This is the place if you work full-time and want to start a small business. Not everyone can quit and start a business. While working, you can start and run a part-time business. This could be for fun or money.
This article lists the best part-time business ideas for people who want to start a business without quitting their day jobs. You can work and run a business. Manage time. You must schedule your daily tasks.
Etsy Shop/Craft Business
My Great Aunt Betty made many creative crafts. She sold them to stores and through a small shop on her property for a while.
I remember her selling her handmade basket-like pocketbooks at Bonwit Teller, one of Boston’s most prestigious women’s stores.
The Internet has greatly facilitated craft business entry. Etsy.com lets you sell your goods and see what others are selling.
Dog Walking Business
Some say I shouldn’t include dog walking on this list because it’s simple. Humbug! Simple businesses can be lucrative! Dog walking is also a great business!
Starting this business is simple. Start walking one dog. You can grow the business at your own pace.
Rover needs regular walks, so this is a repeat-customer business! Repeat customers mean steady income.
Home Landscaping
What’s easier than raking or pushing a lawnmower? Having someone else do it and getting paid! This business offers both! As you grow, you can outsource the work.
The weekend business has many benefits beyond keeping your day job. Weekend customers are more likely to be home. Selling and lining them up on weekends is easy. You get to work outside—a nice change from your desk job!
Start a blog
Many bloggers are wealthy. Huffington Post founders sold their blog for $315 million. You could also be very successful. Starting a blog costs almost nothing.
To make money blogging, you need a lot of readers. Focus on a profitable topic. Unlike the Huffington Post, most people will succeed with a niche blog.
Personal trainer
This is a good business for fitness buffs. Zoom lets you offer online personal training. You could also offer it in person at your customers’ homes, your house, or a nearby health club.
Instead of general fitness, focus on your favorite sport. For instance, soccer coaches charge a lot to train preteen and teen soccer stars. They coach customers at home or on a local school field.
Bartending or Catering
I’d consider a bartending service before a catering service—catering sounds hard! Busboying for eight weeks when I was 16 was my longest job. My two-week dishwasher job at 17 was one of the shortest. Both were laborious. If you love cooking, consider catering or becoming a personal chef.
Mobile Car Washing and Detailing
I considered starting a car wash business (actually, most businesses). Car washes are expensive and difficult to get zoning approval for, but they can be profitable. They need lots of water, which is expensive.
Mobile car washing and detailing have almost no costs (besides a little soap, a couple of sponges, and old towels). You also use your client’s water! No investment, no overhead, and high demand! My kind of business.
Candle Making/Candle Selling
Candles are profitable in many ways. The easiest way is to buy candles from a manufacturer and sell them online, on your website, or at a pop-up holiday store. Make candles yourself. Then sell candles online or through retailers.
This business starts cheaply. Create or sell cool products. You set your work schedule. A good home-based business.
Writing/Content Marketing
Content marketing is the hot freelance writing market today. Content marketing provides valuable content for websites, blogs, emails, and social media. Content marketing knowledge increases marketability.
Start by learning SEO basics. With a little SEO knowledge, you can boost your clients’ blog and article rankings.
Online Boutique/Drop Shipping/Amazon Store
No wonder Amazon sells products from over a million entrepreneurs. Many of these entrepreneurs are doing well. An established website lets you open an online store in minutes. Your store can have a “look and feel,” too. For a fee, Amazon and others will stock, pack, and ship your products.
Dropshipping is even easier if selling your own products on Amazon is too much work. Dropshipping requires only receiving orders and accepting payment. After that, a third party ships the order to the customer. Manufacturers, wholesalers, and retailers can be third parties.
Cleaning Service
Let’s work hard and earn a lot! Cleaning is boring. It’s lucrative. Most full-time entry-level professional jobs pay less than a 20-hour-a-week cleaning business. Why? Because most don’t want to.
It’s also a repeat-customer, steady-income business. Most cleaning services charge by the job, estimating how long it will take. Customers aren’t price sensitive—if they were, they’d clean themselves.
Resume Writing/LinkedIn Profile Writing
Any decent writer can write great resumes and cover letters! Your assistance is always needed!
I see many poorly written, poorly-proofed resumes and cover letters as an employer!
Many candidates’ resumes are attendance records! A resume should sell skills, abilities, and achievements. You can help people find jobs with a great resume and cover letter.
Personal Shopping Service
I hadn’t considered this fun business. Why? I don’t like shopping, except for model railroad accessories and model trains. Personal shoppers aren’t needed.
If you like shopping, many busy business executives will pay you to do their shopping! In this business, I emphasize the personal touch.
Photography
There are many ways to make money from photography. You could freelance business photography. Real estate and auto dealers are always busy. However, most businesses need high-quality photography for their websites.
Photograph weddings and sporting events. Photograph portraits. Use passport photos. Online profile headshots are a niche. Large stock photo companies will pay you after they sell your photos to clients.
Handyperson Business
I was a teen handyman. A woman who ran rental cottages saw me working on my boat and asked if I could help her with basic repairs. I started accidentally.
Small jobs make handyman work a good side gig. You can usually schedule the work you’ll do at a convenient time, unlike fixing plumbing leaks or electrical issues.
eBay Business
eBay and other online marketplaces are profitable. I met a high school student who used eBay to pay for part of his college tuition. While an eBay business seems simple, many have stumbled, made mistakes, and struggled.
Like other part-time businesses, I recommend starting eBay “in miniature.” With a few items, feel your market space. Learn how customers will react to your products, how pricing will work, how auction bidders will react, and how to master the details of processing transactions, packing goods, and shipping them.
Virtual Assistant
VAs are always needed. Part-time work is great. Remote work and scheduling are common. You can choose temporary or long-term virtual assistant jobs since there are always new ones.
Knowing Word, Excel, or Google Docs and Sheets is usually enough. Be organized and responsive to work requests. Even for a simple business like this, you should first learn how to start one.
Tutoring Service
Tutoring doesn’t require genius. Just know more than your students. Tutors are needed from kindergarten to postdoc. You can start a tutoring business even if you didn’t finish first grade—just hire others to tutor!
You can tutor clients online, in their homes, or at a library or coffee shop. While you can tutor many levels and subjects, marketing one popular specialty will likely attract more clients.
