This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
[Music]
Sometimes the best business ideas start with solving your own problems. We've seen this time after time throughout the series of more than 3,000 episodes. And it's very helpful to make a list of your problems or things that are bugging you, annoyances, difficulties, hardships, and so on, because your solution could be somebody else's solution and therefore your side hustle, your business, whatever it turns into as well. Not always the case, of course, but often it is. So today's story features someone who wanted to build a garage gym, but didn't wanna spend thousands of dollars doing it.
I think this was partly during the time of the pandemic when there were supply chain issues and everybody kind of wanted the same thing. Well, he'll share more about it, but basically instead of buying new, he started hunting around for used weights and benches. And then he learned from that process and began reselling, which ultimately turned into a new kind of hustle. I think we first talked about him, or we first had a question from him years ago when he was doing the buying and selling thing. Now he has packaged everything he's learned into a guide.
So this is part of our Throwback Thursday series. Last week in the series, we heard how a creative project for a friend in recovery became a business, eventually leading to a partnership with a Washington DC nonprofit. Today, the garage gym hustle that went digital, let's talk about it, or let's hear about it first, rather. I'll come back at the end with a few words of wrap up. [Music]
Hey, I'm Evan, and I live in Indianapolis.
Back in 2020, when gyms were shut down, I figured I'd finally build out the garage gym I'd always dreamed of. But good luck finding equipment. Dumbbells were back ordered for months. And even no named squat racks were going for $1,200 online. So I did what any broke fitness nerd would do.
I started scavenging. I hit Craigslist, Facebook Marketplace, and even looked through curb alerts on Nextdoor. That first month, I picked up a set of rusty dumbbells, a half broken bench, and a mismatched barbell set, all for free or dirt cheap. At first, I just wanted enough to work out. But after I cleaned the rust off some iron plates using vinegar and a wire brush, I realized people would pay for this.
I listed the extra plates on Facebook for $2 per pound, same as retail at the time, and they were gone in hours. That became my weekend hustle. I'd pick up gear on Friday nights and flip it by Sunday. The margins were solid, especially on brand name stuff. I once bought a full rogue squat rack and barbell set from a guy moving out of state for $150.
I sold it in pieces and made just under $500 from that one haul. By the end of year one, I'd be making around $6,000 profit. Not bad for a scrappy weekend side hustle, but I started burning out. The lifting was fun, the lifting of heavy things for strangers off Facebook, less so. So I pivoted.
I'd kept a ton of notes, what to buy first, how to judge condition, which brands held value, and how to negotiate without wasting time. I turned that into a 40 page PDF guide called Garage Jim's Under $300. It included checklists, restoration tips, layout ideas, and sample setups for different goals. I priced it at $27 and started selling it through Payhip. People trusted that I wasn't selling junk advice.
Over time, I shared tips on a few Discord servers, posted before and after photos, and even did a live Q&A on Instagram that brought in a bunch of sales. Then I launched a free weekly newsletter called Garage Jim Gains. Every week I sent out five to 10 good equipment finds, plus discount codes and DIY tips. I also started using affiliate links for new gear, stall mats, resistance bands, barbell collars, little stuff people buy to round out their setup. The guide has sold just over 640 copies, and I'm also earning 250 to $400 a month in affiliate income.
Combined with past flipping profits, I cleared around $19,000 from the whole thing. It's not full time, but it is sustainable. And the best part is the emails I get from people who say, I followed your guide and now my garage looks like a real gym. That never gets old. I still work out in mine.
80% built from reselling and 100% paid by the hustle. Evan, thank you so much for sharing the story. I love how reselling can often give people a vision to do something bigger and better. And it doesn't have to be reselling, but that is one of the easiest side hustles to get into. So basically you start with something simple and easy.
It could also be gig work, like working the gig economy or performing low paid services on Fiverr, Upwork, just to kind of get your feet wet and learn how things go. Then you gain some confidence and experience, and you start thinking about how can I not just trade time for money, but build something that can sell on its own. And of course that's what Evan has done. So well done. I think he said $19,000 total so far, hopefully much more to come.
And listeners, of course, more to come on the show as well. Let me know what you think. Who you'd like to see featured from our archives of thousands of episodes. If you have a question or a comment and update, sidehustleschool.com. Notes, pages for every episode there as well.
Subscribe or follow, give us a little five star rating. If you don't mind, wherever you listen to podcasts, it makes a big difference. That's it for now. My name's Chris Guillebeau. This is "Side Hustle School." [Music]
From the Onward Project.
