Part II
Operating Services and Special Enterprises
A SERVICE is different from merchandise; it takes a different kind and character of selling. You don’t have the goods to show, to feel, to try, to demonstrate. You are mostly actively selling yourself, personally; your skill, your abilities, and your reliability. The spotlight is off the goods, and on to you.
This is a somewhat more difficult way to make money, because it is so personal, and so limited by what you (or your helpers) can do personally; but it is also a more solid and lasting business. Services are most always repeat service; and a customer pleased can give you constant business. In many ways it is a more satisfying business to you because of your personal craft relationship to it. It is a craft, not a mere trading business, and in this way satisfies one’s instinct for craftsmanship—also, often, creative ability.
You should make the decision whether you would be happiest selling goods or services, after thoughtful consideration; perhaps after testing yourself on both. (Not everybody is sufficiently acquainted with themselves to know precisely what they would find most interesting to themselves). As a general rule, just looking for fat profit is not the surest way to get to where you want to go. Selling goods, merchandise, gives certain types of people satisfaction merely in the process of making a sale. They like the excitement of argument, for the chance of a big quantity sale; they like the “smoke of battle” with a prospect. And they are sometimes ambitious to sell a great deal of goods, and employ sub-salesmen under them. If you sell goods, it is true, there is no top limit to your activities, but if you sell services, there is a limit to what you personally can do. All this is perfectly sound—choice is up to you.
Some of us have a strong craft instinct. We like best to deal in services because we get a chance to use the creative instinct. Women specially incline to prefer service rather than merchandise selling.
There is plenty of money to be made in selling services, even if the chances of large quantity orders are not the same.
Look over these uniquely interesting types of services, for both men and women, and you may find precisely what you want, or at least suggestions to activate your mind toward a better decision. Here are 119 kinds of services—
1. Wall-Washing.
There are hundreds of stores, offices, institutions, churches, public buildings, etc., even homes, which need their walls washed once every year or two, or even oftener; a task which is not usually possible with ordinary facilities. There is now a machine which washes walls at least six times faster than can be done by hand. It makes a business for someone.
2. Rug Washing.
It comes as a most agreeable surprise to many householders to know that they can hire you to come to their homes with your own rug-cleansing machine, and wash their rugs right there while they are lying on the floor! This, too, makes a business, comparable to floor-sanding, etc.
3. Make Candy for sale.
The home-made candy of yesteryear still has its appeal, and it is still a business to make candy on a small scale, in your own home kitchen, or a “candy kitchen” set up in some modest little retail store location.
4. Paint Signs, Counter Cards, etc.
This is quite a neat little business—never were more signs needed by almost anybody offering goods for sale. You don’t now need to be a “lettering artist” as used to be the case. You can buy “letter patterns” which make it remarkably easy and fast. Retailers pay good money for nice signs of all kinds.
5. Answer Telephones.
Nowadays a lot of people in homes, offices, etc. flit around a good deal, and observe short office hours, etc. They feel the need of someone to answer all telephone calls—office or home—during the hours (or days or weeks or months) they are out or away. It is a business now. In large cities you operate only on certain selected exchanges. Elsewhere the whole field.
6. Sharpen Lawn Mowers.
A surprising business! It seems that the average lawn mower needs sharpening once or twice or oftener per season, or else it is extra hard work to push. There are now machines to do this, and you can set yourself up in business—and get it, too, in localities where many lawns are kept.
7. Sharpen Circular Saws, Scissors, Knives, Wrenches, Planes, etc.
Everybody who uses tools today—and who doesn’t?—wants sharp tools. That’s just good craft horse sense. But tools of various kinds need modern equipment for sharpening. It’s a business! The old scissors grinder and knife sharpener peddling the streets, is replaced by a real business, with new equipment.
8. Build Outdoor Fireplaces.
Hundreds of thousands of people in recent years have been discovering the fun of cooking and eating outdoors. After using various make-shift devices, they develop a desire for a really permanent fireplace, solidly built. You can make a quite profitable business of this. With four dollars’ worth of sand and cement, and twelve dollars worth of iron, one person now in this business built a fireplace and collected $129.00 for it! Anybody with any backyard, lawn or outdoor space at all can be interested in such a service.
9. Do Steam Cleaning.
This is a spruce-up age—we are rubbing off the dilapidated look from many things. Steam cleaning equipment can do a wide variety of jobs—from cleaning the exterior of buildings, to concrete floors, even automobiles! The equipment for this is simple to operate—it can generate 75 lbs. of steam in 10 minutes, and costs around $400.00. It can polish off a whole building and make it look like new in double-quick time at a pretty nice sum!
10. Manufacture Jewelry.
Literally tons of costume and other low-price jewelry are consumed today. Individual artistry is at a premium—why not try your hand at it? It needs little space, little machinery, and sells at a high mark-up over costs. Make your own designs, or copy designs—the field is wide open. You can readily and cheaply buy all supplies.
11. Do Sand Blasting.
This is a uniquely versatile business—you can do everything from cleaning automobile interiors to marproofing lamps, refinishing surfaces of all kinds, even etching glass windows. Isn’t difficult to learn—there’s a free course of study.
12. Manufacture Concrete Blocks.
There’s a never-ending demand for concrete blocks, as nothing has yet surpassed them in building construction, for cheapness, solidity, durability. They are a staple anywhere in the U. S., city or country. By using very modern equipment and good techniques, your product can out-compete others.
13. Install Quick Hot Water Heating Units.
A lot of people are unaware that, with new unit devices, their present hot water boiler tank can quickly be converted into an electric hot water heater, for less than $25.00. You could readily make a business out of this, as there are millions who still depend on old equipment, which is too slow. You can install this upon old equipment very satisfactorily. You can make the installation of the electric unit in less than an hour—do it right during your sales call, if need be.
14. Clean Venetian Blinds.
Surprising how many housewives and housemaids by-pass this chore as difficult. You can develop a lot of jobs doing this work with new equipment, and you will find just about every other home open to the suggestion.
15. Grow Midget (Bonsai) Trees.
These outstanding little fruit trees were a tightly held Japanese secret until not long ago. Imagine! They grow hardly more than a foot high—indoors or out—and actually bear fruit. They are dwarfed by secret process. They “sell on sight”. You might add other odd growing items to this unique business.
16. Printing Without Press—Silk Screen Printing.
Very lovely effects can be obtained by the silk screen process, and it is making many friends. You can make a business of it, doing a wide variety of jobs with it.
17. Repair Electric Appliances.
What sellers of the hundreds of electric household appliances don’t tell you is that all too often they are in need of repair! Where to go? How to safeguard against “gyp” repair charges? Make a business of this and earn many householders’ thanks. There are schools which teach such repairs work.
18. Sand Floors.
There’s really only one thing to do with wooden floors when they reach a certain point in wear: sand them. But who will do it? You will, making a business of it; using one of the modern, fast floor-sanding machines, and earning a very fine price per hour, or square foot, for the service. Serve homes, institutions, schools, retail shops, etc.
19. Do Auto Fender Repair.
You don’t have to do anything else to a car—this specialty alone develops plenty of business as a by-product of the great over-crowding of streets and highways, and its resulting minor bumpings, collisions, and accidents. It is quiet easy, not heavy work. All you need to do is have the right tools and bid for the business.
20. Make Keys, Expert Locks.
There’s a large volume of business in duplicate key making. You can set up in business in an incredibly small space,—and on almost no capital—in an alley-way or a niche, or blind space facing the street; or rented few square feet outside or inside a store, or wherever. A key duplicate can be cut on a modern machine in less than 2 minutes. Go into the field deeper, and learn locksmith technique.
21. Raise Hamsters, Guinea Pigs, Chinchillas, Rabbits, etc.
Thousands of these little animals are bought for laboratory work—and also for pets. Hamsters are sometimes called “toy bears.” The technique of raising them is now very well simplified. If you have proper outdoor space in a good climate you can sell an incredible number of them.
22. Clean Upholstery.
Women don’t seem to know what to do with upholstery when it reaches a certain state of soiledness. You can step in and make a business of both cleaning and “match-proofing” upholstery; using modern methods. Surprising how many householders will want such service. It saves new covers or new furniture.
23. Breed Large Frogs.
Frog legs are still a gourmet’s item of food, and they seem none too plentiful in supply ($5.00 a dozen, we’re told). If you have (or will make) a small pond on your grounds you can raise plenty of them.
24. Raise Orchids.
Sounds fantastic—you have always thought orchids were grown either in the tropics or in luxurious hot-houses. You’d be surprised what you can do without a hot house and expensive equipment. It can be made into a most lucrative business.
25. Metalize (bronze, gold & silver) Baby Shoes, Bootees, China, Baskets, etc.
Yes, thousands of parents still wish to preserve their little tot’s first shoes, etc. by bronzing, metalizing them, to last forever. Rare is the family that isn’t sentimental about Baby. They are surprised and delighted that you can manage this metalizing job for them.
26. Install Floor Tiles.
This is another new and flourishing business for an enterprising person of no particular preparation or experience. The new rubber tile flooring consisting of 9 x 9 inch squares are extremely popular and efficient, and almost anyone can lay them fairly fast. Homes, stores, public buildings, etc. are finding the economy and beauty of this type of flooring.
27. Cast Rubber and Plastic Goods.
Rubber and plastic are now materials more versatile than any former art and utility material for casting. Figurines, ash-trays, and a thousand other items may be cast from this ready material, creating saleable items at will. You think up more ideas!
28. Do Photo-Engraving.
Once this called for an extensive investment; now you can set up in business with very little money. New methods and materials are the reason. There is considerable demand in any fair-sized town and you can quickly turn out good work.
29. Grow Earthworms for Fishermen.
“What an idea!” you’ll say. But don’t laugh. Fishermen are usually hard put to it to get worms for bait, and for this reason it is now a business to supply the worms! Requires little skill or capital.
30. Do Re-Weaving, Mending.
Ever gasp at the charge they ask for mending a cigarette burn in your best woolen suit? That’s why it’s a good business. It is meticulous and touchy, but it certainly is a worthwhile job, saving a $50.00 suit from ruin. No wonder people are willing to pay, and there are plenty of suits, skirts to be mended.
31. Test Soil Samples.
Your grandfather would sniff at this as a business, but the laugh would be on him. Farmers, home and lot owners, institutions, golf clubs, etc. pay real money to have their soil analyzed, as much depends on such analysis. You can quickly learn the business.
32. Breed Canaries, Pheasants.
Do you love birds? Here is a chance to enjoy yourself earning a good living. We used to get nearly all our canaries from the Hartz mountains, Austria, but we’ve been learning the trick of breeding good canary songsters in America. There’s a demand.
And pheasants? Gourmets pay high prices for a dish of pheasant. Not enough wild ones available.
33. Grow Mushrooms.
We Americans every year almost double our mushroom consumption. They are no longer a mere luxury item. They grow with remarkably little attention if you give them the exact degree of darkness, temperature, humidity they need.
34. Grow Herbs.
As in the case of mushrooms, we Americans have rapidly become herb conscious. We use far more in our foods than ever was known before. Dozens of persons have been making very good livings growing-up and selling herbs, on quite small plots. There are 3 or 4 good books on herb growing to read, too.
35. Raise Mink.
Nobody need tell you that mink is valuable—it’s almost worth its weight in gold! True, it’s not an easy business; you’d have to give plenty of thought and care to it, and in the right location.
36. Do Roofing.
Strange, a lot of people seriously neglect their roofs, and fail to realize that this is very poor economy. A poor roof also destroys a house’s beauty, while a roof which gives attention to roof artistry greatly enhances its value. You’ll have much attention paid you today talking modern roofing, and it’s an excellent business.
37. Do Bookkeeping, Tax Returns for Small Business.
A bookkeeper I know, getting along in years, lost her job and was alarmed—until she discovered how to make two or three times her former income doing bookkeeping and tax returns for a dozen or more small firms. She’s now her own boss, working on her own time, mostly at her home, and says it’s a swell idea for many other competent persons.
38. Make Artistic Lamps.
There seems to be a revolution going on in lamps. The old eyesore lamps of rococo design are being pitched out and replaced with modern artistic lamps! Not all localities are offered the new artistic, modernistic lamps—therefore to supply the demand is an interesting business—specially for women. Artistic lamps are not hard to put together by someone with taste, ingenuity and smart fingers. They bring very good prices.
39. Manufacture Drain Tile.
Odd business, you say? Just one of those good opportunities for a small business without much capital. Drain tile is used extensively on good farms, in home building, reclamation projects, highway building, etc. At one time only expensive clay tile was used, but now modern machinery has made possible manufacture with concrete, cheaper and better. It makes a business operatable anywhere, not just at clay beds.
40. Sell Tear Gas Service.
What an idea! You’re sure to say. But, stay, its a very good little business, in these modern days of frequent hold-ups, disturbances, burglaries, etc. Banks, stores, offices and other places find that tear gas is an astonishing and quickly effective protection.
41. Do Electro-plating.
This job is not so complicated a business as it sounds, and you could get many small jobs to Plate.
42. Run a Fix-It Shop.
Most people are constantly bothered by the many things that “need fixing”, but they haven’t time to hunt out and contact the proper service to do the fixing. For this reason a Fixit Shop is a good business idea. You don’t of course, do all the fixing in your shop—you “farm out” some of it—to your “staff” of specialists who work with you at “trade” prices. You know just how to get fast action, too, when necessary. You protect your patrons from the frequent scandalous overcharges which repair concerns impose for a mere brief service or small adjustment. Housewives have often hoped for such a service.
43. Operate a Shopping Service.
Many mothers or career women—and men, too—are too tied down to go shopping. They welcome an alert shopping service which will take over. An ideal little business for a smart woman who can save more than her commission of 10% for shopping. She can shop for large as well as small items, and watch the ads for special bargains; even return goods or search for a particular item within a particular price range.
44. Offer A Children’s Party Service.
Many mothers would adore a woman operating a service to help her with children, take them to a party, give a party; take them in a group to museums, or a picnic, or to a children’s performance. A “natural” for a motherly woman or bright girl. She could handle all the details for a childrens’ party at the home of her patron, or arrange to drive children to school and back. Also furnish baby sitters, etc. as a branch of service; also perhaps set up a Day Care Center, for small children while their mothers are working.
45. Moving or House Opening or Closing Service.
This is of course a service for wealthier folk, but there are hundreds of harassed well-to-do folk who have to open and close homes in the country, in Florida or New England, or wherever. In each case the task is usually beyond the strength and resources of the family, or even of its servants (who are nowadays usually very picky.) So, the opportunity for the competent, executive type of woman who knows how to get things done on time, to attend to everything even to a fire in the fireplace and supper on the table when the client arrives. It is worth—and commands—a substantial fee.
46. Operate a “Toy Hospital” and “Exchange”.
The great trouble with most toys is that they usually can’t stand for but a short time the assault of junior! He bangs and tramps on them, and they very readily become “cripples”. They need a hospital! It is a very real economy for parents to have toys repaired, as Junior then is likely to take fresh interest in them-perhaps even more than originally. You can often make these toys stronger than they were originally. Toys discarded by one child last year, may (if fixed) greatly interest the child’s smaller brother or sister.
A “toy exchange” is also “a natural”. Children quickly tire of same toys, and are often given unsuitable ones. The Toy Exchange is a solution, for parents can get equivalent value there in a wanted toy for an unwanted one. All you need is a general set of tools, paint, work bench, raw materials; and distribution of a card into 100 to 500 home mail boxes all around you, and you’ll be in business. Include in your Exchange Baby Buggies, Baby appurtenances of various kinds.
47. Run a Health Club.
In practice this is a kind of small “gymnasium” for exercises, calisthenics, baths, massage, etc. Many persons, particularly women, want to take off pounds, and retrieve “good lines,” which can only be done by keeping the body musculature moderately exercised, massaged, etc. You can get good fees for this if you have a commanding presence and physique, and some training, plus the right ventilated space and facilities, which will include exercise machinery, dumb bells, bars, couches, baths, etc.
48. Operate a Social Center.
Most smaller communities or neighborhoods have no suitable place for out-of-the-home social occasions. An enterprising woman or man who will rent and maintain large, pleasant rooms (in some old residence, perhaps) in which parties, etc. can be held is sure to get patronage. She will need a good floor, a piano, radio, phonograph or juke box, suitable table and chair and kitchen equipment for light refreshments (with perhaps a concession for meals leased to another woman, a good cook), and adequate toilet and clothes closet facilities. Childrens’ parties could be one of her specialties, also birthday and other occasions, organization meetings, lectures, educational classes, possibly even some religious services for small local groups. Young people might find a Saturday night special social dance a highly appreciated facility.
49. Run a “Week-End” Farm.
Large numbers of people just have to get away from it all over the week-end, by going to the country. But where? Resorts are expensive—and are not real “country.” If you have a nice rural home, in a small town or farm, clean, with suitable rooms, bath and pleasant country surroundings, you will get a ready response to a bid to come out to the country, Friday or Saturday to Monday, with country style plain one-dish meals, fresh eggs, chicken dinners, fresh breads and pies, real butter, home made preserves, etc. Even if you have room for only four or six people, it may net you a welcome weekly sum. In hot weather you might put up tents for those who like that; or fix over an old barn for simple, airy sleeping.
50. Home Mending. Repairing, Altering Service.
Wives by the million work today at a job and just haven’t time to mend and repair. At the same time the tailor nearby asks too much for simple work, because of labor and rent rises. This leaves open a wide field of ordinary mending, altering, tailoring, sewing, dressmaking which must be accomplished at less money coot, supplied by a person who operates in her own home to serve her neighborhood. A fairly substantial income can be worked up in this way. Just print a card with name and telephone, telling of the operations you can handle, and see that every household within 10 or more blocks gets one. Keep charges moderate; use every modern device and aids; make permanent customers with the quality and promptness of your work.
51. Open your Home for Convalescents.
With hospital costs so high, and medical opinion being that patients should spend as little time as possible in hospitals, there is very real opportunity to make a small business of taking care of convalescents for a week or two after an operation or illness. The patients prefer it, the doctors like it, the hospital would prefer it, and the cost is much lower. At $35.00 to $50.00 per week, with food, three to ten patients accommodated in a nice home (well-heated, with several bathrooms) a woman with some professional or “practical” nurse training, or comparable family experience, can make a very nice living. If she is a retired registered nurse it is a particularly good idea, and there are many successful instances.
Interest one or more doctors in your idea, get their cooperation and advice, and operate in their visiting territory. They will appreciate the facility, and recommend it to patients, for either financial or medical or psychological reasons.
52. Open a Baby Service Station.
Modern babies require quite a number of things which not all parents find time to provide, especially if the wife works. Why not open a baby service station, supplying nearby parents with timed, specific formulae of milk, nursemaids and baby sitters, rental of baby carriages, walkers, toys, etc.? In any large apartment building or groups of buildings are sure to be quite a few couples needing such service. (See also item 44).
53. Plan, Sell and Paint “Unpainted Furniture.
An increasing number of people are discovering the economy and adaptability of unpainted furniture, now 80 widely available; but they are often stumped by (1) uncertainty as to what units they should get, and (2) lack of time, know-how, facility or willingness to do the painting themselves. They don’t like to give the job to a regular painting firm which often overcharges. There is every reason why they would patronize an individual specializing in it, who would help plan what to have, in the first place, know where to buy it most advantageously, and do the painting in the right way—in a fitting color scheme, harmonizing with other things. This can be a very nice business, leading perhaps eventually to opening an unpainted furniture store, with painting service, and salesmen who would go out to sell.
54. Mow People’s Lawns, with Power Mower.
It naturally doesn’t pay home owners who have no very large lawn to buy a power mower. So this is an opportunity for a business. Buy a power lawn mower and cut people’s lawn on a regular time schedule, for a fee. A 17″ power mower can be had for $66.00, and if you mow ten people’s lawns seven times at a dollar you’ve paid for the mower, and all income is clear from then forward. Plenty of peoples will gladly pay the fee, and you can mow 25 lawns a day easily.
55. Hoe Peoples Gardens with a Power Hoe.
As everybody who has tried it knows, its fun to plant a vegetable garden of any size at all, but hard work to keep the weeds down. Plenty of people will pay you a dollar or two to hoe their garden at intervals with a power hoe. You can buy one for $134.00 and soon get your money back.
56. Open a Neck-Tie Exchange.
It’s been done successfully by quite a few folk. The scheme is that patrons bring in their old ties, pay a dime a piece, and receive in exchange one of the cleaned ties available (of the same grade). The pull of this plan is that you get a change-off from your old ties at only a dime a piece. Many a man is tired of a tie which is a very nice one, still in good shape, and will gladly swap it for another for a dime or a quarter.
57. Operate Counter Stand Concessions.
Many retailers in crowded localities have more space than they need or can afford. They will be interested if you take a year’s option on a corner, window or counter space for some specialty business you will find to rent it to. A watch repair man may want such a small space; or a hat cleaner, expressman, umbrella seller, key maker, popcorn or potato chip dispenser, or theatre ticket agency—or any of a dozen other special sellers. You hunt out the persons who should be interested. You can operate a string of 25 or more such concessions, spending your time finding such corners or tenants for them, or studying locations and possible business, and perhaps even teaching them how to manage and supply such a business. Even barber shops could do well to add shoe shine, manicure, hat-cleaning service, shirts-to-order service, toilet goods or tie counters, etc.
Continued in Pt2b…
