Set up a laundry service and work from home

If you have a washing machine and somewhere to dry clothes then doing other peoples laundry is a way to make an extra income at home.  Businessmen living alone in particular are keen to use such a service and if you can pick up and drop off the laundry then so much the better.  

How much to charge? Check the classifieds for the going rates for laundry and ironing services.  As well as covering your outgoing costs for starch, washing powder, conditioner and stain removers, make sure you are also going to cover your electricity costs and your own time. 

When the time comes to return the laundry to your customers, purchase some plastic laundry bags for a more professional finish.  Also buy some metal coat hangers to keep those freshly ironed and starched shirts from getting creased.  Once delivered, all your customer then needs to do it to hang their laundry in their wardrobe!  Great service!  And a sure to keep your customers coming back for more.  Don’t forget that a happy client will recommend your services...

How will you market your services?

Market yourself both on and off line with business cards, local ads, visit local offices and ask if you can leave your business cards.  Contact companies by e.mail with a promotion offer.

Use the Internet for marketing and reach a much larger market.  You don’t need to have any HMTL (Hyper Text Markup Language) language to create your own website. With Dreamweaver and FrontPage you can create your own website very easily.

Blogger and Word Press are two examples of blog sites that offer …..Within just 5 minutes you can have your own blog site just like this one.  Blogger and Word Press have templates and add-ons so you can customise your own blog site. 

Remember;

Working from home does not involve any large start-up costs.

Marketing costs will be low or even free

Work from home as an entertainer for children’s parties

Are you a dab hand with children?  Can you keep the little ones amused?  In this case you may enjoy being an entertainer for children’s parties.  This is a small business that can easily be run from home.

What services will you offer? Party games, dressing up? Magic show? Book reading? Puppet show?  Face painting?If you are good at dress making then you can help the children to make their own costumes at a costume themed party.

Decide how much you will charge per hour and remember that you also need to cover your transport costs to and from the venue as well as any party props.

Before you start to set up your entertainment business, it is important to do some research through the classified ads as well as from parents on what other entertainers are charging and what they are providing for their services.

Find a gap in the market and offer something different to the other entertainers....

For example, the 70’s…

Take the party children back to the 70’ and introduce them to things that they would have seen in the 1970’s. How about a typewriter?( If you don’t have one tucked away in the attic then you can buy a second hand one pretty cheaply or ask relations) What else was the 70’s famous for?  Do you have any 70’s clothes hidden away? Bring them out for the children to dress up in.  70’s music…books, posters, Games, Making paper aeroplanes, playing marbles or jacks…

When you have made a list of your costs and what you will offer, then you need to make some marketing.

Marketing can be cheap and school fetes are a good place to start.  Hire a stall and promote your party services.  Perhaps some games or costumes? This is the chance to give out your business cards or a promotion leaflet for future party bookings.

Use the Internet for marketing and reach a much larger market.  You don’t need to have any HMTL (Hyper Text Markup Language) language to create your own website. With Dreamweaver and FrontPage you can create your own website very easily.

Blogger and Word Press are two examples of blog sites. Within just 5 minutes you can have your own blog site just like this one.  Blogger and Word Press have templates and add-ons so you can customise your own blog site. 

Work from home baking cup cakes

Are you a dab hand at baking? With the increased popularity in cup cakes there is a real market for people who can provide cakes and cup cakes. Baking at home is a popular and enjoyable way to make some extra cash.

Before you go out and buy a stack of cake tins, boxes and ingredients you need to find a market for your cakes.  If you intend to bake for birthday celebrations, christenings or the like, then you need to check out the demand.  Have a look in the classified ads and online for what is advertised by way of homemade cakes.  Who will buy your cakes?  How will you market your services?

Marketing can be cheap and school fetes are a good place to start.  Hire a stall and sell some cupcakes or cakes decorated with the school logo.  With each cup cake purchased give out one of your business cards or a promotion leaflet for future orders of your cakes.

If you have a printer at home then business cards or leaflets can be printed at home on a small scale.  If you don’t have this facility then business cards can be printed through the Internet, local printers and even supermarkets have machines from where you can create and print your own business cards. These are cheap and a great way to start marketing your cakes.

When you start to get orders, now is the time to borrow or buy equipment.  You may want to consider buying cake boxes so that your cakes are delivered in a special box.  Basic white card boxes are the cheapest option and work out even cheaper when purchased in bulk but you may want to offer your clients the chance to add on different type of box at an additional cost.

How much will you sell your cup cakes for? Research the going prices.  Don’t forget that you need to calculate the ingredients, electricity, baking utensils as well as your own time to get the overall price.

As your client database grows then you can increase your profit margin. It’s best to start off with a small profit margin to build up customer loyalty and recommendations.

For new fresh ideas, keep up to date with cake designs and recipes.  200 cupcakes is a great book by Hamlyn with easy to follow recipes and illustrated throughout with colour photographs.

Market yourself-Use the Internet for marketing and reach a much larger market.  You don’t need to have any HMTL (Hyper Text Markup Language) language to create your own website. With Dreamweaver and FrontPage you can create your own website very easily.

Blogger and Word Press are two examples of blog sites that offer …..Within just 5 minutes you can have your own blog site just like this one.  Blogger and Word Press have templates and add-ons so you can customise your own blog site.  

Remember that working from home does not involve any large start-up costs.

Marketing costs will be low or even free especially if you promote your business through the social networks such as twitter, facebook and Pinterest.

Work from home-Getting started

Working from home is convenient, especially for those with families to look after.

Working from home takes a certain degree of self-discipline so once you have decided to work from home, set yourself goals and write down how you intend to reach them.

The television is distracting so don’t have the telly on when you are working.

Set yourself working hours and keep to them.

So, you know that you want to work from home but don’t have any idea what you want to do –Let’s start at the beginning.

 Make a list.....Take stock and write down everything that you are good at. For example do you have green fingers? If you can make flowers grow then you can set up a small business selling flowers.

Are you artistic? If you are, then you can plant the flowers in a pot which you have decorated and sell them for special occasions with a higher mark up.

Write down all of your past work experience and learning experiences. What examination certificates do you have? Have you taken any work based training or adult education courses?

Write down your experiences. Have you travelled? Are there any cities or countries that you know well? Do you keep pets? Do you exercise? Have you been on a diet? Do you have any dietary restrictions? Are there any good or bad personal relationships that you want to share?

What interests do you have?
Medical, fitness, health and beauty, pets, dating, shopping, travel, What do you have access to? Do you have access to the Internet at home? Can you drive? Do you have a car? Do you have a kitchen, garden, garage with storage space?Telephone?

Once you have made your list, I hope that this will give you some inspiration for what you can realistically do from home.

 If however after making your list, you are still a little stuck for inspiration, then this blog will keep updating with suggestions and tips to start you off.

Ideas to make money at home- About this blog

This blog is about how each and everyone of us can earn a little extra money working from home.

What you wont find here are any get rich quick overnight schemes or promises to become a millionaire or any offers of non existent work from home schemes …

This blog will very simply share a few suggestions on how you can make money at home.

Of course if you really work at it then you may well become a millionaire but for now lets aim at earning a realistic part time salary!

There are times when we all want to earn a little extra cash in order to get through the month and pay those bills, save for a holiday, get the car through its MOT and what better way to do this than to utilise your spare time and do some part time work from home.