634: $100k Hosting Local Craft Workshops as a Side Hustle

634: $100k Hosting Local Craft Workshops as a Side Hustle

Released Thursday, 10th October 2024
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634: $100k Hosting Local Craft Workshops as a Side Hustle

634: $100k Hosting Local Craft Workshops as a Side Hustle

634: $100k Hosting Local Craft Workshops as a Side Hustle

634: $100k Hosting Local Craft Workshops as a Side Hustle

Thursday, 10th October 2024
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0:01

A hundred thousand bucks hosting a local workshops as

0:03

a side hustle. What's up? What's up? Nick Oh,

0:05

Loper here. Welcome to the side hustle show because

0:07

your nine to five may make you a living,

0:09

but your five to nine, it makes you alive.

0:11

Today, I want to share a unique side hustle

0:14

idea and that's hosting local classes or workshops. Maybe

0:16

it's not as scalable as building an online course

0:18

business, but there's a whole lot less competition. It's

0:20

going to be easier to get your first customers

0:22

and you get some like great money. In fact,

0:24

my guest has made over a hundred thousand dollars

0:27

in sales doing this on the side from her

0:29

day job over the last couple of years from

0:32

100kartist.com. Chloe Winstanley, welcome to

0:34

the side hustle show. Hi,

0:36

Nick. Thanks so much for having me. I'm

0:38

excited for this one. Stick around. We're going to

0:41

cover how to come up with your workshop topic

0:43

or idea, how to market the thing, how to

0:45

get those first students in the door and how

0:47

to potentially scale it up. So it takes less

0:49

of your time. Now, if you're new to the

0:51

show, welcome. Thank you so much for tuning in.

0:53

This is the show that deconstructs realistic legit ways

0:55

to make extra money in your spare time. If

0:57

that's what you're looking for, you're in the right

0:59

place. Nobody has more experience in this phase. We've

1:01

been doing it every week since 2013, over 600

1:04

episodes to choose from. And while I would love

1:06

to have you binge on the entire catalog, that

1:08

entire archive, I want to invite you instead

1:10

before you do that, create your own eight to

1:12

10 episode personalized playlist. It's a little extended sampler

1:14

platter, if you will. It's all super easy. All

1:16

you gotta do is go to hustle that show,

1:18

answer a few short, multiple choice questions and you'll

1:20

get that curated playlist you can add directly to

1:22

your device. You can learn what works and then

1:24

you can go out and make some more money.

1:26

That's at hustle that show. Now Chloe, I want

1:28

to start with how'd you come up with this

1:30

idea for these little craft workshops? So

1:33

it kind of just grew progressively. Like

1:35

in 2021 in New Zealand, we were

1:37

in COVID lockdown and so we were

1:39

like staying at home. And so a

1:41

lot of people seem to be like

1:44

turning to indoor crafts and things like

1:46

that. I started a terrarium business, which

1:48

didn't really go anywhere. And then after

1:50

that, I gave polymer clay a try.

1:52

Initially I was making polymer clay earrings

1:54

and selling them online. So I was

1:57

like the only person in New Zealand

1:59

making them. And I

2:01

realized that people, you know, they were

2:03

happy to spend money on jewelry, but

2:05

they also really wanted to just learn

2:07

how to make it themselves. And I

2:09

think particularly coming out of COVID, people

2:11

really wanted to get out of the

2:13

house. And so I was able to

2:15

host people. I had a studio in

2:17

Christchurch, which is in New Zealand. It

2:19

grew from there over time, from serving

2:21

five people to eventually bringing on staff

2:23

and serving 40 people in one workshop.

2:25

So it really grew in that respect.

2:28

So it sounds like started as a

2:30

hobby. Yeah, I can mess around with

2:32

this polymer clay. I can make some

2:34

jewelry. I can make some earrings, like

2:36

a fun little outlet if I'm stuck

2:38

at home and having some success selling

2:40

them online. Is this Etsy? Is this

2:42

through your own site? No, I had

2:44

a my own website and I would

2:46

just advertise on Facebook. And that's how

2:48

I reach customers. After that, I was

2:50

attending markets, craft fairs in New Zealand

2:52

to sell them. But I just realized

2:54

that I could make way more money

2:56

from hosting people for workshops than I

2:58

could just by selling the earrings, like

3:00

the profit margin for one pair of

3:02

earrings versus a whole workshop was just

3:04

like so much more. And for a

3:06

similar amount of work as well, because

3:08

it's still a lot of work to

3:10

make the earrings. So if I'm just

3:12

like hosting 20 people at

3:15

the same time, I'm making a

3:17

lot more within just like two hours of my

3:19

time. So it just made more

3:21

sense in that respect. That's so interesting. Our friend who

3:24

was selling on Etsy 10 years ago, I found the

3:26

same thing to make these really nice looking, you know,

3:28

baby blankets. She's like, I'm gonna have to charge $100

3:30

for this thing to make it worth the time that

3:32

I have into it. And people could go buy the

3:35

same thing for $12 at Target. Like

3:37

it's a really tough sell. But you turn around, teach

3:39

people how to make their own. Okay, now I can

3:41

do it for 510 40

3:43

people at a time. And now this starts to

3:45

become an entertainment type of business more than an

3:48

education type of business more than

3:50

a kind of a done for you product business.

3:52

Absolutely. Yeah. Like the experience is what people sign

3:54

up for. That's what they pay the money for.

3:57

And so many people a lot of the time

3:59

they wouldn't even really care about what they made

4:01

at the end of it, because they're just there

4:03

to have fun with their friends. Yeah, there was

4:06

one in our old town, and it was like

4:08

a sip and paint type of thing. They did

4:10

a ton of group outings and, you know, girls'

4:12

night out type of stuff, or a company team

4:14

building, where it's like, oh, you got your wine,

4:17

and you got the artist leader in front is telling

4:19

you step by step how to recreate this famous painting,

4:22

and, you know, people are having a great time. Sounds

4:24

like something similar. So these first five people, how do

4:26

they find you? How did

4:28

you find them to show up for their

4:30

workshop? I just advertised, again, on Facebook for

4:32

that. I just found that I got good

4:35

results from just advertising to people there on

4:37

Facebook for the local event. And at the start,

4:39

I had five people just because I was like

4:41

finding my feet. And I was really like having

4:44

a lot of imposter syndrome at that point, because

4:46

I was like, you know, I'm not a professional

4:48

artist. I just started learning polymer clay like three

4:50

months ago. Why would these people want to come

4:52

and learn from me? You're nervous. Are people going

4:54

to really show up? Yeah, like are they going

4:56

to like, I'm not going to know what I'm

4:58

doing really, but again, like

5:00

my friend attended that workshop and she was

5:02

just really encouraging. Like I charged people $30 New

5:05

Zealand dollars, which was like

5:07

a tiny amount. And she was like, you know,

5:09

you have to like value yourself and value your

5:11

time. And that's how I worked

5:13

up to eventually charging people like $100 New Zealand

5:15

per person. And

5:19

just like, yeah, actually like valuing my skills and my

5:21

time and knowing that, you know, like I'm not a

5:23

professional, but I'm like good enough to be able to

5:25

teach these people and teach them well and make sure

5:27

that they have a good time. Very good. So

5:30

you secure the studio space and say, Hey, we've

5:32

got a venue for this workshop. And you put

5:34

the word out on Facebook and say, at this

5:36

time, at this place for 30 bucks, come on

5:38

in. We'll teach you how to make this jewelry.

5:40

We'll teach you how to make these earrings. And

5:42

lo and behold, people bought tickets for it. Yeah,

5:45

yeah. And it was quite funny because like I

5:47

said at the start, like I tried a terrarium

5:49

business, like I'd tried many different businesses over the

5:51

years and none of them had gained traction the

5:53

way that this did. So it was just kind

5:55

of like a surprise to myself because I wasn't

5:57

used to it. Like I wasn't used to putting

5:59

an idea.

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