Starter Story Sunday Breakfast #12

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Updated: October 3rd, 2022

This is an archive of the Starter Story newsletter, which is read by 225K people every week.

In each issue, we share the biggest business ideas that are working today, along with case studies of founders who are making millions every month. Sign up today ➜

What is the Sunday Breakfast?

It's 5 bite-sized case studies to get you motivated for the week ahead. You can read it in 2 minutes or less.

I hope you enjoy it:

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1. The orange juice 🍊

This side project newsletter reached $2K/month and got acquired

With people sharing their Substack newsletters all over Twitter, this founder was eager to find an idea that allowed him to try the platform. He then noticed lots of people were sharing pictures of their workspaces.

So he put 2 and 2 together and a newsletter about workspaces was born.

Main takeaways from this case study:

The importance of consistency. The newsletter never missed a date, no matter what. Even though he sent over 100 editions before making a single dollar.
Leveraging user-generated content (UGC). Letting users create the content for you takes a huge weight off your shoulders. Making people excited about sharing is a huge win.

2. The coffee ☕️

This former nanny started a $940K/month business

Having been both a customer and a nanny she really knew the pains both sides were experiencing.

The best you can learn from this? How once you’ve validated a business idea in a market, you can quickly expand to other markets by franchising. Specially operations-intensive businesses like this one.

Vetted business ideas are very valuable. That’s why the franchising model still exists. Lots of people will happily pay a fee in exchange for a turnkey business where they don’t have to figure out operations, marketing, etc.

3. The eggs 🍳

This CBD store has grown 450% in 2 years

Yes, being part of a growing trend helps, but it’s not enough to grow at this rate for a couple of years.

This is the third time we interview this founder and it’s amazing to see how they’ve grown from $4,5K/month to $9K/month and now they make $20K/month.

They attribute this incredible growth to these 4 strategies:

SEO. Hired an SEO and now they’re Google’s first result locally and top 5 statewide.
Rewards Program. This has increased customer loyalty; now approximately 50% of the sales come from returning customers.
Email & SMS. Somehow they were completely ignoring this huge channel.
Local Events. Another way to keep their name out there is to sponsor local events.

Make sure to read the full story to get all the details of each.

4. The toast 🥪

This guy started a $36K/year auto detailing business

The best part, though? He only works 3 days per week. As he says: “not a bad deal!”.

With a passion for cars, this founder kept jumping jobs in the automotive industry until he found the perfect combination of:

Doing something that he likes
He’s good at it
There’s an opportunity in the market

Like many people, he wasn’t sure about leaving his job, but he was spending way too much time thinking about starting the business to not do it. If this sounds like you, this story will give you a great dose of inspiration.

5. The pancakes 🥞

This guy has built a websites portfolio that has generated $1M+ in profit

Inspired by a situation a family member was experiencing, he built a site to help people with felonies on their record find a job.

A great niche opportunity that was totally overlooked and underserved.

The result? It was sold for $500K.

What you’ll learn: Great insights on how a true expert plans and works on growing websites with a 100% focus on SEO. No ads, no social media. If you want to level up your SEO, you have to read this case study.

Thanks for reading!

meet the author

David Bustos

Hey there! 👋 I'm David, and if you ever got an email from Starter Story, I probably wrote it. With a background in working with startups and writing, being part of this team is kind of a perfect fit for me.

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