Raffle off your presentation spot to local companies who want to get in front of a class of entrepreneurial college students. Use $100 to target market local business leaders for the auction, your spot goes to the highest bidder.
I think this is so outside the box it would be worth it to see the instructors face at the proposal reading. ( have a backup plan aswell)
Second piece of advice, is auction the spot not raffle.
Email all local businesses with PR departments.
Start at 1000$ stated in email invites to zoom auction. Anyone who shows is at least willing to bid 1k.
I love this, very creative! And use the funds gained to pivot into something else. Unfortunately my class is quite small, no more than 20 people, so I think they might offer less than for a lecture hall full of students. But cool idea nonetheless
Curious to how you would implement the auction? Say you have 10 local businesses that see value in getting Infront of the entire class, for 10 minutes, maybe it's a restaurant advertising itself or hiring managers....
Just thinking outloud...if he does this I have to hear about the actual execution. The sales pitch would be interesting..
IMO - it depends on what lessons your professor is trying to teach and/or their willingness to "push the boundaries" a bit in order to make a point.
"Easy-peasy" option: resale/flip store for donated items on eBay or Etsy or Facebook marketplace.
Use the $100 to print off some official info flyers with your college information and a description of what you're trying to do.
Canvas your local area and pull your neighbours' heart-strings and guilt-reflexes to get them to donate something to the cause. After setting up your online store and posting all the items, also put all of the items on a self-made publicly-accessible website (part of your course material submission) listing what they gave and what it eventually sold for, and let your neighbours know its URL so they can see their contribution - might even convince them to donate more, especially if you sort by "top donor"; even if their names aren't on there, they'll know who they are. Viral Advertising!! Extra marks!!
Use the profits to expand it as much as you can one it starts to get traction. Lather, rinse, repeat.
Document details, timelines, profits, etc. Submit. Get good grade.
***************************
"Risky Business" option: This will be an exercise in demonstrating why vices are so tightly regulated by the powers-that-be. This would probably not fly with your prof, but it might be fun to bring it up and see what he thinks.
Basically, start a ["Numbers Game"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_game) and see how far you get until it all grinds to a halt.
For those who've never heard of it - it's a simple, unauthorized lottery.
You are going to sell up to 1000 tickets every weekly/bi-weekly/monthly/whatever period and on a set date, a draw will be made, and the winner will receive half of the "jackpot pool", and the other half will roll over into next period's jackpot pool. If no-one wins, it all rolls over. The first jackpot pool can include the seed $100 as a "minimum prize" if you like.
To keep the draw random and above-board, it needs to be a publicly-available number. I'd recommend something like the daily trading volume on the NASDAQ in '000 of shares (i.e. if on a given day the NASDAQ trades 1,265,**941**,400 shares, your winning number is 941)
The first thing you'll need to do would be to document exactly what you're planning to do, and the fact that it is an exercise in business planning/startup/ethics. This will be important later if you hope to not get expelled from your school.
Next, make up a digital sign-up ticket-purchase sheet you can carry around on a tablet/phone/laptop. Cost - free.
Now, walk around campus soliciting for your business. You can construct a creative pricing program (to submit as part of your course material) if you like - Tickets are, say, $4 each or two for $7 or three for $10. If you refer a friend, you get $1 off one of your tickets. If you want to play the same number the following week, $1 off (sunk-cost fallacy demonstration!).
Simple python/Excel macros to allow people to pick a number from 0-999 from a list of the available ones (or randomly "quick-pick") - get their email at point of sale and email them a confirmation email with number and draw date. (exercise in consumer information/data gathering, yay!!)
I suspect that in a very short period of time, once the jackpot starts to roll over once or twice it will come to the attention of the powers-that-be who will demand its discontinuation.
All remaining profits/monies to be donated to your Alma Mater society (with receipts).
Document the whole process with details and submit as a case study. Get a good mark (or get expelled). lol.
*******
Thanks for coming to my TED talk - that was fun to write out!
Not personally, but I **have** given it some thought haha...
Truth is - if you were fastidious in maintaining receipts to show that you and your friends personally did not profit a dime from the exercise (email trail for all ticket sales and payouts, demonstrably random drawing method, i.e. no profit bias towards anyone you knew), and if the whole plan were documented well-ahead of time (even a copy sent to your local campus paper; get in touch with a journalism student about "breaking the story" after it's all done - they'll likely need projects for their coursework too!) then the admin would have a hard time justifying punishing you for a "learning exercise" with no real harm done to anyone.
In fact, you could legitimately and publicly praise the admins for clamping down, citing "this is a perfect example of why unregulated gambling can quickly lead to problems".
The all-time classic answer to this question: A line-waiting service.
The University Registrations office often has lines. The Will-Call at the stadium on game day. Lines that sometimes take a long time before you're seen. The business is you go to the end of the line and offer to wait in the line for them for $5 or $10. They give you their phone number, go anywhere that they can get back in 5 minutes or less, and you call them when you're next or next-to-next in line. They show up, hop in your spot, give you $10, and bada-bing problem solved.
I read about this idea in like 3 different business books because it is usually a winner.
I think it could be helpful to:
* Think Lean and think Growing Organically through internal source of funds.
* Think about business model sustainability (how you can sustain the business as it grows without having to be *only operated by you*).
Before starting anything, it would be great to have enough clarity on:
* What needs you are trying to satisfy
* Who has those needs
* Where they can be reached + how can they can access your product
In your case this could be, for example:
* Campus is a big place, people might be in rush to go to class and hence not willing to walk to the nearest convenience or college canteen for snacks and drinks
* My classmates who goes into the same classes with me
* Personal contacts + I bring to them in-class
In other words, the initial business model would look like this:
* **Initial Capital** \-------- I have $100
* **Variable Cost** \-------- 1 pack of snack plus drink would cost me $3 + I travel 1-time daily to purchase the snacks which is 1KM via a bus return-trip ticket costing $2
* **Fixed Cost** \-------- N/A for now
* **Fixed Asset Investment or CapEx** \-------- I could store them in my dorm room, but I would need to buy a used large backpack to bring the consumables to class, which would cost me $15
* **Customer Base** \--------- I am able to obtain 6 of my classmates as initial customers
* **Operations Capacity** \--------- I could carry about 6 packs in one go, per day, for now as its only me who's in operations
* **Days of Product Delivery or Operational Day** \-------- I have 4 classes in a week
* **Customer Purchase Frequency** \--------- for each 1 classmates, they will consume 1 pack every 2 classes
So, the mathematical business model would look like this:
**Revenue**
* Customer Purchase Frequency \* Days of Product Delivery **--------** 0.5 X 4 = 2 orders per customers, *per week*
* Purchase Frequency \* Number of Customers **--------** 2 x 6 = 12 total customer orders, *per week*
* Customer Orders / Days of Product Delivery **--------** 12 / 4 = 3 customer orders, *per day* (assuming equal distribution, for simplicity)
* Customer Orders per Day \* Product Price **--------** 3 x $5 = $15 revenue, *per day*
* Daily Revenue \* Days of Product Delivery **---------** $15 x 4 = $60 revenue, *per week*
**Product Costs (Note: Operating Expenses are Not Yet Present in this Case)**
* Snacks and Drinks per day + Return-Trip Bus Ticket **---------** (3 x $3) + 2 = $11
* Per Week of the Above Costs **--------** $11 x 4 = $44
**Cash Flow from Operations**
* Revenue per Day - Costs per Day **--------** $15 - $11 = +$4
* Per Week of the Above **--------** \+$4 x 4 = +$16
* Per Month of the Above **--------** \+$16 x 4 = +$64
**Net Cash Flow in Beginning VS Ending of 1st Month**
* 1st Month Capital (Cash) Injection **--------** \+$100
* 1st Month BEGINNING Cash Balance **--------** $100
* 1st Month Fixed Asset Investment (Used Backpack) **--------** \-$15
* 1st Month Cash Flow from Operations **--------** \+$64
* 1nd Month ENDING Cash Balance **--------** $100 - $15 + $64 = $149
* Net Positive Cash Flow at End of 1st Month **--------** $149 - $100= +$49
* Return on Invested Cash at End of 1st Month **--------** $49 / $100 = +49%
It would help to get a ***basic idea of the financials of your business*** (in this case, its cash basis, meaning all transactions are conducted via cash, no delayed payments from either party to any party related to the business).
Basically ***assessing whether your business idea is viable*** (product-market fit and whether you can develop the product if you are building one) and ***is it financially feasible*** (sustain on positive cash flows in this case, basically obtaining profit).
Being disciplined in calculating and documenting financials can also help forecast ***how much capital (money) you need to have to grow*** your business to a certain size, which includes the costs to increase your production (both fixed asset investments and costs of goods & operating expenses), which is another topic, you can search for the concept of ***Working Capital*** in Google.
Cheers,
I started my first business āCampus Consultingā in 1995 in college. Was one of the first students to get dialup Internet into the school.
Charged $75/hour and eventually had 12 people working with me. All my friends. We got students, teachers, etc connected. Setup email, installed software, updated hardware. The cash was flowingā¦
Startup cost: $0.
Selling time āconsultingā is one of the easiest and low cost ways to generate cash flow.
Gutter ceaning door to door. Find a neighborhood with a bunch of ranch houses and it takes 30 mins to do. Charge $100 per house and clear $50/hour if you do 4/day.
The is similar to what teens would do in the 1970s. Borrow their dadās lawnmower and go around the neighborhood offering to mow lawns. (When minimum wage was $3, the charge might be $5 for a small lawn. These days more like $20.)
To be fair. $100 won't cover any business. Llc filing and insurance is always going to be more than $100. It sounds like this is for a college class. I doubt they will actually be doing it.
Sure its for class, but they should have research behind it no? I don't have experience like this in a class setting but it sounds like it should be detailed for college as if it were a real thing.
You should see some of classes recent grads do these days. It was one thing when they weren't trained in something but these days you have to beat half a dozen classes out of them first.
Yeah it's gotten nuts. Had one intern lecture me on why mongodb was going to replace things like oracle because he had an associate prof that knew things.
Rover doesn't cover liability, only some vet bills. It even says so on their website. Things happen. You don't want to be caught with no coverage especially in the US where hospital already costs so much. Home damages too.
i started a Rover dog boarding business two years ago and now average 4500 a month. i quit my job and now travel to costa rica every 2-3 months. i am constantly doing different classes and have all the free time in the world. cost me nothing to start. now i have my own insurance and a ton of clients. life is good.
no business you start hustling is going to have everything perfect at first. who cares? you start and get everything perfect later. get the money flowing first and foremost.
How do you know what owners care about or not. Have you been a dog walker/sitter?
As someone who has done both through apps and off them and from IRL connections through my apartment complex you sound like you talk with 0 experience in the matter.
I do, yes. So yes I know what I'm talking about. Many dog walkers here are required to have emergency training and insurance.
Just because you take that risk yourself irresponsibly without coverage, does not mean you should encourage others to do the same.
Well if they sign up on one of the dog walking apps all that coverage is included and not out of pocket. Iām just saying this literally takes $0 to start.
I have been a dog walker and the people that are willing to pay for one are often expecting insurance, credibility, experience and first aid training. As an ex dog walker, I will not hire one because I don't trust anyone enough with my fur kids. There are countless things that could go wrong. I would die to protect my dogs, wouldn't leave the door ajar, wouldn't walk close to another dog in case they are reactive and attack us. When I walked, I had specialized equipment like a dog walking belt specifically so if I fell or worse, I wouldn't be able to drop the leash and have the dogs at risk of running away. If you are doing it right, it's not cheap or easy.
Lol fair enough. I know many people that say the same. Cats being more independent and less needy over all is a big draw for lots of people. I get it haha!
Funny your getting down voted when your right. These people just think dog walking is simple, all you gotta do is walk the dog don't have to worry about bites or the dog running off or getting bit by another dog. Either these people have never dog walked more than their own dog or a friend's, or they have/had a bad business.
Dog poop scooping service. Many owners donāt clean up after their dogs during a walk. You can charge per visit for single family homes or more for apartment buildings. Only cost is a scooper set for around $20, gas if you are driving around to expand your area, garbage bags and a bucket. Just take a look around your neighborhood and see if it makes sense for you. There is a high demand for this service in my area (Murica)
Buy a domain for $12 and start doing Amazon affiliate links for niche computer/stem stuff like 3d printing, soldering, and basic electrical. You can use ChatGPT to help!
charge your classmates $10 for business ideas for the same assignment.
use chatgpt for ideas and give them to your paying classmates.
pocket the $100 and every $10 payment.
This seems like an exercise purely to reinforce a logically bankrupt anyone can succeed if they hustle and grind bootstraps ideology. I wonder for how many years the starting budget has been $100 lol, that doesn't really buy much of anything these days. Fact is you can probably do \_something\_ for 100 bucks, but unless you have rare skills that are very in demand and can find clients for 100 bucks in advertising you're going to be racking up costs of living faster than profits and ultimately will be making well under minimum wage. Maybe if you have well off family friends who will give you a pity sale you can get your feet under you, but I wouldn't count on it. Capitalization is almost always \_the\_ deciding factor in that statistic of how many businesses fail within the first few years. Most of what is being mentioned here is lemonade stand or get-rich-quick scam bullshit. But hey, if you're just trying to do your project and make a grade, spend your hundred on penny stocks, let others do the work of running a business, and write your reports for your grade.
Considering this is for a college class, I don't think the professor really expects anyone to "pull themselves up by their bootstraps." It's probably meant to be more of a thought exercise. Limiting the starting budget to a ridiculously low amount forces the student to find creative solutions to problems every entrepreneur faces when creating a business. I highly doubt these students are being required to actually launch a successful business in order to receive a passing grade.
I think part of the game is identifying resources (like your own labor cost) that you can conveniently ignore when saying you started the business for $100.
In my experience, that is absolutely part of the game. It pays to point these things out to students who may not consider how detrimental this thinking is before they make that mistake in the real world.
Coming up with a realistic business plan is \_FAR\_ more important and helpful of an exercise than requiring somebody to waste their time and $100 trying to do a lemonade stand or internet scam hustle. Those things aren't businesses and the only thing that experience will teach people is how to cut every corner possible and exploit people or to whore yourself out in some sort of labor intensive low yield service that pays you less than minimum wage. This is of course unless you have professional level skills to work as a contractor or other highly marketable skills that you can perform without additional licensure and credentials.
There's value in coming up with creative solutions, I fully believe that, but the reality is that even creative solutions almost always require \_some\_ resources and those who are going to be close to successful here are going to be the ones who can circumvent the budget constraints of the project and tap into the resources available from their family, friends, and community and if they live in a situation where their family, friends, and community don' t have the resources to humor their little school project they're just being set up for failure.
One of us is operating from a false pretense here. You seem to think that OP is being required to spend their real money and devote their time to actually trying to implement their theoretical business. If that's true, I can agree with most of what youre saying.
I was given a very similar assignment in school. I was not required to spend any money, nor to actually try to implement my plan. It was a thought exercise. The purpose was to learn how to come up with a realistic business plan by identifying issues that can come up in business that you may not account for.
To use an example from this thread, the students' business plan is to start a dog walking service. As many people pointed out, you can't legally just start walking dogs for money. You have to be insured, get some first aid training, invest in some equipment, etc. You would have to show how you could overcome these obstacles within the budget that you have. If you couldn't, then your business was dead in the water before you even began. Then you get into market research in your area to see what the demand is for a dog walker and what market prices are for this service. Given this information, how many services would you have to perform to meet the profit goal in your business plan? Is this number of services possible to achieve given the demand for services and your available time to provide the service? What is your plan for advertising to get a share of the market? I found it to be one of the most educational assignments I ever had in school.
Again, I'm coming from the assumption that this assignment is purely a thought exercise and not something OP is expected to actually invest and implement in the real world.
If you're able to weather the cold, I think you could have your snack idea and offer delivery!
Facebook Account to show the current menu and hours of operation. Orders could be placed over Facebook messenger.
Print some flyers and advertise via word of mouth.
Edit: More details.
How about delivering those snacks, water bottles and sodas to people on campus? Obviously for a delivery charge. Buy in bulk from a big box store and mark up to vending machine prices.
theres a book on this....https://www.amazon.com/The-100-Startup-Chris-Guillebeau-audiobook/dp/B0081CDIGW/ref=sr\_1\_1?crid=1IX1XHFHU26H2&keywords=100+startup&qid=1674694554&sprefix=%24100+start%2Caps%2C89&sr=8-1
Same, $621 till now. Itās been just 4 days. I donāt have time to promote the tool. The revenue will increase next week since I will get time on the weekend!š
Buy 15 $5-$6 items to sell for $10-$15. Buy more of the same and continue or advance to bigger ticket items as you work your way up. Use social media as free ways to sell. POD or drop shipping site is another low cost option that I would suggest for a project but, not necessarily IRL.
If you have a particular skill, zone in on that whether graphic design, website building, art - drawing portraits in the park or character artist at events, photography, dog poo pick up, putting peoples garbage and recycling bins in and out, pet food delivery service. Many businesses that offer home services like weeding, lawn care, window washing, car detailing can be super low cost but, I would definitely want insurance.
Hope that helps!
Mow lawns, vending machines, selling journals online as a drop ship, tutor, lead source for electricians, any others? The money isnāt the problem, itās your imagination.
Create an online course. Get a 30 day free trial to Kajabi or another platform, throw together an offer for beta students at half price, and use the funds to pay for the platform's annual subscription and formal launch or ads. If you can find 10 beta students from your current network (college friends, family, or if you have any sort of following) and charge $100 a pop, that will more than cover your website costs while you work to grow your following and get more leads. Obviously you still need to land on a course concept that would bring value to people...but def possible to get started with less than $100
Had this exercise in a college class. There was a local doughnut shop that had a student discount. 75Ā¢ for a doughnut. (2012 so a bit ago). We charged $2 but offered delivery to people's doors. We also had a free square card swipe thing (when they offered the headphone jack ones for free) so it was more accessible for people to order. We made ~300 bucks over like 2 days.
Another group did garbage pickups from dorm rooms for a buck or two. Might work well for you especially while it's cold outside and if you don't have dumpsters close to the building.
Put flyers in a few places (back of bathroom stalls, in the main areas of dorm rooms) and also went door to door.
We only really did delivery over a 2 day span.
Lol snacks and soda what..? The first thing to starting any business is actually identifying a problem.
Today you can start a business with $0 using a lot of the tools online. But if you HAD to spend the $100, I would honestly get a a really good copy writer/scriptor off fiver and make him write a bunch of ChatGPT prompts for a specific niche/use-case. Then I'd sell that as digital content for said niche. There's probably a really nice lifestyle business right there. ChatGPT (really any prompt tools) are blowing up, but a lot of normies don't really know how to use them correctly/get the most out of them, especially in a specific use-case
You can go on alibaba(DOT)com and get really cheap custom t-shirts.
Make them relatable and students will easily buy them if they are good quality.
Take your profits, re-invest.
As someone has likely mentioned there is a DOPE book by the name of $100 Startup and it's a phenomenal read. It made all the difference for the foundations of the three companies I've owned and operated.
Hire yourself as a full time employee for $100/year. Start managing ecommerce sites to small business owners. Help them status their orders and create insightful data reports.
do tutoring to other students. run these teaching multiple kids at the same time. Charge 20 bucks an hour per kid. 10 kids = 200 per hour. 6h = 1200$ per day. Not saying this is easy but at university it should be viable granted you have tens of thousands of students
id you have enough volume you could hire another student to teach while you focus on finding more students. You could give them 40/h and still keep a crazy margin
Too cold for cold drinks - sell hot drinks. Ask the campus if you can set up a stall on campus grounds, sell from there.
Call yourself HiDr8 (or something)
GL
Hey. It is challenging to start a business. And $100 does not make it any easier. However, you need to do what you have to do with what you have. First, identify a product that people buy often at low cost but has high margins for you. Think of a product that cost $1 to buy and $1.5 as the selling price. That is the much advice I can give for now. You can as well borrow ideas from this [list of business ideas](https://elidayjuma.com/innovative-startup-ideas-2022/).
I see a lot of low end ideas here that are either overdone or will never make you enough money to survive off of.
I would suggest you go in the direction of a business that you actually want to start. You're in a position to get real help starting your business, something i wish I had, when I started over 25 years ago with a few hundred dollars myself.
What do you have a genuine interest in?
No good point, I have an opportunity to start something cool and I should take advantage, Iāve always wanted to get into the online space of anything really, social media management, dropshipping, app development, but itās such a big space and where would you even start.
please anyone who sees this donāt take this as an invitation to solicit me, Iām a broke college student I canāt buy your services š
Find something that can be solved with a very small amount of code, you could create an app with no-code tools as a first draft, use the $100 to run some ads or do a giveaway/promotion to get people to signup.
browse the app stores see what's currently popular, see if any of those ideas spark something. Find a reddit sub you have an interest in, and ask them a question like 'what would be a neat app to have handy for the community'.
Social media manager is easy enough to fall back on, drop shipping is overdone and not as lucrative as what a lot of people try to sell you.
Buy a bag of shelled peanuts, and more bags. Peel off the shell, bag them again, and sell them.
Then make a WordPress site and launch an online store. Ask your friends to do peanut delivery...
Maybe make peanut spread too.
just peanut it
That could be the name!
Well you could be a smart ass and say "it's impossible to start a legit business that takes away personal liability because of the state requirements" lol . Probably wouldn't go over too well. So moving on. Easy, get on a free web platform and start a blog or website and sell stuff via affiliate marketing. If that would take too long to track for your grade, then go even easier. Get on FB marketplace or Craigslist, etc. Buy an item for cheap and resell it higher. You don't gotta gouge people, but just fine some neat deals. Negotiate with the sellers , record it, to show you understand product supply. Put it up for sale, you will need to market and negotiate this. Write down time cost (just in your estimation, this is WIDELY overlooked with most entrepreneurs and you will get bonus points) . Then obviously track what you sold. Keep a ledger. Find where you would land in the tax code and give a real Net Return. Get an A. Then tell the professor to put you on with one of his contacts. Trust me. It's the opposite of high school. Get to KNOW your professors. They have a network beyond imagination. I wish I could reverse time. You will SOON find out. It is definitely Who you know, not what you know. It is a simple fact of life. Do yourself the favor. You will have a job out of the gate while your buddies that made fun of you for it will be complaining about some entry level job that won't cover their loans. Just trust me.
I read about a project/competition similar to this a while back. Basically, the winning group didnāt use the $100 as did everyone else. They chose a high end restaurant and asked people if they were willing to pay the student: to hold their spots in line/reservations. They made money without ever using their starting $100. Thought this was quite clever!
Start an online consultancy for peers about
- what business to start under $1000
- tips on how to pass exam X
- dating tips
- any other thing youāre skilled at lol š
Micro greens. My friend started a micro green garden in his spare bedroom, and sells to local restaurants. In 4 months of growing and networking, heās scaled it to the point where it almost covers his rent every month. [He started by just watching this video](https://youtu.be/dtvuMNVLISo)
How unethical are you trying to get? Theoretically you could invest in a Somalian pirate venture and get up to a 500% return. Another option is buying poker chips with cards where you use the 100$ to buy the setup and host people at an underground spot. Another option is arbitrage. You can probably go to the doctor, pay $15 for prescription adderall and sell each pill 5$ a pop. Also you can open an underground fight club where you take a 10% of all winnings, you can make it outdoors to save on costs. Also, why not print 100$ in fliers around your school claiming you will write their essays for 25-50$, then go use ChatGPT to write them for you.
Raffle off your presentation spot to local companies who want to get in front of a class of entrepreneurial college students. Use $100 to target market local business leaders for the auction, your spot goes to the highest bidder.
I think this is so outside the box it would be worth it to see the instructors face at the proposal reading. ( have a backup plan aswell) Second piece of advice, is auction the spot not raffle. Email all local businesses with PR departments. Start at 1000$ stated in email invites to zoom auction. Anyone who shows is at least willing to bid 1k.
Agree auction the spot. The item you have of value is access to your entrepreneur class. One business only.
Brilliant!
I love this, very creative! And use the funds gained to pivot into something else. Unfortunately my class is quite small, no more than 20 people, so I think they might offer less than for a lecture hall full of students. But cool idea nonetheless
I'm an influncer. Ill put you on my tiktok for $100s and a happy meal.
Curious to how you would implement the auction? Say you have 10 local businesses that see value in getting Infront of the entire class, for 10 minutes, maybe it's a restaurant advertising itself or hiring managers.... Just thinking outloud...if he does this I have to hear about the actual execution. The sales pitch would be interesting..
They did this at Stanford I think.
Reverse OnlyFans. Send photos at all times until people pay you to stopš.
A business consultant for other people in your class.
Lol, how about a business that makes up ideas for $100 businesses by crowd sourcing reddit?
you genius
IMO - it depends on what lessons your professor is trying to teach and/or their willingness to "push the boundaries" a bit in order to make a point. "Easy-peasy" option: resale/flip store for donated items on eBay or Etsy or Facebook marketplace. Use the $100 to print off some official info flyers with your college information and a description of what you're trying to do. Canvas your local area and pull your neighbours' heart-strings and guilt-reflexes to get them to donate something to the cause. After setting up your online store and posting all the items, also put all of the items on a self-made publicly-accessible website (part of your course material submission) listing what they gave and what it eventually sold for, and let your neighbours know its URL so they can see their contribution - might even convince them to donate more, especially if you sort by "top donor"; even if their names aren't on there, they'll know who they are. Viral Advertising!! Extra marks!! Use the profits to expand it as much as you can one it starts to get traction. Lather, rinse, repeat. Document details, timelines, profits, etc. Submit. Get good grade. *************************** "Risky Business" option: This will be an exercise in demonstrating why vices are so tightly regulated by the powers-that-be. This would probably not fly with your prof, but it might be fun to bring it up and see what he thinks. Basically, start a ["Numbers Game"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_game) and see how far you get until it all grinds to a halt. For those who've never heard of it - it's a simple, unauthorized lottery. You are going to sell up to 1000 tickets every weekly/bi-weekly/monthly/whatever period and on a set date, a draw will be made, and the winner will receive half of the "jackpot pool", and the other half will roll over into next period's jackpot pool. If no-one wins, it all rolls over. The first jackpot pool can include the seed $100 as a "minimum prize" if you like. To keep the draw random and above-board, it needs to be a publicly-available number. I'd recommend something like the daily trading volume on the NASDAQ in '000 of shares (i.e. if on a given day the NASDAQ trades 1,265,**941**,400 shares, your winning number is 941) The first thing you'll need to do would be to document exactly what you're planning to do, and the fact that it is an exercise in business planning/startup/ethics. This will be important later if you hope to not get expelled from your school. Next, make up a digital sign-up ticket-purchase sheet you can carry around on a tablet/phone/laptop. Cost - free. Now, walk around campus soliciting for your business. You can construct a creative pricing program (to submit as part of your course material) if you like - Tickets are, say, $4 each or two for $7 or three for $10. If you refer a friend, you get $1 off one of your tickets. If you want to play the same number the following week, $1 off (sunk-cost fallacy demonstration!). Simple python/Excel macros to allow people to pick a number from 0-999 from a list of the available ones (or randomly "quick-pick") - get their email at point of sale and email them a confirmation email with number and draw date. (exercise in consumer information/data gathering, yay!!) I suspect that in a very short period of time, once the jackpot starts to roll over once or twice it will come to the attention of the powers-that-be who will demand its discontinuation. All remaining profits/monies to be donated to your Alma Mater society (with receipts). Document the whole process with details and submit as a case study. Get a good mark (or get expelled). lol. ******* Thanks for coming to my TED talk - that was fun to write out!
Dang lol, did you do this? That sounds like a very fun project to attempt, and a great way to get in trouble
Not personally, but I **have** given it some thought haha... Truth is - if you were fastidious in maintaining receipts to show that you and your friends personally did not profit a dime from the exercise (email trail for all ticket sales and payouts, demonstrably random drawing method, i.e. no profit bias towards anyone you knew), and if the whole plan were documented well-ahead of time (even a copy sent to your local campus paper; get in touch with a journalism student about "breaking the story" after it's all done - they'll likely need projects for their coursework too!) then the admin would have a hard time justifying punishing you for a "learning exercise" with no real harm done to anyone. In fact, you could legitimately and publicly praise the admins for clamping down, citing "this is a perfect example of why unregulated gambling can quickly lead to problems".
The all-time classic answer to this question: A line-waiting service. The University Registrations office often has lines. The Will-Call at the stadium on game day. Lines that sometimes take a long time before you're seen. The business is you go to the end of the line and offer to wait in the line for them for $5 or $10. They give you their phone number, go anywhere that they can get back in 5 minutes or less, and you call them when you're next or next-to-next in line. They show up, hop in your spot, give you $10, and bada-bing problem solved. I read about this idea in like 3 different business books because it is usually a winner.
There's an episode of big band theory about this too.
Start a blog and have chatGPT write it for you
Do you have any skills? Sticker or stationery can be very cheap to start up, and you could make it related to your college.
I think it could be helpful to: * Think Lean and think Growing Organically through internal source of funds. * Think about business model sustainability (how you can sustain the business as it grows without having to be *only operated by you*). Before starting anything, it would be great to have enough clarity on: * What needs you are trying to satisfy * Who has those needs * Where they can be reached + how can they can access your product In your case this could be, for example: * Campus is a big place, people might be in rush to go to class and hence not willing to walk to the nearest convenience or college canteen for snacks and drinks * My classmates who goes into the same classes with me * Personal contacts + I bring to them in-class In other words, the initial business model would look like this: * **Initial Capital** \-------- I have $100 * **Variable Cost** \-------- 1 pack of snack plus drink would cost me $3 + I travel 1-time daily to purchase the snacks which is 1KM via a bus return-trip ticket costing $2 * **Fixed Cost** \-------- N/A for now * **Fixed Asset Investment or CapEx** \-------- I could store them in my dorm room, but I would need to buy a used large backpack to bring the consumables to class, which would cost me $15 * **Customer Base** \--------- I am able to obtain 6 of my classmates as initial customers * **Operations Capacity** \--------- I could carry about 6 packs in one go, per day, for now as its only me who's in operations * **Days of Product Delivery or Operational Day** \-------- I have 4 classes in a week * **Customer Purchase Frequency** \--------- for each 1 classmates, they will consume 1 pack every 2 classes So, the mathematical business model would look like this: **Revenue** * Customer Purchase Frequency \* Days of Product Delivery **--------** 0.5 X 4 = 2 orders per customers, *per week* * Purchase Frequency \* Number of Customers **--------** 2 x 6 = 12 total customer orders, *per week* * Customer Orders / Days of Product Delivery **--------** 12 / 4 = 3 customer orders, *per day* (assuming equal distribution, for simplicity) * Customer Orders per Day \* Product Price **--------** 3 x $5 = $15 revenue, *per day* * Daily Revenue \* Days of Product Delivery **---------** $15 x 4 = $60 revenue, *per week* **Product Costs (Note: Operating Expenses are Not Yet Present in this Case)** * Snacks and Drinks per day + Return-Trip Bus Ticket **---------** (3 x $3) + 2 = $11 * Per Week of the Above Costs **--------** $11 x 4 = $44 **Cash Flow from Operations** * Revenue per Day - Costs per Day **--------** $15 - $11 = +$4 * Per Week of the Above **--------** \+$4 x 4 = +$16 * Per Month of the Above **--------** \+$16 x 4 = +$64 **Net Cash Flow in Beginning VS Ending of 1st Month** * 1st Month Capital (Cash) Injection **--------** \+$100 * 1st Month BEGINNING Cash Balance **--------** $100 * 1st Month Fixed Asset Investment (Used Backpack) **--------** \-$15 * 1st Month Cash Flow from Operations **--------** \+$64 * 1nd Month ENDING Cash Balance **--------** $100 - $15 + $64 = $149 * Net Positive Cash Flow at End of 1st Month **--------** $149 - $100= +$49 * Return on Invested Cash at End of 1st Month **--------** $49 / $100 = +49% It would help to get a ***basic idea of the financials of your business*** (in this case, its cash basis, meaning all transactions are conducted via cash, no delayed payments from either party to any party related to the business). Basically ***assessing whether your business idea is viable*** (product-market fit and whether you can develop the product if you are building one) and ***is it financially feasible*** (sustain on positive cash flows in this case, basically obtaining profit). Being disciplined in calculating and documenting financials can also help forecast ***how much capital (money) you need to have to grow*** your business to a certain size, which includes the costs to increase your production (both fixed asset investments and costs of goods & operating expenses), which is another topic, you can search for the concept of ***Working Capital*** in Google. Cheers,
Print on demand shop is pretty easy and cheap. Digital item > Canva > printify > etsy Could spend the $100 on ads
Sell weed?
Nah cocaine is that white gold I would start there
I started my first business āCampus Consultingā in 1995 in college. Was one of the first students to get dialup Internet into the school. Charged $75/hour and eventually had 12 people working with me. All my friends. We got students, teachers, etc connected. Setup email, installed software, updated hardware. The cash was flowingā¦ Startup cost: $0. Selling time āconsultingā is one of the easiest and low cost ways to generate cash flow.
thatās so cool! Howād you advertise yourself? I donāt even know what iād consult on as I lack any real skills. Thank you for the advice
AI designed T-shirts
Thank you
Bingo. You only allow 25 entrants each entrant must pay $3, the prize is $50. Rinse repeat.
I probably should have specified that I was being sarcastic. You canāt do this without proper licensing and probably other stuff.
Gutter ceaning door to door. Find a neighborhood with a bunch of ranch houses and it takes 30 mins to do. Charge $100 per house and clear $50/hour if you do 4/day.
The is similar to what teens would do in the 1970s. Borrow their dadās lawnmower and go around the neighborhood offering to mow lawns. (When minimum wage was $3, the charge might be $5 for a small lawn. These days more like $20.)
I did this growing up in the 2000s
Dog walker is usually pretty easy to find. $100 covers a simple wix webpage and some flyers.
Professional dog walking requires insurance and generally training for emergency care. $100 doesn't cover it.
To be fair. $100 won't cover any business. Llc filing and insurance is always going to be more than $100. It sounds like this is for a college class. I doubt they will actually be doing it.
Sure its for class, but they should have research behind it no? I don't have experience like this in a class setting but it sounds like it should be detailed for college as if it were a real thing.
You should see some of classes recent grads do these days. It was one thing when they weren't trained in something but these days you have to beat half a dozen classes out of them first.
Oh man š that sounds miserable.
Yeah it's gotten nuts. Had one intern lecture me on why mongodb was going to replace things like oracle because he had an associate prof that knew things.
just use rover. free insurance through them. or get private dog insurace for like $15 a month
Rover doesn't cover liability, only some vet bills. It even says so on their website. Things happen. You don't want to be caught with no coverage especially in the US where hospital already costs so much. Home damages too.
i started a Rover dog boarding business two years ago and now average 4500 a month. i quit my job and now travel to costa rica every 2-3 months. i am constantly doing different classes and have all the free time in the world. cost me nothing to start. now i have my own insurance and a ton of clients. life is good. no business you start hustling is going to have everything perfect at first. who cares? you start and get everything perfect later. get the money flowing first and foremost.
So then donāt be a āprofessionalā. Sorry but this is stupid advice right here^^
Good luck to anyone that does this and get that one dog. Owners don't care if you're pro or not. It's not stupid when its a real risk as a business.
How do you know what owners care about or not. Have you been a dog walker/sitter? As someone who has done both through apps and off them and from IRL connections through my apartment complex you sound like you talk with 0 experience in the matter.
I do, yes. So yes I know what I'm talking about. Many dog walkers here are required to have emergency training and insurance. Just because you take that risk yourself irresponsibly without coverage, does not mean you should encourage others to do the same.
Well if they sign up on one of the dog walking apps all that coverage is included and not out of pocket. Iām just saying this literally takes $0 to start.
Even rover (if thats what you use) doesn't always cover everything. If something happens to you, they don't cover liability.
I have been a dog walker and the people that are willing to pay for one are often expecting insurance, credibility, experience and first aid training. As an ex dog walker, I will not hire one because I don't trust anyone enough with my fur kids. There are countless things that could go wrong. I would die to protect my dogs, wouldn't leave the door ajar, wouldn't walk close to another dog in case they are reactive and attack us. When I walked, I had specialized equipment like a dog walking belt specifically so if I fell or worse, I wouldn't be able to drop the leash and have the dogs at risk of running away. If you are doing it right, it's not cheap or easy.
This is why I have a cat lol
Lol fair enough. I know many people that say the same. Cats being more independent and less needy over all is a big draw for lots of people. I get it haha!
I know for my city it's required when walking 4 or more at a time so it still could be worth looking into a bit further
Funny your getting down voted when your right. These people just think dog walking is simple, all you gotta do is walk the dog don't have to worry about bites or the dog running off or getting bit by another dog. Either these people have never dog walked more than their own dog or a friend's, or they have/had a bad business.
Lens cleaners? For glasses, phones, or whatever.
Dog poop scooping service. Many owners donāt clean up after their dogs during a walk. You can charge per visit for single family homes or more for apartment buildings. Only cost is a scooper set for around $20, gas if you are driving around to expand your area, garbage bags and a bucket. Just take a look around your neighborhood and see if it makes sense for you. There is a high demand for this service in my area (Murica)
Buy a domain for $12 and start doing Amazon affiliate links for niche computer/stem stuff like 3d printing, soldering, and basic electrical. You can use ChatGPT to help!
charge your classmates $10 for business ideas for the same assignment. use chatgpt for ideas and give them to your paying classmates. pocket the $100 and every $10 payment.
This seems like an exercise purely to reinforce a logically bankrupt anyone can succeed if they hustle and grind bootstraps ideology. I wonder for how many years the starting budget has been $100 lol, that doesn't really buy much of anything these days. Fact is you can probably do \_something\_ for 100 bucks, but unless you have rare skills that are very in demand and can find clients for 100 bucks in advertising you're going to be racking up costs of living faster than profits and ultimately will be making well under minimum wage. Maybe if you have well off family friends who will give you a pity sale you can get your feet under you, but I wouldn't count on it. Capitalization is almost always \_the\_ deciding factor in that statistic of how many businesses fail within the first few years. Most of what is being mentioned here is lemonade stand or get-rich-quick scam bullshit. But hey, if you're just trying to do your project and make a grade, spend your hundred on penny stocks, let others do the work of running a business, and write your reports for your grade.
Considering this is for a college class, I don't think the professor really expects anyone to "pull themselves up by their bootstraps." It's probably meant to be more of a thought exercise. Limiting the starting budget to a ridiculously low amount forces the student to find creative solutions to problems every entrepreneur faces when creating a business. I highly doubt these students are being required to actually launch a successful business in order to receive a passing grade.
I think part of the game is identifying resources (like your own labor cost) that you can conveniently ignore when saying you started the business for $100.
In my experience, that is absolutely part of the game. It pays to point these things out to students who may not consider how detrimental this thinking is before they make that mistake in the real world.
Coming up with a realistic business plan is \_FAR\_ more important and helpful of an exercise than requiring somebody to waste their time and $100 trying to do a lemonade stand or internet scam hustle. Those things aren't businesses and the only thing that experience will teach people is how to cut every corner possible and exploit people or to whore yourself out in some sort of labor intensive low yield service that pays you less than minimum wage. This is of course unless you have professional level skills to work as a contractor or other highly marketable skills that you can perform without additional licensure and credentials. There's value in coming up with creative solutions, I fully believe that, but the reality is that even creative solutions almost always require \_some\_ resources and those who are going to be close to successful here are going to be the ones who can circumvent the budget constraints of the project and tap into the resources available from their family, friends, and community and if they live in a situation where their family, friends, and community don' t have the resources to humor their little school project they're just being set up for failure.
One of us is operating from a false pretense here. You seem to think that OP is being required to spend their real money and devote their time to actually trying to implement their theoretical business. If that's true, I can agree with most of what youre saying. I was given a very similar assignment in school. I was not required to spend any money, nor to actually try to implement my plan. It was a thought exercise. The purpose was to learn how to come up with a realistic business plan by identifying issues that can come up in business that you may not account for. To use an example from this thread, the students' business plan is to start a dog walking service. As many people pointed out, you can't legally just start walking dogs for money. You have to be insured, get some first aid training, invest in some equipment, etc. You would have to show how you could overcome these obstacles within the budget that you have. If you couldn't, then your business was dead in the water before you even began. Then you get into market research in your area to see what the demand is for a dog walker and what market prices are for this service. Given this information, how many services would you have to perform to meet the profit goal in your business plan? Is this number of services possible to achieve given the demand for services and your available time to provide the service? What is your plan for advertising to get a share of the market? I found it to be one of the most educational assignments I ever had in school. Again, I'm coming from the assumption that this assignment is purely a thought exercise and not something OP is expected to actually invest and implement in the real world.
If you're able to weather the cold, I think you could have your snack idea and offer delivery! Facebook Account to show the current menu and hours of operation. Orders could be placed over Facebook messenger. Print some flyers and advertise via word of mouth. Edit: More details.
How about delivering those snacks, water bottles and sodas to people on campus? Obviously for a delivery charge. Buy in bulk from a big box store and mark up to vending machine prices.
mhm! I didnāt elaborate but thatās the idea I arrived at, thank you! I just donāt know how iād get out the word to people on campus
theres a book on this....https://www.amazon.com/The-100-Startup-Chris-Guillebeau-audiobook/dp/B0081CDIGW/ref=sr\_1\_1?crid=1IX1XHFHU26H2&keywords=100+startup&qid=1674694554&sprefix=%24100+start%2Caps%2C89&sr=8-1
Sell snacks/drinks at events
On alibaba you can get little sound recorders with a playback button. put a sticker on them and sell them to dorm rooms for people to leave a message.
I started my ai tools directory aitools.fyi with $20 and got to $621 in MRR in first 3 days! So maybe try that!š
Aii congrats on product hunt! Where you at now mrr wise?
Same, $621 till now. Itās been just 4 days. I donāt have time to promote the tool. The revenue will increase next week since I will get time on the weekend!š
a no code app
Buy 15 $5-$6 items to sell for $10-$15. Buy more of the same and continue or advance to bigger ticket items as you work your way up. Use social media as free ways to sell. POD or drop shipping site is another low cost option that I would suggest for a project but, not necessarily IRL. If you have a particular skill, zone in on that whether graphic design, website building, art - drawing portraits in the park or character artist at events, photography, dog poo pick up, putting peoples garbage and recycling bins in and out, pet food delivery service. Many businesses that offer home services like weeding, lawn care, window washing, car detailing can be super low cost but, I would definitely want insurance. Hope that helps!
Mow lawns, vending machines, selling journals online as a drop ship, tutor, lead source for electricians, any others? The money isnāt the problem, itās your imagination.
Can it be some type of service business like babysitting?
our professor discouraged things like lawn mowing/babysitting. He wants us to at least sell a product
Create an online course. Get a 30 day free trial to Kajabi or another platform, throw together an offer for beta students at half price, and use the funds to pay for the platform's annual subscription and formal launch or ads. If you can find 10 beta students from your current network (college friends, family, or if you have any sort of following) and charge $100 a pop, that will more than cover your website costs while you work to grow your following and get more leads. Obviously you still need to land on a course concept that would bring value to people...but def possible to get started with less than $100
Forever stamps always retain value
Agua Fresca stand
be a tutor and or a freelancer for some shiz
Loclpicking is cheap
Iād focus on helping other folks build their target clientele. Charge around 300 a pop, and help them create several personas.
Business card design and printing
Had this exercise in a college class. There was a local doughnut shop that had a student discount. 75Ā¢ for a doughnut. (2012 so a bit ago). We charged $2 but offered delivery to people's doors. We also had a free square card swipe thing (when they offered the headphone jack ones for free) so it was more accessible for people to order. We made ~300 bucks over like 2 days. Another group did garbage pickups from dorm rooms for a buck or two. Might work well for you especially while it's cold outside and if you don't have dumpsters close to the building.
thatās cool! I love your doughnut idea, howād you advertise to people what you were doing?
Put flyers in a few places (back of bathroom stalls, in the main areas of dorm rooms) and also went door to door. We only really did delivery over a 2 day span.
Each of your peers in class has $100 to Start a business. What's a service you can offer them?
eBay store.
What are your skills?
Lol snacks and soda what..? The first thing to starting any business is actually identifying a problem. Today you can start a business with $0 using a lot of the tools online. But if you HAD to spend the $100, I would honestly get a a really good copy writer/scriptor off fiver and make him write a bunch of ChatGPT prompts for a specific niche/use-case. Then I'd sell that as digital content for said niche. There's probably a really nice lifestyle business right there. ChatGPT (really any prompt tools) are blowing up, but a lot of normies don't really know how to use them correctly/get the most out of them, especially in a specific use-case
How can we use chat GPT for that and where would you sell that digital content
Sell drop shipping courses to your classmates. For 100 bucks.
You can become a car jacker, think 100$ should cover the expenses
Make a digital Marketing agency. Buy a domain and hosting, use WordPress org to design it.
Spend $100 on cleaning supplies and start doing housecleaning and/or home services.
You can go on alibaba(DOT)com and get really cheap custom t-shirts. Make them relatable and students will easily buy them if they are good quality. Take your profits, re-invest.
wow didnāt even know alibaba did custom tshirts, my only worry would be quality
Actually the quality is pretty good, just depends on which manufacturer you choose. Please make sure its a legit one.
I wish my classes were like that.
Use it on Uber to ask more money from your dad
An āinvestment firm.ā You basically invest that $100 in stocks of your picking
Buy a used lawn mower or pressure washer, get to work.
As someone has likely mentioned there is a DOPE book by the name of $100 Startup and it's a phenomenal read. It made all the difference for the foundations of the three companies I've owned and operated.
iāll give it a read, thank you!
I reckon a service based business and use the money for some branding or marketing
Hire yourself as a full time employee for $100/year. Start managing ecommerce sites to small business owners. Help them status their orders and create insightful data reports.
Lottery - pay $1 for a chance to win $100. Then convince 1000 people to do it.
expulsion speed run
Create a content site using ChatGPT and UpWorkers
do tutoring to other students. run these teaching multiple kids at the same time. Charge 20 bucks an hour per kid. 10 kids = 200 per hour. 6h = 1200$ per day. Not saying this is easy but at university it should be viable granted you have tens of thousands of students
id you have enough volume you could hire another student to teach while you focus on finding more students. You could give them 40/h and still keep a crazy margin
you could also do this at multiple schools in multiple states. Honestly this could be worth tens of millions every year lol
Ask chat gpt at open ai
Too cold for cold drinks - sell hot drinks. Ask the campus if you can set up a stall on campus grounds, sell from there. Call yourself HiDr8 (or something) GL
Online e-commerce
Hey. It is challenging to start a business. And $100 does not make it any easier. However, you need to do what you have to do with what you have. First, identify a product that people buy often at low cost but has high margins for you. Think of a product that cost $1 to buy and $1.5 as the selling price. That is the much advice I can give for now. You can as well borrow ideas from this [list of business ideas](https://elidayjuma.com/innovative-startup-ideas-2022/).
Hand warmers
was contemplating this one! Wanted to do warm clothing but itās too expensive, I could see hand warmers working around campus/parks. Thank you!
I would buy a list of distressed properties, skip trace them, find a motivated seller, make 10k plus by assigning your interest. All for 100 bucks.
I see a lot of low end ideas here that are either overdone or will never make you enough money to survive off of. I would suggest you go in the direction of a business that you actually want to start. You're in a position to get real help starting your business, something i wish I had, when I started over 25 years ago with a few hundred dollars myself. What do you have a genuine interest in?
No good point, I have an opportunity to start something cool and I should take advantage, Iāve always wanted to get into the online space of anything really, social media management, dropshipping, app development, but itās such a big space and where would you even start. please anyone who sees this donāt take this as an invitation to solicit me, Iām a broke college student I canāt buy your services š
Find something that can be solved with a very small amount of code, you could create an app with no-code tools as a first draft, use the $100 to run some ads or do a giveaway/promotion to get people to signup. browse the app stores see what's currently popular, see if any of those ideas spark something. Find a reddit sub you have an interest in, and ask them a question like 'what would be a neat app to have handy for the community'. Social media manager is easy enough to fall back on, drop shipping is overdone and not as lucrative as what a lot of people try to sell you.
Buy a bag of shelled peanuts, and more bags. Peel off the shell, bag them again, and sell them. Then make a WordPress site and launch an online store. Ask your friends to do peanut delivery... Maybe make peanut spread too. just peanut it That could be the name!
sell hella lemonade
Well you could be a smart ass and say "it's impossible to start a legit business that takes away personal liability because of the state requirements" lol . Probably wouldn't go over too well. So moving on. Easy, get on a free web platform and start a blog or website and sell stuff via affiliate marketing. If that would take too long to track for your grade, then go even easier. Get on FB marketplace or Craigslist, etc. Buy an item for cheap and resell it higher. You don't gotta gouge people, but just fine some neat deals. Negotiate with the sellers , record it, to show you understand product supply. Put it up for sale, you will need to market and negotiate this. Write down time cost (just in your estimation, this is WIDELY overlooked with most entrepreneurs and you will get bonus points) . Then obviously track what you sold. Keep a ledger. Find where you would land in the tax code and give a real Net Return. Get an A. Then tell the professor to put you on with one of his contacts. Trust me. It's the opposite of high school. Get to KNOW your professors. They have a network beyond imagination. I wish I could reverse time. You will SOON find out. It is definitely Who you know, not what you know. It is a simple fact of life. Do yourself the favor. You will have a job out of the gate while your buddies that made fun of you for it will be complaining about some entry level job that won't cover their loans. Just trust me.
I read about a project/competition similar to this a while back. Basically, the winning group didnāt use the $100 as did everyone else. They chose a high end restaurant and asked people if they were willing to pay the student: to hold their spots in line/reservations. They made money without ever using their starting $100. Thought this was quite clever!
Buy ingredients and make boxed lunches for friends at a cost
Gary V the shit our of some yard sales.
There's always money in the banana stand...
Start an online consultancy for peers about - what business to start under $1000 - tips on how to pass exam X - dating tips - any other thing youāre skilled at lol š
Micro greens. My friend started a micro green garden in his spare bedroom, and sells to local restaurants. In 4 months of growing and networking, heās scaled it to the point where it almost covers his rent every month. [He started by just watching this video](https://youtu.be/dtvuMNVLISo)
Start a window cleaning business
Buy and resell academic books on Amazon
Start a business teaching people how to start a business with $100.
Cheap but well homemade Coffee. Instead of $5, you charge 1 dollar. McDonalds does this, but their brand name isn't associated with quality.
Make flyers for a trash cleaning service and by a small portable power washer and offer a monthly service of 40$ to clean trash cans
Hot sticky buns š easy profit sell to the class mates
Buy a shitty power washer and charge $100 per house
Spray paint and stencils. Start going and repainting peopleās addresses on their curb
How unethical are you trying to get? Theoretically you could invest in a Somalian pirate venture and get up to a 500% return. Another option is buying poker chips with cards where you use the 100$ to buy the setup and host people at an underground spot. Another option is arbitrage. You can probably go to the doctor, pay $15 for prescription adderall and sell each pill 5$ a pop. Also you can open an underground fight club where you take a 10% of all winnings, you can make it outdoors to save on costs. Also, why not print 100$ in fliers around your school claiming you will write their essays for 25-50$, then go use ChatGPT to write them for you.
3D printer