If you’re a people person, direct selling can be a great way to earn some extra income if your busy with school or another job. While it’s definitely not a “get rich quick” scheme, it usually is very easy to get started, as most of these companies offer start-up packages and even training sessions to send you on your way. Direct selling is great for people who are self-motivated, but wish to work in a flexible environment. Because you get back what you put into it, there are many different scenarios – ranging from earning some extra spending cash to making a full time living – depending on your level of commitment.

If you decide something this might be up your alley, you’ll need to pick a company you’d like to work with. The nice thing about becoming a direct seller is that you aren’t an employee of the company that you sell products for – instead, you are an independent contractor and make a commission on the items you sell. Most companies are willing to buy back any unsold product, so you’re not locked into anything permanent, and its not hard to get out if you find out direct selling isn’t your thing. You’ll want to do some homework in order to find a company. You can start by looking at the Direct Selling Association. Their directory only lists companies that follow a specific ethical code of conduct, which helps to weed out some of the “sketchy” companies out there. You’ll also want to speak directly with any companies you’re interested in working with to ask them any questions, and even test out some of their products. You’ll be more successful selling something if you’d be willing to buy it yourself. The normal age limit to become a sales representative is 18, but you’ll want to look into this as well to make sure that you can meet any other specific requirements they may have.

When getting into the direct selling world, you’ll also want to watch out for fraudulent schemes, such as Ponzi schemes and pyramid schemes. Pyramid schemes are illegal scams that have large numbers of people at the bottom of the pyramid pay money to a few people at the top. Their main goal is to recruit new “sellers” in order to make more money, and they typically don’t even sell a product to consumers. These types of schemes also usually involve high start-up costs in order to generate income. While the legitimate companies will also often require a start up fee to cover the cost of your first products, its usually not a very high cost. Recognized direct selling companies seek to make money with you over time, not take large amounts from you up front, as fraudulent schemes attempt to. For more warning signs to look for, as well as some great “getting started” tips,  check out directselling411.com.

Aside from the money perks, direct selling can be a great networking tool, and can also help you hone in on your leadership skills. Many companies break up their sellers into teams, and team leaders carry much of the responsibility for the training of new sellers and the sharing of company information. Direct selling is definitely a social job, so if you like being around and communicating with others, this could be a great way for you to make money, either as a short term solution to make some extra cash or even possibly as an enjoyable long-term career.

photo credit: lumaxart

Everyone likes to shop, right? Shopping for profit sounds even better! Many people have been doing this and have been super successful, and you can too. More specifically, I mean by shopping at garage sales, and turning around and re-selling the items you bought – either at your local consignment shop or by setting up an online store, through venues such as eBay, Craigslist, or even Amazon.com.

Garage sale shopping for profit can happen in three easy steps:

Search

• If you intend to sell items you find at garage sales, you have to do some prior homework. This will make your job easier when it comes to hunting through the sales. First, you need to figure out what you want to sell. You can do this by checking out local thrift stores to see what they’re selling or performing searches on websites such as eBay to find out what types of items people are looking for. Online marketplaces are also a good place to find out what price items are going for so that you can go to your garage sales with an idea of how much you want to pay for items if you should find them.
• Another great idea is to bring your laptop/iPhone or other device with internet access to the garage sale itself. This way you can do a search for items on the spot to help you decide whether or not you want to purchase them.
• Do your research to find out where and when garage sales are being held in your area. This way, you can hit as many sales as possible without spending unnecessary time and money for travel.
• The better prepared you are, the more successful you’ll be at finding items and reselling them.

 Shop

• Now for the fun part! Experts suggest going with $100 – $200 in all forms of currency – lots of quarters, $1 and $5 bills. Get to the sales as early as possible – that way you get your prime pick of items. Good types of items to begin looking for are clothing, books or music, purses and other accessories, or electronics. Keep your eyes peeled for bargain prices, and be prepared to offer the seller a lower price, and to leave your contact information if a seller doesn’t like your offer – they may change their minds later!

Sell!

• After you’ve organized all of your newfound treasures, the next step is to figure out where you’d like to sell your items.
• If you’d rather not get into the online selling world, you can take your items to a local consignment shop and put them up for sale there. This is always good because you can have face-to-face interactions with people. If you’re not sure where the consignment shops are in your neck of the woods, www.consignmentshops.com is a good directory that lists consignment shops, resale shops, thrift stores and antique shops across the nation, along with their contact information.
• If you do decide to sell your stuff online, there are many sites you can choose from. Some, like GarageSaleSally, are sites where you simply display your items, and they handle the transaction for you with a direct sale, instead of an auction. It seems people have found the most success with eBay. Its very easy to set up a store of your own and set up auctions, and there’s a lot of help available too. If you have a Mac, there is even a program out there that helps you edit, track, and manage all of the auctions on your eBay store. Can’t get much simpler than that!
• Amazon.com is another good online marketplace to use, especially if you’ve found books or music during your garage sale hunting.

It will take some practice to figure out what items are worth searching for and purchasing at garage sales, and what method of resale works best for you. But this is another business idea that allows you to have some fun (retail therapy!) while potentially making a decent profit.

Here are a few other good sites that have tips and success stories on buying and reselling from garage sales:

• How to Find Garage Sale Gold
• Reselling Garage Sale Items
• Top Ten Garage Sale Items to Resell on eBay

Happy Hunting!

image credits: ppelisek, annablume

Nothing seems easier than a good “get cash quick” scheme, but when it comes to trading in your gold jewelry are the cash-for-gold companies really paying what you deserve? Perhaps not. Most are familiar with the Cash4Gold television ads… They even aired an ad during the Super Bowl starring Ed McMahon and MC Hammer. Sure these ads are very appealing, especially in these uneasy economic times, but it can be very easy to get ripped off if you don’t know what you’re doing. Choosing a reputable company to assess the value is key when it comes to getting money from your jewelry.

According to this former Cash4Gold employee, the behind-the-scenes process of the well-known Cash4Gold appears to have some questionable practices:

• The pouch that is sent to you is only insured up to $100, so if you send it in with jewelry that is worth more than $100 and the pouch becomes lost, you’re screwed!
• Your check is usually signed within 24 hours of testing your jewelry, however the check is not sent out for another 3-4 days. Why is this a problem? The “100% satisfaction guarantee or your jewelry returned” is only valid within 10 days from when the check is dated, making it easy for the company to get away with more money than it should. 
• Cash4Gold purposely issues insufficient checks just to have customers call back and complain, and that is if they are even smart enough to figure out that they have been jerked around. 

There are many other options for trading your gold in for cash, such as jewelry stores that may offer more accurate appraisals. Holding onto any items you feel are valuable is another good alternative, since it’s usually the case that stuff like that only increases in value as time goes on. But if you’re dead set on turning items in for cash, definitely make sure to do some research first so that you’ll be able to decide what price is acceptable.

By Megan

After reminiscing about our own experience selling lemonade to golfers, I dug out this old picture of us with our homemade stand, hard at work putting those selling skills to the test! Dorky, weren’t we? But we definitely were able to use our “cute little kid” appeal to our advantage when convincing those golfers to buy our lemonade and cookies – especially when they accidentally let a swear word fly after a bad tee-off! (I think we even included a sign saying “Swearing costs extra”)

Our first experience in the business world was definitely a memorable one, and it was fun going back and discovering this picture! Hope you got a kick out of it too.   

How’s your lemonade stand going? Don’t forget about the contest! Even if you don’t want to contribute your results, we’d still love to hear from you with any funny stories or great pictures from your lemonade-selling experience!

Does your family own a party boat? Are you old enough to operate one (or know somebody who is)? Any popular lakes nearby? If your answer to these questions is yes, you should put some serious consideration into a party boat snack bar. Throw a grill and a couple of coolers on the boat and you’re set.

Keep it simple – start off by purchasing basic snack bar food (hotdogs, burgers, buns, chips, soda and water) from any wholesale store. This should be all you need to start with.

Make some large, homemade signs advertising your new floating snack bar. This is very important, so make them easy to read and attractive to the eye.

Make your rounds around lunchtime on a hot sunny day. Drive close to shore and look for people from land to wave you down. Also drive near areas where there are lots of boats, even if that means out in the open water. Limit your time out on the water so that you don’t use up too much gas, as that will most likely be your biggest expense.

Before you start a business venture such as this, be sure to check out the local peddling, vending, and soliciting laws to see if a permit is necessary. You don’t want to have any encounters with the law!

Photo credit: Rob W.

  By Staff

If you’ve got an adventurous spirit and love being outdoors, maybe you should give treasure hunting a try. We’re not talking treasure maps marked with an “X” and fending off pirates here, but a more high-tech method that involves a metal detector. You might be thinking that metal detectors are only for old retired guys, but the beauty about this money-making idea is that anyone with a little bit of determination can have success with it.

If you live near a beach you have the perfect landscape to work with, but you can also try this out in a park or a field that has a historical background. Beaches are good because people will drop all kinds of things during walks on the beach or while swimming. There’s also always the possibility for rare trinkets to come in with the surf and be buried in the sand. Just look at the treasures one hunter has found! Fields or other open spaces are good for finding more historical items of value, such as old coins or even antique jewelry.

Your main investment for this venture will be the purchase of a metal detector. These vary in price range, depending on how high tech you want to get. You’ll have to do some looking around before buying one, but there are tons of blogs out there dedicated completely to treasure hunting and finding the right metal detector. If you’re not ready to buy a metal detector right away, you could try renting one. Rental services like zilok.com list metal detector rentals for low as $30.00 a day. 

After you’ve gotten your metal detector and learned how to use it, you’ll need to find a place to use it! You can try out a random area and hope for the best, but most metal detector hobby sites out there suggest doing some research first – history of the area, what kinds of artifacts have previously been found there, etc. It can greatly improve your chances of finding something of value.

You could get lucky and have some great finds on your first trip out, but more likely it will take some time. Once you’ve got some “treasure”, you’ll need to clean it up, and again do some research to find out about your artifacts. Many of the treasure hunting websites out there have forums that you can visit to find out more about what you’ve found and what to do with it. If you think you’ve got something good, you can list it on ebay.com and try to sell it, or hold on to it, start up a collection,  and see what value it brings in the years to come!

Metal detecting isn’t exactly quickest and easiest way out there to make money, but over time it can become a very fun and rewarding hobby! There are many good lists of tips and guides out there, so use them to help get you started. Good luck!

Photo credit:

Every day tons of golf balls fall victim to the unforgiving tangles of the golf course rough. Golfers don’t usually bother to waste time looking for their lost balls, but would gladly shell out some cash to the person retrieving them if it meant not having to buy an expensive box of brand new golf balls.

Wandering around the golf course in the middle of the day might not be too smart,  as you could be hit with one of those balls you’re in search of. You could eliminate this by conducting your search at night, so that you could sell the balls during the daytime. And to help find the golf balls easier, why not devise some sort of a black light device to really make them stand out from their background?

There are currently similar gadgets out on the market that include special glasses you can wear, and blacklight headstraps, but these can be costly, and to keep start-up costs low you might want to create your own simple golfball-finding tool.

Basic, battery-powered black lights can be purchased for as low as $8-$12, and can easily be fastened to a stick or pole using duct tape or some other handy material. A little bit of easy construction, and you’re ready to head out and hunt down those MIA golf balls! Once you’ve gathered a collection, polish them up a bit and set your price, and they’re ready to be re-sold to golfers.

As an update to our previous lemonade stand challenge, we have decided to turn this into a full-fledged contest with a winner, a prize, and bragging rights to boot. We will send a “Benjamin” ($100) to the winning entry. 

There are a few catches however. You must fulfill the “experiment” as stated in the Lemonade Stand Challenge article, but we will go over the rules again…

• A minimum of one hour must be spent giving away “free” lemonade, but accepting tips. Make a sign if you want! (We Accept Tips, Thanks for the Tips, Tipping is not a city in China, etc.)
• You must spend an equal amount of time selling lemonade at normal price, and still accept tips if you want.
• Provide statistics: number of lemonade sales in each session, price you charged during non-free session, total revenue in each session, average revenue per sale, biggest sale/tip in each session.
• Must send in results by e-mail.
• Include in e-mail a photo of you with lemonade holding a sign of any size that says Finding Benjamin. This verifies that you didn’t make all this up. (Videos are also acceptable if you feel up to the challenge!)
• We will ask your permission if we want to post any photos you send us .
• All entries that fulfill the above requirements will be put into a hat and the winner will be drawn at random. 
• The deadline for this contest is September 7, 2009 (Labor Day), so get busy perfecting that lemonade-selling strategy!

Send your results to chrish@jfhinnovative.com

I’ll be the first to admit that I am a huge pack-rat. I have tons of stuff that sits unused 99% of the time, and I hold onto it long after it is useful to me (if it ever was in the first place!). I’m sure there are plenty of others just like me. And for you fellow pack-rats who might be looking to make some quick and easy cash (who isn’t?!?), your accumulation of items might offer the opportunity. 

Online services are popping up that serve as a sort of bulletin board for those looking to rent out things they own – game systems, tools, electronics, fancy purses, you name it! – and for those looking to borrow items. Zilok.com seems to be one of the leaders in this field right now (see video), but there are several other similar sites out there: Loanables, Rentoid, and RentNotBuy to name a few. 

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These sites attempt to provide everything necessary between the item owner and the renter in order for a transaction to take place. Owners typically have the option to control different aspects of their transaction – the rental price, what kind of contract is used, whether or not a security deposit is required and how much, and even whether or not to accept a rental request – but this varies with the service. 

Typically, an in-person meeting between owner and renter is arranged through the site, and while the services generally provide good security precautions, there are a few extra steps you can take to ensure a safe and successful transaction: 

• Examine the renter’s photo ID, and take a picture of the ID to keep on file. 

• Zilok and most other services have a feedback system for owners and renters. Use it. Check the feedback status for anyone you deal with. 

• Always require a security deposit to ensure the protection of whatever you are renting out.

• Be sure to arrange the meeting in a public place, and even better, bring someone with you when you go to make the exchange. This is just general safety advice – use your head.

• Consider what can happen if things go wrong. If the rental item causes property damage or personal injury, are you at risk? A “waiver” of liability in the rental contract may or may not be effective. And your homeowners/excess liability insurance policies may have exclusions for property leased out to others.

You can always place an ad on Craigslist if you don’t want to use one of these services, but what’s nice about them is that they cover all your bases for you so there’s not as much effort involved on your part. 

And how about Mom, Dad, and other family members? Perhaps they would agree to allow you to rent out that extra drill set or pair of snowshoes, but make sure to ASK first. I don’t think they’d appreciate it if their things started to randomly disappear!

Recycling and “going green” are all the rage these days, so why not make some money while you’re saving the planet? You can do this pretty easily by finding an item that might unnecessarily be tossed out, for example old clothing, and applying a little bit of creativity to turn it into a new item that people would be interested in buying.

Some people have already made successful businesses for themselves by selling stuffed animals and purses, but what’s so great about creating this kind of business is that you can put your own unique spin on whatever product you are creating, like blankets, quilts, or anything else you can dream up. A home economics course is usually required at some point in grade school, and the sewing skills you learn there are most likely sufficient to get you started on a project like this. It doesn’t necessarily have to be a sewing project either – maybe you’re artsy and want to turn the glass from old bottles into a sculpture or even some kind of jewelry item. The more creative and unique, the better!

Once you decide on what you’d like to create, you’ll need to gather your supplies – ask for donations from Mom’s closet that she’d otherwise throw out, or take yourself shopping and visit some thrift stores for some funky clothing or other materials. Remember that when using recyclable materials, there’s usually a pretty easy and cheap way to get them. Grab anything else you might need (art supplies, needle/thread, etc) to get started and let those creative juices flow!

Test out your newly fashioned product by giving a few of them away to friends, or as gifts. If you can’t seem to generate much interest, it may be a sign to go back to the drawing board (or sewing machine!) and try something different.

If you see that friends and family would be interested in purchasing your item, it’s likely that others would be, too. Setting up an Ebay seller’s account is a really easy way to start marketing and selling your product. Another idea would be to find a local craft festival and set up shop. Craft fair attendees are always looking for unique, homemade items.

This doesn’t have to be a huge operation until you’re ready for it to be. Have fun with it and see where it takes you. Remember to play up the fact that you’re reusing material to make something original – people will pay top dollar for something eco-friendly AND one-of-a-kind.

Have any creative ideas or suggestions? Let us know!

Photo credit: urbanwoodswalker