This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
[Music]
Hello and welcome. I'm so glad you're here. Welcome to Side Hustle School season two. We are getting underway with an all new journey. And if we haven't met before, by the way, my name is Chris Guillebeau.
I'm the host and guide of Side Hustle School. I've been working for myself, creating all kinds of different projects for 20 years. And for the past 10 years, I've been helping people start their side hustle. And here on the show every day, seven days a week, I'm bringing you a different story of someone, perhaps someone like you, who takes action to create more freedom and more options for their life. So as we kick off a new year for new listeners who might just be joining, I wanted to explain a bit more of what it's about, how it works.
And for our many long time listeners, thank you, you guys are awesome. I'll tell you some new things that are coming up. First things first, the purpose of this show, our single mission, is to help you create a new source of income without quitting your job. So it's not about having a startup. It's not about risking at all.
It's not about begging money or looking for investors, nothing like that. It's about using the skills you already have and going from idea to income, usually in a pretty short period of time. So our goal is to help busy people who don't necessarily want to be entrepreneurs. Maybe they've never thought of themselves as business owners, but they do like the idea of making money apart from their paycheck. And a lot of people who've been listening to the show are doing exactly that.
Thousands of people all over the world are starting a side hustle. And by the way, when I say side hustle, like people use this phrase a lot. It's kind of in the culture now and people mean different things. Let's be specific. I'm talking about an income generating project.
It's not a hobby. It's not just something you do for fun, although it can be fun. It's definitely not a part time job. Like I said, this show is for busy people who are already working a lot. It's not about working 40 hours for your main job and then going to work 20 hours for somebody else.
It's also not about driving for Uber or Lyft or something like that. I don't think those things are bad at all. We actually have a lot of ride share drivers listening to the show. But I think of those things as kind of starter hustles because in those situations, you're still on somebody else's platform. They still control your compensation and competition.
In a lot of ways, it is just like a part time job. So what I'm talking about is making an asset that works for you. Being able to wake up to money in your bank account. Going about your regular day, maybe even being at your job, you get a little email that says you've got money from a product or a service you set up. If you've never experienced that before, I want you to have the chance this year.
It's incredibly empowering. And on the show, we feature all kinds of stories of people starting creative projects. Again, regular people, not celebrities, not people with huge social media followings. Just give you a couple of examples. We featured a new mom on maternity leave who sells baby items on Etsy and a year later is earning $10,000 a month from it.
We looked at a Florida man who earns $100,000 selling T-shirts he doesn't even print or own. He uses a combination of Facebook ads and a print-on-demand service so that he's basically taking no risk whatsoever. He starts this project by spending $10 a day for a month doing little experiments until he finally finds a winning formula. And now, as I said, he's made more than $100,000 doing that. We have lots of stories of kids and teenagers and families.
Last year, we featured an eight-year-old who starts a side hustle with his mom selling a more comfortable form of athletic cup for boys. His name is Kyler, and this wasn't just a, "Oh, let's teach Kyler about money and have a little play business." This is a real thing. They've been doing it for a couple years. It now earns more than $5,000 a month. And then last but not least, to give you a crazy example, this was just recently episode 324 of the show.
We called it the $300,000 Bouncy Castle Drop Shipping Hustle. And this is a story of a guy who figured out, you know, those bouncy castles or bounce houses that go on people's yards during parties? He figured out how to be a reseller of those without keeping any inventory, just like the T-shirt guy. So he doesn't have a warehouse or his garage filled with bouncy castles. He's basically just set up a website and connected would-be buyers with the companies that make these things.
It costs very little in terms of money to start up. It was mostly about the research, finding the right opportunity. And in less than a year, this project has made more than a quarter of a million dollars. So to be clear, I'm not guaranteeing that you're going to make more than a quarter of a million dollars in a year. Try to highlight lots of different stories.
Some people are making $500 a month, and that's great too. In fact, that's a good question. What would you do if you had an extra $500 a month? What would that mean to you? For a lot of people, it's a significant payment on their bills.
Other people are paying off debt or saving up for something. So success is not guaranteed, but these are true stories. Every single day, you're gonna hear a different true story. And as I said, this is empowering. Doing this can make a tremendous difference in your life.
At this point, we have more than 20% of our stories coming from listeners in season one, like people who listened last year and then got the idea for their project, went out and made it happen. Last month, we featured a minister who supplemented salary by selling custom dice for role-playing gamers. After listening to the show, figuring out how to make these dice, he now earns an extra $3,000 a month from this project. Again, not small money. This is potentially life-changing for a lot of people.
So we know this is working, like the proof is in the outcome, and I'd like to create that outcome for you this year. And by now, you might be wondering, "Wow, this sounds great. How much does it cost? Like, what's the catch?" Well, guess what? The show is completely free.
Every single day, all of the archives are free, more than 365 episodes now. Each episode has daily show notes with resources. You can go to the website and read more and follow some links and do your own research. Last year, I did 50 free events around the world for the side hustle book. And how is this possible?
Well, we have sponsors that allow us to keep the lights on to provide this free content for you. It also helps me keep Libby the side hustling cat well-fed. Libby or the libstore or Liberia, she works with me part-time, usually in the middle of the night. So that's how it works. It's pretty simple, totally free show to you, brought to you by sponsors that usually have some kind of special offer they want to get in front of you.
So without further ado, let's say a quick thank you to today's sponsor. And right after that, I'll tell you how you can benefit from a side hustle school and be part of this community. [Music]
All right, are you still with me? I hope so because we've got a long year ahead. Lots of stuff coming up, a new episode every day.
The first and most important thing you can do is to make sure you're subscribed. You can subscribe to the show directly on Apple Podcasts, in Spotify, in Stitcher, wherever you prefer to listen to podcasts. You can also listen to every one of the episodes, including all the archives, for free directly on sidehustleschool.com. While you're there, you can get a free five steps to hustle course when you give us your email, or if you just want to send us an email directly, you can write to hustle@sidehustleschool.com and we will send you that information. Once again, that's hustle@sidehustleschool.com.
You can just send a blank email and you should get a response right away. You may also want to pick up the side hustle book. It's all about how to go from idea to income in 27 days. It's a specific process, a how-to method to take what you hear on the show and apply it to your own life. And that book is cheap.
I mean, it should cost $25 or less wherever books are sold. You can buy it online. You can ask at your local bookstore, which is always awesome. And a lot of listeners have found it to be a good companion guide to the show. Last but not least, very soon.
In fact, next week, actually, we're gonna launch the long-awaited Side Hustle Society, which is a training program in online community. Unlike the daily episodes and almost everything else we do, this one will not be free, but of course we'll make sure it's reasonable. And I also think it's important to invest in yourself. So if you'd like to be the first to hear more about that, just come to sidehustleschool.com/society, or you can just keep listening 'cause I'll be talking about it on the show. All right, well, all of that should be pretty simple, but if you remember nothing else, just remember to subscribe so you can get each episode sent to your phone or computer and then listen every day for 10 minutes or less.
Each episode is short, on point, telling you a story, telling you something you can learn. And I'm gonna make a commitment to you. If you commit to doing this and making this part of your routine, listening every day, it's okay if you have to catch up sometimes, I know life happens. But if you make it part of your routine, I commit to being here. It's gonna be a new episode every day, you can count on it, and I'll also support you however I can.
At the end of each episode, I always say inspiration is good, but action is better. It's because I don't want people to just be inspired by the show. I want it to make a difference in their lives. I want them to take action to create freedom and options. It's because I don't want you to just be inspired or motivated.
I want this to make a tangible difference in your life. And like I said, we'll do everything we can to support you along the way. Let's make this your year of taking action. A new episode will arrive tomorrow at 601 a.m. Eastern time.
You can download it whenever you want. That's just when it comes out. I hope you'll join me for it. I hope you'll stay tuned. And here's to your hustle.
