ideas to start a side hustle and make money

In last August, I decided to quit my job because I was tired of dealing with agressive clients and bullies.

I am now searching for another job but, at the same time, I am searching for ideas that would help me work for me and maybe become self-employed, start a side hustle or a little business.

Do you have any ideas of what I should do? Here are some of my skills and interests:

- Writing and proofreading in french (native language) and english.
- Public speaking and giving conferences in french and english.
- Building an educational program.
- Very knowledgeable about nature, wildlife and woodland and wetland ecosystems.
- Expert in how we can create low-maintenance gardens that can increase biodiversity of birds, bees and butterflies.
- Very knowledgeable about Earth sciences.
- Knowledgeable but not a specialist on hiking, paddleboarding and outdoor sports.
- Know,edgeavle but not a specialist in wilderness survival and map and compass.

 

Grow and sell gourmet mushrooms. They grow in like 6 weeks and can sell them for $6-8 a pound. What I want to eventually do. Something with horticulture for a side gig. Or making stuff with wood, I think that's pretty cool..My grandfather was a carpenter and built all kinds of stuff. My mom still has a jewelry box he made and the wood still smells amazing I don't know if its the type of wood or the laquer.

 

Teach English or French online.

 

Sell crack on a street corner. It's a tried and true classic.

 

Sounds like you could work for a french-english translation company, go into teaching, or maybe start copywriting for nature companies/magazines?

 

Landscaping! Housing market is booming and I always found organizing my natural environs to be very meditative and inspiring.

Also, if you happen upon a dozen diminutive gentlemen smoking pipes in your foyer one evening looking for a guide through the woods, it could work out rather well for you... or not!

 

I have been in 14 businesses in the last 44 years. Some of them I have failed at miserably, and gone broke with. Others I have been shut down due to changes in government regulations, two of them were open one day and then no longer met the new regulations or restrictions. Some changed with the times and were no longer profitable. Two I have sold and made a ton of money on. Most of my life I have operated three businesses at the same time, today I only have two, but am looking for the next.

Some common denominators have existed in all of the business which you may find helpful.

You either make someone money or you save them money, a simple concept, but one that is lost on most people that start a small business.
You eliminate a problem for someone. You do something that they are either unable to do or unwilling to do. Being an expert or have the ability to convince another that you are one, is key to success in any field.
The more people you can take care of, the more you make, their problems are your problems.
The better you are at handling stress and fixing problems is the key to happy customers, happy customers are the most important key to success.
Sales is where all the money is made in any business, you need to able to convince the general public you have more than a dollar worth of stuff for just a dollar or less.
You can't sell it right, if you did not buy it right.
You need to know your costs to a penny, I can tell you in any of my businesses what a minute of my time is worth, my costs, my profits. If you have to guess if your making money, you are not.
Risk and your mental strength. With small risks come small rewards. You need to be able get knocked on your ass and get back up swinging.

Anytime you think something is overpriced, there is room for you to make money. If there are all ready,10 people in a business, there is no really a need for an 11th, Supply and demand always works. Find something that is in short supply that most are not doing. As a new business or side hustle you will have to be willing to offer a better deal or more expertise to pull customers away from those already in the same field or convince new customers you are the guy to go with.

If you find something you might be interested in, go visit and talk with whoever is the best in the field, you will find that most business people love to share the ups and downs and details of their business and their hard earned lessons, just make sure you are not talking to someone so close to you that they view you as a competitor.

Making money is just like writing, it looks easy when it's done right, some people have the gift to see things you don't. It takes more effort and time than you thought and lots of mistakes, but just like writing those that seem best at it, have no problem sharing how to make yours better

Find a problem, offer a solution, it has worked for me most of the time for me, and when it didn't I just tried something else.

For me, making money is a lot easier than trying to be a good writer. Work with the skills and knowledge you have or ones you want to learn, somewhere there is a void that needs to filled.

 

Do you earn a living as an author? In my case, I still don't know what to do.

There are two things I really like spending my time doing;

1. Writing.
2. Art (oil painting, modeling buildings and dioramas for my future model railroad). I really like doing stuff with my hands and my mind (mind) and also use my creativity.

But I need to pay my monthly expenses.

Thanks for the tip. I could do that. Do you know where I could do or if I have to start a website on my own?

Yes I could help companies translate from english to french or the opposite but the problem is that I don't really know where to search for companies that need that kind of services. I have been off the job search market for more than twenty years so I am a little rusty.

I was thinking about landscaping but it will have to wait for next year. The winter is coming in a few weeks here but thanks for the suggestion.

Wow, wow, wow! Thanks for all the tips and help. What you wrote will be so useful for me that I have just written a few notes in a notebook.

Thanks again!

 

Try Verbling.

 

Thanks. I will try it. The only problem is that I don't have a diploma, a certification or any experience teaching french or english. In my last job, I was doing workshops and guided tours about nature.

 

Here is a suggestion. French is the national language of Haiti Right now the US and soon to be Canada will be bombarded with Haitians, a bunch who are already here, who will need to assimilate into your country or mine. Employers will be looking for those who can train the newcomers. Haitians will be trying to navigate the laws and new rules of whichever country the settle in, not only understanding the verbal but written word. I do a lot of work with a farmer here, about 50 employees a fair number of them are Spanish speaking and most can only mouth the words, "My English is not so good."
Seems to me you might be in the write climate to use your skills, the trick will be in finding those who can pay for them because it costs more to be wrong than right. Do you have a profile on Linkdin that business owner's can find you with a listing your skills? How is your Spanish?

 

I don't believe you need any formal qualifications to sign up to tutor on Verbling.

Experience in teaching a language obviously helps, but there are plenty of tutorials out there.

 

It sounds like you could lead nature tours: showing people what plants are safe and what are not, and possibly even teaching them how to survive in the wild.

You might be able to do online tutoring for those who want to learn French as well.

 

Tour guide for French-speaking tourists.