We started this just before spring break of 2017 with $100. I (Nate) convinced Alysha to let me try this crazy idea after showing her all my research. I first scanned every item in our house that had a barcode (Books, games, canned food, etc). After getting together a nice little pile of things that made money, I drove to Walmart to spend my $100. And this is what started it all…
We almost quit after 3 weeks because apparently there was something about our account that got it flagged and even though we had sent all of this stuff to Amazon, none of it was listed for sale. Well after Alysha got her angry teacher voice in touch with someone from Amazon we were finally able to get our account activated. 2 hours later and we had already sold a few items. Within 24 hours we had sold over $100 worth of stuff and had made back our investment.
The idea of “Oh my gosh this actually works!?!?!” was a never ending topic in our house for the next few weeks. For the first 4 months we mostly did thrifting, garage sales and retail arbitrage in the clearance sections since this usually has the highest ROI (Return on investment). We wanted to get the most bang for our buck and didn’t mind putting in the leg work to find them items.
Because we were both teaching full time, we eventually started to have more budget then we had time to spend (A very weird problem we thought we would never have). At this point we branched out into Online Arbitrage and wholesale. We also hired some help packing and “de-stickering” products. We grew our business while teaching for a year and a half, never paying ourselves, and continuing to roll all profits back into our business.
The first time we paid ourselves was to use a payout to put a downpayment on our house. At the end of the school year, we quit our jobs and started working solely for ourselves for the first time. It exhilarating and terrifying to run your own business, but we loved the newfound freedom that came with working for ourselves.
Fast forward to now, and we sometimes have to pinch ourselves that this is our life. We both are home full-time, and after becoming licensed foster parents in 2019, we were insanely blessed to finalize the adoption of our two precious children in April of 2020. It’s overwhelming to see our goals and dreams play out before our very eyes. Our Amazon business is thriving, we’ve hired employees to free up some of our time, and after helping guide multiple friends and family members in starting their own Amazon business, we made the leap to start teaching others outside our immediate circles. We saw a gap in the Amazon community, and realized that there were very few positive and uplifting spaces for beginners to learn. We also noticed that while there are many knowledgeable Amazon sellers, effectively teaching others how to do it was a skill we could contribute with our teaching background. Thus began Hustle Buddies.
As always, we just want to share a bit of our story and knowledge and hopefully it helps someone else along the way! There is plenty more that I could say about our story, but this gives you an idea. If you have any questions or you want to hear about any aspect in particular, leave a comment below!
