245
6 min 51 sec

Man Sells $1,400 in Coffee to Neighbors with NextDoor App

After teaching himself to roast coffee—nearly burning down his apartment in the process—a California man gets creative and uses a social network to grow his hustle.
$100 Startup Food Product Unique Ideas

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What It's About

A man in California learns to roast coffee—without burning down his apartment building.

Business Model
Product
Skills Required
Coffee Roasting & Organization
Complexity
Medium
Profit Potential
Medium

Words of Wisdom

Nowhere in the description for Nextdoor does it say you’re supposed to use it to sell to your neighbors… but obviously, Marc got a little creative. I don’t think he could do it this way every week, but as a launching pad, a proof of concept experiment, it was perfect.

Fun Fact

Bedfellows Roasting Company is now currently roasting in Encinitas, California. Their site offer subscriptions, gifts, and they have wholesale and retail locations in town as well. Marc surfs most mornings and roasts all the coffee himself. He might add one or two employees in the future, but for the most part, this is his exact dream.

Notes from Chris

Episode 245

In 2015 Marc Beauregard, a musician in San Francisco, told a friend he had plans to start a coffee roasting company. His friend brought over a copy of The $100 Startup and told Marc to follow every single word of the book, to a tee. Well, he did.

A lot of coffee roasters creep slowly into roasting after years behind the counter as a barista, but Marc decided that wasn't his way in. He needed to learn to roast coffee, and he wanted to immediately.

His idea? Start his own Side Hustle.

He would forgo the expensive rent for a top-dollar brick-and-mortar cafe downtown and open an online-based coffee subscription box. Teach people about coffee, and how to reinvent their morning ritual and thus, their day.

Marc decided to research how to roast coffee at home, and this didn’t go well. He was soon setting fire alarms off throughout his building and smoking out his neighbors. What started as buying 10lb. bags online and roasting them in his bedroom, quickly blew up into a part-time Side Hustle.

Marc's biggest breakthrough came when he created an account on a social media network. No, not Instagram. A more intimate site called Nextdoor, which connected him to 8,000 homes nearby. After observing the nature of the channel, he threw up a casual, subtle, neighborly post about fresh roasted coffee.

By the end of the weekend, he had sold over $1,400 of coffee.


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Inspiration is good; inspiration combined with action is better. Now get back to work!

Yours in the revolution,

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Resources

CREATE YOUR ONLINE STORE

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Many Side Hustle School listeners are building sites using Shopify's easy-to-learn platform. Try it free today!

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GET YOUR FIRST 1,000 EMAIL SUBSCRIBERS

Social media is nice, but building an email list is still the single best way to get customers and clients for your hustle. It's not hard to get started—sign up for a 30-day trial and join the list-building challenge! You’ll be up and running in no time.


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Quote of the Day
"What started as buying 10lb. bags online and roasting them in my bedroom, quickly blew up into a part-time side hustle. In a few short months, I found myself driving across the bridge with a van filled with huge barrels of coffee."
—Marc Beauregard #SideHustleSchool

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To infinity and beyond,

Chris Guillebeau