Businesses You Can Start for $100 or Less

This isn't a list of hypothetical ideas. It's not "50 side hustles for 2026" pulled from thin air. These are real businesses started by real people for very little money, drawn from a study of more than 1,500 people who built businesses earning $50,000 or more a year.

How to pick (and how not to)

Before you scan for what sounds cool, you need a filter. In the book I call it convergence: the overlapping space between what you care about and what other people are willing to spend money on.

Picture two circles. One is your passion and skill. The other is usefulness to others. The business lives in the overlap. Miss one circle entirely and you've got a hobby nobody will pay for. Or a job you'll hate. Neither is what we're after.

Here's the other thing people miss. You're probably good at more than one thing. I call this skill transformation—you take what you already know and apply it in a new context. Teachers are good at communication, adaptability, crowd control, lesson planning. A waitress named Kat Alder realized her people skills transferred directly into PR work. She didn't go back to school. She just reframed what she could already do.

So don't look at the businesses below and think "I could never do that." Ask instead: what do I already know that someone else would find useful? That question is the starting point. Everything else follows from it.

Started for under $100

These people spent almost nothing. Some spent literally nothing. And they all built businesses earning $50,000 a year or more.

Chelly Vitry — $28

Chelly started food tours in Denver with $28. Twenty-eight dollars. That was her total startup investment. She built a food tour business from that, eventually earning around $60,000 a year. The business was her knowledge of Denver's food scene, packaged into an experience people would pay for. The $28 was basically a rounding error.

Nicolas Luff — $56.33

Nicolas's entire startup cost was a business license in Vancouver. Fifty-six dollars and thirty-three cents. That's what stood between him and running his own business. He started in 2000—before the tools were as cheap and accessible as they are now—and still managed to launch for less than the cost of a decent dinner.

Tara Gentile — $80

Tara invested $80 and built a publishing business that grew past $75,000 a year. Her business grew so quickly that her husband ended up staying home too. Eighty dollars to a household where both adults work for themselves.

Susannah Conway — $0

Susannah started teaching photography classes in England. When someone later asked her "What did you not foresee when starting up?" she answered: "I didn't know I was starting up!" She wasn't executing a business plan. She was doing something she loved, and people started paying for it. Sometimes that's how it works.

Michael Hanna — $0

Michael lost his corporate job. A friend offered him access to closeout mattresses, so he found an empty car dealership, set up shop, and started delivering them by bicycle. No startup cost whatsoever, and he told me he'd never been happier.

Started for under $500

A little more capital, but still less than most people spend on a weekend trip.

Chris Dunphy & Cherie Ve Ard — $125

Chris and Cherie invested $125 to start Technomadia, a software consultancy for healthcare providers. They built it past $75,000 a year while living on the road. A hundred and twenty-five bucks. Less than a car payment.

Jaden Hair — $200

Jaden started Steamy Kitchen for $200 as a recipe developer and food publisher. That initial $200 led to cookbooks, TV offers, and corporate sponsorships—all because she was really good at cooking and knew how to share it.

Amy Turn Sharp — $300

Amy invested $300 to start a handcrafted toy company in Columbus, Ohio. Three hundred dollars in materials and she was in business.

Jen Adrion & Omar Noory — $500 ($250 each)

Jen and Omar pooled $250 each to start their maps business. They sold out their first print run in ten minutes, and within nine months they were both doing it full-time.

Started for under $5,000

Still a fraction of what most people think you need. Nobody took out a business loan. Nobody pitched an investor. These are credit-card-and-savings-account amounts.

Charlie Pabst — $3,600

Charlie was a store designer for Starbucks. "One day I drove to work and realized I couldn't do it anymore." He spent $3,500 on a computer and $100 on a business license, then launched a freelance design business. He now earns around $100,000 a year doing the same kind of work—just for himself instead of for a corporation.

Michael Trainer — $2,500

Michael bought a camera for $2,500 and started a documentary business in New York City. He later sold the camera for a profit, which means his actual net startup cost was even lower than $2,500. The camera was an investment that literally appreciated.

David Henzell — $4,000

David left the largest ad agency outside London and invested $4,000 to start Lightbulb Design, his own agency. He told me: "For a while the illness managed me, but now I manage it. Lightbulb started as a way for me to make a living on my terms." Four thousand dollars to buy his freedom.

The instant consulting path

There's no "consulting school" or degree. You can start a new business as a consultant in about one day, if not sooner. Of all the paths in the book, this one is the fastest from zero to revenue.

Two rules make it work:

Rule 1: Be specific. Don't be a "business consultant" or a "life coach." Get specific about what you can really do for someone. "I help dentists get more five-star Google reviews." "I help restaurant owners cut food waste by 20%." The narrower you go, the more valuable you become.

Rule 2: Don't underprice. No one values a $15-an-hour consultant, so don't charge that. Since you probably won't have forty hours of billable work every week, charge at least $100 an hour or a comparable fixed rate for the benefit you provide. When you price too low, people assume you aren't good enough. Price for the value you create, not the time you spend.

That's it. Pick a specific skill, find people who need it, charge what it's worth. You can be operational by tomorrow.

The information publishing path

Selling what you know—packaged into something downloadable—is one of the most profitable paths in the book. You create it once, then sell it over and over. Here's how, in eight steps:

1. Find a topic people will pay to learn about
2. Capture the information: write it down, record audio or video, or combine formats
3. Combine your materials into a downloadable product
4. Create an offer (this is different from just having a product—you need to frame the transformation)
5. Decide on a fair, value-based price
6. Find a way to get paid (a free PayPal account works to start)
7. Publish and get the word out
8. Cash in and head to the beach (this step may require further effort)

Brett Kelly did this with an ebook about Evernote. He wrote a comprehensive guide, sold it as a PDF, and earned over $120,000. From a PDF. About a note-taking app. He was good at using it, people wanted to learn, and he packaged his knowledge into something they'd pay for. Classic convergence.

Purna Duggirala did it from India, teaching people how to use Excel. He went from earning $136,000 to over $200,000. Excel. The spreadsheet software that's been around since the 1980s. Turns out a lot of people will pay to finally understand pivot tables.

Brandon Pearce took a different route but the same principle. He was a piano teacher who built Music Teacher's Helper, a software tool for other music teachers. It reached $30,000 a month. He lives in Costa Rica now.

The pattern is always the same: find the thing you know that others want to know, turn it into a product, sell it while you sleep.

More from the study

A few more, because I want you to see the range:

• Lisa Sellman built a dog-care business earning $88,000 a year.
• Kelly Newsome left a $240,000 lawyer job and started Higher Ground Yoga. She earns $85,000 a year now—less money, immeasurably more freedom.
• Megan Hunt makes hand-crafted wedding dresses and accessories from Omaha, Nebraska. Her marketing strategy? "My marketing plan is strategic giving." She gives away value—time, knowledge, connections—and the business comes back to her.

These aren't unicorn stories. Nobody went viral. Nobody got lucky on Shark Tank. They found the convergence point, started cheap, and kept showing up.

6 steps to get started right now

Not next month. Not after you "do more research." Right now. Here's the minimum viable path from the book:

1. Decide on your product or service. Doesn't have to be perfect. Pick one and move.
2. Set up a website, even a very basic one. A free WordPress site is fine. You can upgrade later. You probably will. But don't let "I need a better website" become the reason you don't start.
3. Develop an offer. This is distinct from a product or service. An offer frames the transformation—what someone's life looks like after they buy. (Your First Sale walks through this in detail.)
4. Ensure you have a way to get paid. A free PayPal account is enough to start. Don't let payment processing become a six-week project.
5. Announce your offer to the world. Email your friends. Post on social media. Tell people what you're doing. The world can't buy from you if it doesn't know you exist.
6. Learn from steps 1 through 5, then repeat. Your first attempt will teach you more than any amount of planning. Adjust and go again.

That's it. Six steps. You could do all six this weekend if you wanted to. Most of the people in the study started exactly this simply.

Frequently asked questions

What if I don't have any special skills?

You're probably good at more than one thing. The book calls this "skill transformation." Teachers are good at communication, adaptability, crowd control, lesson planning. A waitress named Kat Alder turned her people skills into a PR career. Write down everything you're good at—not just job titles, all of it. Organizing events, explaining complicated things simply, cooking for groups, navigating bureaucracies. Somewhere in that list is the seed of a business.

Do I really need less than $100?

No, and that's not quite the point. The average startup cost in the 1,500-person study was $610.60. But many people started for well under $100, and some started for nothing. The point isn't that you need to spend less than a hundred bucks. It's that money isn't the barrier. The decision to start is the barrier. If you're waiting until you have "enough" saved up, you're waiting for the wrong thing.

What's the fastest path to income?

Services and consulting, hands down. You can start the same day. There's no consulting school—just pick something specific you can do for people, charge at least $100 an hour, and find your first client. Digital products (ebooks, courses, templates) take longer to build but scale better over time because you create them once and sell them repeatedly. Pick based on your situation: need money this week? Services. Building for the long run? Products.

Can I start while keeping my day job?

Almost every person in the study did exactly that. Evenings. Weekends. Lunch breaks. Gary Leff earned $75,000+ from his travel consulting side business and never quit his full-time job. Kelly Newsome left her $240,000 lawyer salary, but only after her yoga business was already earning enough to support her. You don't have to leap. Build the bridge first, then cross it.