All Boxed In: Knoxville Man Rents Reusable Packing Totes

This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.

Do you like moving? Of course you don't. Nobody does. Even when you have to move, even when you're excited about the eventual move, the move itself is usually stressful and it almost always takes more time than you expect. I remember my most recent move, I thought I had estimated high. I was like, let me give myself some buffer. You know, here's how much

time each part of the process is going to take. Well, I was off by a wide margin. Basically took twice as long even though I thought I had given myself some extra time. And it was stressful even though in the end it was good. Now one of the problems with moving is all those cardboard boxes. They are expensive, they're wasteful. Most of us use them only

once and there's not much use for them afterwards. Of course, where there are problems, there are opportunities. This is a Side Hustle School after all. And by the way, my name is Chris Guillebeau. I'm your host. In today's story, a marketer from Tennessee delivers reusable

plastic moving totes earning an extra $500 a month so far with a lot of potential for growth. We're going to call it all boxed in. Knoxville man rents reusable packing totes. Stay tuned. The whole story is coming up after this shout out to our sponsor.

We all have to do it at least once in our lives. No matter what advances technology brings, moving can still be stressful and expensive. For anyone who has ever spent hours shoving all their earthly possessions into a U-Haul, you know the struggle is real. For the most part, we take moving day challenges in stride and consider them a necessary evil. But as Frank Ramey of Knoxville, Tennessee listened to the lamentations of his sister and brother-in-law regarding their recent hellish move, an idea began to take shape.

That idea took shape in the form of a box. Because that was one of their biggest complaints. Cardboard boxes. No move was complete without an abundance of flimsy and expensive cardboard boxes and rolls of sticky packing tape. To them, the whole process just felt so wasteful.

What do you do with those boxes when you're done? You can store them for later, but you never know. They'll hold up over time. Like most of us, Frank never really gave the moving business a thought unless he needed to actually move. He happily ran an online marketing company but knew that there had to be a stress-free and eco-friendly solution to those cardboard box woes. In his mind, the

solution would be made of something sturdy and reusable, like plastic. Something that movers could rent on an as-needed basis so that storage wasn't an issue. But before running with what he thought was a great idea, Frank did some research. As he put it, "Your idea might be a good one, but you have to ask yourself if you're in the right area for it." Since this was something that he planned on starting out locally, Frank wanted to learn how many people move into the Knoxville area each year and how many of those moves were local. Only when the numbers looked good did he know it was time to unbox his idea for real.

That was the beginning of rent plastic moving boxes, or RPM boxes for short. Frank planned on delivering sturdy, waterproof, and reusable plastic totes for people to pack their belongings in. When the client's move was complete, Frank would pick up the boxes, sanitize them, and then get them ready for the next customer. Ideally, he wanted each tote to be sturdy enough to use more than 400 times each and capable of being responsibly recycled once they had served their purpose. Thus began the hunt for some boxes that would stack up to his vision. In stack up they did. Frank found some promising totes online. He ordered

a few at retail price to test them out, but a good side of the slur never pays retail. He then located the manufacturer, who was based in the US, and they gave him the name of one of their local distributors, where he buys the totes by the pallet at a discount. Unfortunately for them, Frank's first customers weren't his sister and brother-in-law, as they were already settled at their newly home by the time RPM boxes were ready to launch. That first customer was the result of some clever advertising. She was a referral from a person with a home organization business he had reached out to in order to be listed on their website as a vendor.

Frank had no background experience that would help him figure out how to price this new service. And he made the rookie mistake that a lot of new hustlers do. He started out pricing way too low in order to generate clients. He upped his prices to profitable levels based on testing where the true market value and demand was. Ultimately, he chose three different packages based on the needs of his customers. A 1-2 bedroom 40-box package for $119. A 3-4

bedroom 60-box package for $159. And a 5-bedroom 90-box package for $209. He threw in some zip ties and labels on the house. This eco-friendly moving solution has been a big hit. Apparently lots of people have a deeply felt hatred of cardboard boxes and packing tape.

The plastic totes also make things easier on whoever is physically moving them. They have handles and stack more easily than cardboard boxes. The totes also force people to unpack quickly since they have to be returned within a two-week window. In some ways, this is a bonus side effect because living amid stacks of unpacked boxes is depressing. In the beginning, Frank was spending 10-15 hours a week on this hustle. He built the

website, spent some time networking, delivered totes, picked them up, sanitized, and currently the business just takes about 2-5 hours a week, most of which is spent cleaning the boxes. Frank's home has a large detached workshop where the totes are cleaned and stored, but he has a long-term plan to rent a small warehouse with a storefront that would allow customers to pick up and return the totes themselves for a discount. This all started in June 2018, and since then the business has averaged $600 a month in net income. Most of his small startup costs went to purchasing the totes, which were just about $15 each. He already owned the truck he uses to deliver and pick up.

As word-of-mouth spreads about RPM boxes, Frank is trying to find a balance between keeping inventory lean while keeping up with customer demand. In the future, he's looking to expand outside the Knoxville area, and he's even toying with the idea of turning RPM boxes into a micro-storage business as a way to produce passive income. Clearly, there's still more than one business idea, just waiting to be unboxed. Okay so here's a question. Because moving is stressful, it's almost inherently stressful, like I said, what are some other problems associated with it that could be solved? Or

at least reduced, improved, etc. Well, here in this story we're talking about boxes, which is a really basic, practical thing. But I think other challenges include getting people to help, saying farewell to a place you've lived for a while, and just making decisions in general. There's a lot of decision fatigue that goes into moving because you're packing up stuff. Do I keep this? Do I not keep it? If I don't keep it, what do I do with it?

What box does it go into? Do I need to think about the order of how I'm packing? Does the packing schedule affect other scheduling issues, or vice versa? There's just a lot of emotional labor involved in packing up your home and making these kinds of decisions. So I wonder about a moving coach or a move advisor who helps people make those decisions, either virtually or through some kind of guide that takes people through best practices, or just being on site during the big day. It could be an interesting service. It's almost like

a home organizer, but focused specifically on this kind of transition. So perhaps that's an idea for somebody out there. And there could be some others as well. Those are just the first things I thought about, moving, stressful, etc. Why is it stressful? Well,

because of these reasons. So whenever there's a problem, consider what a potential solution could be. Frank did that. He followed up on his idea, and now he's got this interesting business that's just waiting to be expanded. So it's definitely an idea that's worth expanding or franchising. It reminds me of a story we did long ago about a guy who makes local maps

of some kind, and he now franchises this in different areas. Since we ran that episode, I actually heard from a number of listeners who have followed up with him and are now working with him on that local franchise model. So congratulations to Frank, and I'm glad he's making some people's lives better through improving the moving process. Listeners, inspiration is good, but inspiration with action is better. Today's show notes, including links to RPM boxes, anything else that I mentioned, are at sidehustleschool.com/964.

Thanks so much. Much more is coming up soon. Do be sure you're subscribed. Tell your friends it's completely free. My name is Chris Guillebeau. This is Side Hustle School.