manufacturing business doing six
figures, started off as nothing more than a retail dropshipping or a
retail arbitrage business which is something many of you guys are
doing right now.
Without
further adoo, let's get started telling Sarah's story...
One
big message and takeaway from today's story is this. If you're
looking for something or a product and you can't find it, build it
yourself. This is exactly what Sarah did. Sarah Kazynski was looking
to buy some custom printed candy hearts for her co-workers, you know
those chalky heart shaped candies we tend to see around Valentines
Day.
Sarah
figured it would be a cute fun idea and thought surely it can't be
hard to find that. Sarah started Googling, she searched high and low
but didn't have much luck. In desperation she started contacting
candy companies seeing if they had any ideas.
One
particular company reached back out to her via Facebook and told her
they offered this service, and after e-mailing with them discovered
the fee was very reasonable. Despite looking at their website and
social media accounts she couldn't find any additional information
about this service that they supposedly offered. Any mention of this
service on the companies website and marketing materials was
non-existant.
Sarah e-mailed the company and explained that she worked in marketing and could help them with this, but nobody ever replied. As a marketer Sarah couldn't resist but to offer this service herself. She quickly threw up a 3 page template type website, something any of you could create using Shopify, Wix, BigCommerce, GoDaddy, etc.
She
posted these custom printed candy hearts at a price just slightly
over what the manufacture would charge. This is essentially retail
dropshipping or retail arbitrage. Not so different from finding a
product on Bed Bath and Beyond or Target or Walmarts website, marking
it up and re-selling it on eBay, Amazon or Shopify. Not very
different than finding a product on Ali Express and drop shipping it
to your Shopify customers.
Now
because Sarah couldn't find anyone offering this service, obviously
nobody was competing for these keywords or this business so within a
matter of days Sarah was ranking number one on Google for custom
printed candy hearts
That same day she got her first order,
and then three more, and then three more. Even though Sarah was just
a re-seller or a dropshipper, she discovered the business was taking
a lot of her time. She wasn't manufacturing, she was simply taking
orders and then placing those orders on the manufacturers website
having those orders shipped to her customers, keeping up with all the
details was taking a lot of time. It wasn't just her either, the
manufacturer themselves was falling behind with all her orders in
addition to all their normal orders.
During the peak of the season they
e-mailed Sarah and let her know they woudln't be able to fill every
order of hers for the season. Now this is a common problem with
dropshipping. Because your not actually handling the production or
ordering of the products, because your reliant on a third party it
can really throw a wrench in your business when inventory isn't
available, prices change, etc. This is exactly what Sarah was running
into. It was a bit embaressing but Sarah e-mailed some of her
customer s and let them know she woudln't be able to fulfill their
orders. Despite not having all her orders filled Sarah still made a
nice profit that first season.
Custom printed candy hearts is
obviously a seasonal business which only lasts a few weeks leading up
to V Day. Sarah was thinking ahead however and wanted to be better
prepared for when next season came around the following year and she
didn't want to be reliant on an unreliable company.
Sarah was smart, she was good at
marketing but she knew nothing about production lines, nothing about
the candy business, nothing about production machinery or printing
equipment.
Like most entrepreneurs Sarah decided
to figure it out. Now this is another big lesson we can take from
Sarah. Despite not knowing about any of these things, Sarah didn't
quit, she didn't whine, she didn't say “OH MY GOSH I NEED A
MENTOR”. She figured that shit out on her own!!!.
She started researching companies who
make candy equipment and printing equipment. She found a supplier who
stated they had a machine which could do what she wanted. However
upon receiving the machine she realized that it didn't do the job.
Next she got on the phone and started
calling around to all sorts of companies big and small. She found a
company who promised to make a machine which would actually work. Now
the downside, it was going to cost her all her revenue she made from
the first year, and there was no gurantee the machine would work,
what if it was like the first machine.
Despite that, because this was a side
hustle and Sarah didn't “need” the money she made that first
season, she decided to roll the dice and buy the machine. The machine
showed up a month later and it actually worked. She ran that machine
12 hours a day, 7 days a week and was able to fulfill all her orders.
Sarah was now in a good place. She had the page 1 Google ranking, she had the ability to fulfill all her orders herself and not be dependent on a third party supplier.
It's a year later, Sarah has worked out all the kinks, she has some employees running the production so she can focus on her day job and the marketing aspect of her side hustle.
Despite having a six figure side hustle
business Sarah still works her day job. This may seem shocking to
many of you who dream of quitting your day job, but Sara wasn't
really after the money, she was after the freedom and she got that
freedom without having to leave her day job.
Because Sarah's boss knows she's not
dependent on the job she has, she gets a little more respect at work.
She wound up getting a raise, has a bit more scheduling flexibility
at her day job, and all is good.
This is definitely something I can relate to. It was about 3 years after starting my side hustle before I left my day job. But one thing I realized towards the end of my employment “working for the man” was that work was a lot more tolerable when I knew I didn't have to be there. When my boss got on my case or I had a bad day at work, just knowing that if I really wanted to I could walk out. That I didn't need the job. That made it much more enjoyable.
I eventually did leave my day job. My
side hustle income had grown to the point I could more than support
myself, enough time had passed that things were pretty stable, and
the business was growing to the point that it did need full-time
attention. It just so happenend the company I was working for was
starting to go downhill, new management was coming in, and overall
things were kind of starting to suck which made the somewhat nervous
task of quitting much easier to do.
One more lesson, and probably the most
important lesson this story should leave you with is this. Sarah
didn't know half the things she needed to know to get this business
going, but she figured it out. She didn't quit, she didn't give-up,
she didn't sit around waiting for a mentor to come save her. She did
research, made phone calls, and just figured things out on her own.
This is something every one of you need
to learn to do if you really want to be an entrepreneur. The
definition of entrepreneurship is literally being innovative and
solving problems, so if you want to be an entrepreneur you can't be
the type of person who sits back and waits for someone else to solve
your problem or waits for someone else to hold your hand. You have to
be a go getter, a self starter, and someoen who can go tackle
problems.
When Sarah couldn't find custom printed candies, she went out and found them by asking candy manufacturers. When the supplier she used couldn't reliably filled orders she found a way to do it herself. Then that first machine she ordered from China didn't work so she decided to invest her whole first years earnings into a new machine. She was able to do that because she didn't need that money, she knew her product sold and there would be orders the next year, etc.
This story tells us about probably one
of the most important skills an entrepreneur should have which is
resourcefulness.
Now in terms of how you could do
something similar. This isn't quite as cut and dry as an Amazon
Affiliate program like we discussed last week where I can just say
okay go join Amazon Associates program, find a niche and start
creating content.
This particular business requires a bit
more outside the box thinking. Think about products you've sought out
in the past but couldn't find. Think about a product which you maybe
would like to customize but nobody offers that service. Think about
something you wanted to buy for yourself or someone else but that
didn't exist. These are great jump off points to creating a business
like Sarah's.
There's one sort of way I can put a
spin on this which would maybe make it easy to do, or at least easy
to start investigating some ideas. You may want to look for a USA
based company who provides marketing or novelty type products to
large companies to advertise. Think about things that beer or liquor
companies will give away at bars, things your company you work for
gives away as swag, etc. Start browsing the suppliers of those
products online catalogues and you may come across some cheap and
interesting products which you could brand and sell on Amazon. Many
of these companies don't just sell zip drives which say Xerox and
lanyards which say Dell, some actually have some pretty cool or
unique products. Also by sourcing this stuff domestically you can
typically order in smaller quantities, you don't have to deal with
the confusing or expensive shipping from China, and you may find an
opportunity to brand or create a product right in your backyard.
As always I welcome your guys thoughts
and comments. Drop a comment either in the comments section below
this blog post if you're reading, or below this Youtube video if
you're watching. Thanks for checking back in this week. I hope you
guys enjoyed today's episode. Stay tuned for Thursday when we'll be
talking about a women from Pennsylvania who made over $40,000 Pinning
pictures on Pinterest. For now, Rules For Rebels signing off. Please
like, comment, subscribe and share if you enjoyed this video and I'll
catch you guys on Thursday!
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