This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
[Music]
Hey there, welcome back to Sadduce School. I'm Chris Guillebeau. Now from time to time, I talk about the importance of creating an origin story. An origin story is kind of a history or a backstory behind your hustle or your business. If you're creating some kind of offer, some kind of product or service, anything that you hope to sell to customers or clients, it really helps to show a bit of yourself and a bit of your own journey how this whole project kind of came into being.
And a lot of what I tell you on the show are essentially origin stories. So-and-so had this problem or they had this experience or they had this idea. And then because they had this other kind of skill, they thought, what if I could create such and such? And that's what makes a story interesting is all those details. I don't think I actually told you much about where this concept comes from.
The notion of an origin story actually comes from the world of comic books. And in the world of comic books, when an artist or a writer is creating a new character, that character doesn't just appear out of nowhere. That character, whether it's a superhero or a super villain, they have to show some history. They have to show why that person or that creature became or transformed or morphed into his current state of being. Why does this matter in the world of side hustles?
Well, instead of just talking about it, I'll tell you a story right after this. [Music]
And now our story. For the past 12 years, Alex Moore has been an elementary school teacher. Originally from St. Louis, Missouri, he taught in that area for part of the time before moving overseas to London to continue teaching and play rugby.
While in London, he met his future wife, Paula, who's from New Zealand. And this eventually led both of them to relocate back to her homeland. But before then, on Alex's first trip to New Zealand to visit Paula's hometown and family, he had a crazy idea. He heard that it was possible to pan for gold in parts of New Zealand. And his crazy idea was to find enough gold to make his wedding ring.
Well, he spent about 20 to 30 hours pursuing this goal. But after all that work, he only found about two grams of gold. You need about 20 grams to make a ring. So he was only 10% there. But still, when he got home, he took the gold he'd found and had that melted down into his future ring.
And it was that process that led him to his first long-term and high-income earning side hustle. When talking to the jeweler, Alex learned that he taught jewelry making on the side. He thought it would be interesting. So he signed up for lessons. He continued these lessons off and on for two years while he was teaching.
And after he'd learned enough, he was able to start making a few pieces of his own and sell them on Etsy. He built this up over time until he was eventually selling rings, bracelets, earrings, and necklaces. This took place for a few years off and on until he moved to New Zealand. There, he began to ramp up by selling at craft markets that would take place at different times. He now lives in Queenstown, which is a huge tourist destination.
There's also one of the world's largest craft markets there. Right on the banks of the gorgeous Lake Wakatipu, this Saturday market is called the Creative Queenstown Arts and Crafts Market. It brings hundreds of new customers every weekend, usually tourists, and it was at this market that Alex began to get a lot more serious about his hustle. By now, he was still selling on Etsy, but he also created his own website and he had taken on the moniker Gold Pan Pete, which draws on his origin story of panning for gold, mostly unsuccessfully, in New Zealand. You can check out goldpanpete.com.
I will link that up in the notes, where he sells online, and of course, to tourists visiting that market. Now, most of his sales are actually coming from that market itself, but then he tends to get repeat customers who order more jewelry from him once they return home. So let's talk about the numbers. With arts and crafts in particular, I always want to know, is this really working? And if so, what does that look like?
Because a lot of people struggle in this field. There are a lot of great makers out there. The makers who actually make money are a much smaller group. So fortunately, Alex was very specific with me. He said during an average week with online sales and the craft market, he does about $800 in net income.
His best week of sales so far has been $1,400. So based on the average, he's making $40,000 a year in his side hustle. His time commitment is usually eight hours selling at the market on Saturday, and maybe about six hours a week in the home workshop during the evenings once his kids go to bed. So it's fair to say that making jewelry and obviously being on site for eight hours every Saturday is a relatively time intensive production. But still for $40,000 a year, that hourly rate is very high.
And presumably if he had less time available, he could just set up shop every other week. He could work half the time and make $20,000. But the point is no matter how he does it, he's making a good income for those hours he puts in. And he's also a lifelong learner, which I really appreciate. He's continuing to learn more jewelry making skills.
He's going to weekly lessons with a master goldsmith. And he's also expanding his online presence with that online shop and social media and hoping to create more of a wholesale business into shops around the world. Now Alex is still teaching, but because of his hustle, he's been able to cut back a bit. He said that he was starting to get burned out on being a school teacher. So he's been able to transition to a three day a week job for that role.
When he was teaching full time and also selling his pieces at the market, he was working six days a week and hardly seeing his kids at night, which of course was distressing. But with a new schedule and focusing more on the side hustle, he's able to see them much more. Even though he loves teaching and he's had a good overall experience, he does help to make even more of a transition at some point to retire, at least temporarily. And for a season commit 100% of his time to the side hustle to see how far he can take it. So I really loved hearing how someone is successful actually making pretty good money at one of these weekly crafts markets.
I usually hear the opposite. I usually hear from a lot of people who make good art or good crafts, but really don't have much luck at these kinds of markets or fairs or festivals. And I think the key is first of all, the product is a good profit margin, relatively high price for this kind of jewelry, and also this specific market, which has a recurring group of tourists coming through every week. It's not just the same people living in that town. And without both of these elements, it might be a lot more of a challenge.
It's also interesting that he's making much more money from that market than he is online, even though he has a really nice looking website. So Alex recognizes that there's a lot of potential to reach people worldwide without being on site for eight hours every Saturday. So that's why he's investing his time and attention in online marketing and building up those social profiles. He never struck it rich panning for gold, but with $40,000 in net income this year, being able to restructure his life and work to be less burned out, more time with the kids, making something he finds meaningful, I think that's pretty great. So in a way, he actually did succeed in panning for gold, or at least those 20 to 30 hours he spent doing so were not spent in vain.
And as for you, you may not wanna fly halfway around the world and spend the better part of a week panning for mineral resources, but there is a hustle waiting for you too. I hope you are working on it. If not, I hope you are thinking about it. I hope you are learning. I hope you feel inspired, but more than that, I hope you take action on what you hear.
You can find the show notes for today's episode, learn more about gold pan Pete, more about jewelry making in general, and to see that market in Queenstown, go to sidehustleschool.com/62. I'm Chris Guillebeau, and I'll see you tomorrow.
