Self-Employment - Basics
In hard economic times, people tend to return to the basics–by necessity if not choice.
We can’t make any guarantees, but the suggestions below are good possibilities. And they should get you thinking in the right direction about other likely businesses.
Barter Network
When people don’t have money, they do barter. They’ve always got stuff—and skills—that they can exchange. See our Barter page.
Bicycle Sales / Repairs
The first thing you should do right now is run out and buy as many used bicycles as you can. Used bike sales and repairs should do very well. You could even add motorcycles and scooters, because of the good gas mileage they get.
Boarding House
If your home is big enough, or can be made big enough, open a boarding house. Offer rooms on a weekly or monthly basis, and include as many meals a day as you feel you’re up to. You should probably at least include breakfast and likely even dinner, giving your guests a choice as to which plan they prefer. If you expect short-term guests, you could turn your home into a hostel or bed and brekfast inn.
Note: There is currently no youth hostel in the Napa Valley. While the valley’s tourist industry prefers only high-end visitors, there is no reason you couldn’t catering to backpackers and other more casual visitors.
Car Repair
While this is no time to be in the new car sales business, car repair should be fine as people try to keep their existing vehicles running as long as they can—and as long as they can afford the gas. Consider basic car repair/maintenance where you go to the customer’s home to do the service. You might even have luck with ongoing maintenance contracts. You could also give car repair classes.
Carpentry/Furniture Repair
No more mass produced coffee tables. Instead of remodeling every 10 years, we can go back to making sturdy, beautiful furniture that will last several generations. Skilled carpenters will be in high demand.
Cheap Luxuries
Even in hard times—actually particularly in hard times—people will want to spoil themselves now and then. But the luxury has to be cheap. It might be a special chocolate chip cookie, or delicious homemade candy. Or maybe it’s very special handmade giftwrapping paper. Or fragrant handmade soap or a hand-carved wooden toy.
Cobblery and Shoe Repair
This goes along with tailor and clothing repair, but cobblery is a dying art these days. Watch it revive.
If you’d like to go even farther with your skills, consider shoemaking.
Bespoke Shoemaking
[book]
Designed to teach the art and craft of handmade shoemaking.
Computer Repair
Computer repair and maintenance should do exceptionally well. People will no longer be running out to buy the latest upgrade (computer, monitor, printer, etc.) but will be more interested in keeping what they have working properly.
Delivery Service
It makes much more sense to pay a slight fee to have a store deliver a purchase to you than to get in your car and make a round trip to do it yourself. Smart store owners will offer free delivery in order to attract customers.
Bikes at Work
Bicycle Cargo Trailers
Entertainment
People want to be entertained, particularly when times are tough. Consider bringing together talented people to offer live entertainment in neighborhood or community locations. You probably won’t get rich but you’ll have a good time, and you and the entertainers will end up with more money than when you started.
Errand Service
On a more personal level than a delivery service, errand services can combine your needs with similar needs of others, to provide services cheaper than you could do them yourself. This might be pickup and delivery, but could also include banking, taking children to after-school classes and sports or pets to the veterinarian, and a variety of other activities.
Fads
It would be nice to invent, and get rich off, the next fad. But you can also stay in touch with the culture, and offer low-cost ways for your community to enjoy those fads.
Farming
You don’t have to have a huge farm to have a healthy farming business. An acre of land and a lot of hard work will produce what you need for a small-scale business. Consider also specialty items such as mushrooms, herbs, or sprouts. Because of the many uses of hemp, that will be a great crop once it’s legal—or at least possible without enforcement—to grow.
Herbal Treatments
You can grow, or forage for, herbs and use them to make healing concoctions, syrups, salves, teas, and a variety of other healthy items. You could also use flowers for Aromatherapy.
Home Repair
People will have to do what they can to keep everything in their home in working order. If you have carpentry, plumbing, electrical and a wide variety of other relevant skills, you can be a big help to those people. You might even have success at teaching these skills to others.
Instruction
You name it, someone will be interested in it. Whether it’s using tools, playing music, sewing or storytelling. The lessons likely to do best will be those focused on basic essentials, saving money and protecting health, such as gardening, food canning, inexpensive home cooking, yoga and other health exercises, meditation and relaxation, herb foraging and use, and pet care.
For online instructional materials, see our Self-Education page.
Instructional Video Library
Considering setting up an instructional video library; videos and DVDs that teach people various skills, whether they’re home or car repair, sewing, musical, language or any of hundreds of other subjects.
For places to purchase or rent instruction videos, see our Self-Education page.
Locksmithing
A useful service. Even if you don’t have a keymaking machine, you can still help people get into things if they’ve lost their keys.
The Open Organisation of Lockpickers
Locksport International
Organic Pest Control
The need for people who can capture unwanted household pests in a humane and/or chemical free manner is obvious.
Raising Chickens and Rabbits
Lots of people might start their own gardens, but very few will raise their own meat. You can take advantage of that by raising chickens and rabbits—and other critters if you’ve got room. See our Small Animals section.
Rental Library
Libraries aren’t just for videos and books. Consider offering specialty kitchenware, car and woodworking tools, games, toys, household repair tools, gardening equipment and literally anything else you can think of.
Seamstress / Tailor / Clothing Alterations
In hard times, people can’t afford to simply buy new clothes to replace slightly worn clothing. Darning socks will be back again. Sewing and knitting skills are no longer common, nor are sewing machines. Anyone with these skills will be much in demand.
Knitting Help
More than 150 free online knitting instruction videos
Seed Farmer/Plant Nursery/Consultant
More and more people will be growing food in their backyards, or even starting small farms. They’ll need seeds, plants and advice.
Small Appliance / Electronics Repair
Till now it’s been cheaper to throw away a broken radio, telephone, blender, microwave, coffee maker and similar appliances than to have it repaired. That time is over. With the end of cheap imports, and loss of income, people will no longer be able to afford new items. They will either have to do without, or find someone with the skills to fix them.
Soap Making
Everybody needs soap. While there might not be a time when you can’t find soap to buy, you’ll save money, have some fun, and end up with an excellent barter item by making your own soap.
Taxi/Pedicab driver
There will be increasing demand for public and shared transportation. If you can modify your car to run on alternative fuel, this could be a very profitable venture for city-dwellers. You could also rig up a bicycle-driven pedicab.
Toys and Games
There was a time when toys were not mass-produced plastic things. They were carefully crafted from wood, cloth and other natural materials, were treasured by the children who received them, and were passed down from generation to generation. Create some yourself, and you’ll have customers.
We can’t make any guarantees, but the suggestions below are good possibilities. And they should get you thinking in the right direction about other likely businesses.
Barter Network
When people don’t have money, they do barter. They’ve always got stuff—and skills—that they can exchange. See our Barter page.
Bicycle Sales / Repairs
The first thing you should do right now is run out and buy as many used bicycles as you can. Used bike sales and repairs should do very well. You could even add motorcycles and scooters, because of the good gas mileage they get.
Boarding House
If your home is big enough, or can be made big enough, open a boarding house. Offer rooms on a weekly or monthly basis, and include as many meals a day as you feel you’re up to. You should probably at least include breakfast and likely even dinner, giving your guests a choice as to which plan they prefer. If you expect short-term guests, you could turn your home into a hostel or bed and brekfast inn.
Note: There is currently no youth hostel in the Napa Valley. While the valley’s tourist industry prefers only high-end visitors, there is no reason you couldn’t catering to backpackers and other more casual visitors.
Car Repair
While this is no time to be in the new car sales business, car repair should be fine as people try to keep their existing vehicles running as long as they can—and as long as they can afford the gas. Consider basic car repair/maintenance where you go to the customer’s home to do the service. You might even have luck with ongoing maintenance contracts. You could also give car repair classes.
Carpentry/Furniture Repair
No more mass produced coffee tables. Instead of remodeling every 10 years, we can go back to making sturdy, beautiful furniture that will last several generations. Skilled carpenters will be in high demand.
Cheap Luxuries
Even in hard times—actually particularly in hard times—people will want to spoil themselves now and then. But the luxury has to be cheap. It might be a special chocolate chip cookie, or delicious homemade candy. Or maybe it’s very special handmade giftwrapping paper. Or fragrant handmade soap or a hand-carved wooden toy.
Cobblery and Shoe Repair
This goes along with tailor and clothing repair, but cobblery is a dying art these days. Watch it revive.
If you’d like to go even farther with your skills, consider shoemaking.
Bespoke Shoemaking
[book]
Designed to teach the art and craft of handmade shoemaking.
Computer Repair
Computer repair and maintenance should do exceptionally well. People will no longer be running out to buy the latest upgrade (computer, monitor, printer, etc.) but will be more interested in keeping what they have working properly.
Delivery Service
It makes much more sense to pay a slight fee to have a store deliver a purchase to you than to get in your car and make a round trip to do it yourself. Smart store owners will offer free delivery in order to attract customers.
Bikes at Work
Bicycle Cargo Trailers
Entertainment
People want to be entertained, particularly when times are tough. Consider bringing together talented people to offer live entertainment in neighborhood or community locations. You probably won’t get rich but you’ll have a good time, and you and the entertainers will end up with more money than when you started.
Errand Service
On a more personal level than a delivery service, errand services can combine your needs with similar needs of others, to provide services cheaper than you could do them yourself. This might be pickup and delivery, but could also include banking, taking children to after-school classes and sports or pets to the veterinarian, and a variety of other activities.
Fads
It would be nice to invent, and get rich off, the next fad. But you can also stay in touch with the culture, and offer low-cost ways for your community to enjoy those fads.
Farming
You don’t have to have a huge farm to have a healthy farming business. An acre of land and a lot of hard work will produce what you need for a small-scale business. Consider also specialty items such as mushrooms, herbs, or sprouts. Because of the many uses of hemp, that will be a great crop once it’s legal—or at least possible without enforcement—to grow.
Herbal Treatments
You can grow, or forage for, herbs and use them to make healing concoctions, syrups, salves, teas, and a variety of other healthy items. You could also use flowers for Aromatherapy.
Home Repair
People will have to do what they can to keep everything in their home in working order. If you have carpentry, plumbing, electrical and a wide variety of other relevant skills, you can be a big help to those people. You might even have success at teaching these skills to others.
Instruction
You name it, someone will be interested in it. Whether it’s using tools, playing music, sewing or storytelling. The lessons likely to do best will be those focused on basic essentials, saving money and protecting health, such as gardening, food canning, inexpensive home cooking, yoga and other health exercises, meditation and relaxation, herb foraging and use, and pet care.
For online instructional materials, see our Self-Education page.
Instructional Video Library
Considering setting up an instructional video library; videos and DVDs that teach people various skills, whether they’re home or car repair, sewing, musical, language or any of hundreds of other subjects.
For places to purchase or rent instruction videos, see our Self-Education page.
Locksmithing
A useful service. Even if you don’t have a keymaking machine, you can still help people get into things if they’ve lost their keys.
The Open Organisation of Lockpickers
Locksport International
Organic Pest Control
The need for people who can capture unwanted household pests in a humane and/or chemical free manner is obvious.
Raising Chickens and Rabbits
Lots of people might start their own gardens, but very few will raise their own meat. You can take advantage of that by raising chickens and rabbits—and other critters if you’ve got room. See our Small Animals section.
Rental Library
Libraries aren’t just for videos and books. Consider offering specialty kitchenware, car and woodworking tools, games, toys, household repair tools, gardening equipment and literally anything else you can think of.
Seamstress / Tailor / Clothing Alterations
In hard times, people can’t afford to simply buy new clothes to replace slightly worn clothing. Darning socks will be back again. Sewing and knitting skills are no longer common, nor are sewing machines. Anyone with these skills will be much in demand.
Knitting Help
More than 150 free online knitting instruction videos
Seed Farmer/Plant Nursery/Consultant
More and more people will be growing food in their backyards, or even starting small farms. They’ll need seeds, plants and advice.
Small Appliance / Electronics Repair
Till now it’s been cheaper to throw away a broken radio, telephone, blender, microwave, coffee maker and similar appliances than to have it repaired. That time is over. With the end of cheap imports, and loss of income, people will no longer be able to afford new items. They will either have to do without, or find someone with the skills to fix them.
Soap Making
Everybody needs soap. While there might not be a time when you can’t find soap to buy, you’ll save money, have some fun, and end up with an excellent barter item by making your own soap.
Taxi/Pedicab driver
There will be increasing demand for public and shared transportation. If you can modify your car to run on alternative fuel, this could be a very profitable venture for city-dwellers. You could also rig up a bicycle-driven pedicab.
Toys and Games
There was a time when toys were not mass-produced plastic things. They were carefully crafted from wood, cloth and other natural materials, were treasured by the children who received them, and were passed down from generation to generation. Create some yourself, and you’ll have customers.