💸 Make $70/day pressure washing trash cans

GM. Happy New Year! This is Work "After" Work, the newsletter that's going to help you achieve all your finance-related resolutions for 2023. Cheers! 🥂

Here's how we're starting the week:

• 🚮 Pressure washing garbage cans

• 😂 Meme of the day

THERE'S REAL MONEY IN THIS DIRTY BUSINESS

You all must’ve heard the phrase, “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure.”

In today’s newsletter we’re going to make that phrase a reality. Today's side hustle, pressure washing garbage cans, is easy, affordable, and can be done without learning any new skills - just follow a few steps!

A little fun fact: The average American produces and throws away 4.4 pounds of trash per person every day.

All that trash ends up in their trash cans. Garbage day rolls around and your local garbage truck comes and takes it away. And if you're a big procrastinator, this might be you that morning:

Sounds about right but is your trash can really clean after the garbage truck empties it? You guessed it, nope. Every week you say hello to leftover gunk in your garbage can.

This gunk invites rats, ants, possums, raccoons, and other rodents to make your garbage can their rent-free home. Not to mention, it just smells like a garlic and fish market had a food fight inside of it.

That's what this side hustle is solving. Not the rodents, you won't catch me doing that. Preventing them from ever getting there in the first place.

Sell your pressure washing services to clean up your neighborhood's garbage cans. You’d be surprised at how many money people are willing to pay you for a one-time cleaning fee or a monthly service to clean up those nasty things!

Here’s an example of what The Clean Can Company charges for pressure washing.

How much can you make?The real answer is: it depends. If you live in a wealthy area where prices are generally higher, you can charge a higher price.

I've done a fair amount of research on pricing and the highest I've seen is $50 for the first can then $20 for every can after that. After all, this is a dirty job that many aren't willing to do so you can charge a higher rate.

A good rule of thumb is to make sure you're getting a high hourly rate because you're not going to be doing this for 8 hours straight. You want to make those 1 or 2 hours a day count.

Try $25 for the first can and $10 for every can after that. If it takes you an hour to clean both, which I don't think it will, that's $35/hr. Do this twice a day and you're washing an extra $500 every week - not too shabby 💪

Now usually I'd stop there and get into the steps but today we've got a 2 for 1 for ya. Kinda like a buy one get one free, but everything's free.

As I was researching about power washing, I found myself constantly watching satisfying shorts on power washing. And these videos had a ton of views. #satisfying on TikTok has 377B views.

Then the light bulb went off. There's also a huge opportunity here to create content around the work you're doing.

Here's a YouTube channel called Forever Self Employed who started his channel with a pressure washing business. It's a simple setup - just a tripod and a GoPro.

According to Social Blade this channel pulls in $35k-$573k annually.

And he's gained over 400k subscribers in the past year 👀

Just like this channel does, record yourself washing, in post talk about how much money you made, and even create a course for your followers (that's what he does).

I can't tell you how many TikTok's I've watched of satisfying cleaning videos. There's a real market for before and after content.

Now let's get into it. Here's a step-by-step guide to getting started

1. Buy a pressure washer

The first step is obviously to buy a pressure washer. Don't spend $1000’s on the expensive commercial grade ones.

The pressure washers on Amazon that go for around $150 will do just fine - like this one.

Just make sure whatever pressure washer you buy has a soap attachment that allows you to spray soap on the trash cans before you actually pressure wash them.

For the soap, you can buy any cheap soap solution from Amazon or make a watered down mixture of Dawn dish soap.

2. Spread the word, get those customers

When it comes to acquiring customers there are a couple of ways you can go about it.

Joining Facebook groups and posting Facebook ads is a great idea to get jobs in your area. You can also try Craigslist but I think you'll have better conversions on Facebook.

If not those, you can go the tried and true method of creating professional looking flyers or cards and go door to door selling your services. The personal touch will always do the best.

If you do go this way, stack the deck in your favor when talking to a potential customer.

What do I mean by this? When I used to shovel snow to make money when I was younger I would use the fact that I'm a young hustling kid saving for college.

Give people a reason to give you a shot and crush it when they do 👊

You could pitch it like this: -

“Hi, my name is Faares and I was wondering if you'd like to have your garbage cans pressure washed. One quality wash can remove all the smelly gunk that attracts pesty rats and possums that can later get into your house. I start with a soapy solution to thoroughly break up the grime and smell and finish with a power washing to leave it clean and pest-free.”

When they ask for the price say what you think is appropriate for your area. Don't go lower than $30 for both cans. Remember it's a dirty job with sometimes years of guck, don't undercut yourself.

3. Get power washing!

Now that you've got your equipment and clients, it's time to start making those trash cans look like a newborn baby.

Create a system that works for you and makes you more time efficient so you can finish as many jobs as possible.

Let's do some quick math about what you can makeI'm going to assume you'll make $30-$70 for every job you do. It will take time but once you're able to get 2 jobs per day, that's $210-$490 a week. Keep it going and that's $900-$2,100 a month.

When considering the cost of the pressure washer and soap at $200, you'd only have to do 3-6 jobs to break even. I know you can do that.

Whenever you get a booking, set it up for after work, get the pressure washer out and pay your gas costs, Netflix subscription, and a good chunk of your grocery bills for the month.*and don't forget to record it for YouTube!*

MEME OF THE DAY

That's a wrap for today ladies & gents!

DISCLAIMER: None of this is financial advice. This newsletter is strictly educational and is not investment advice or a solicitation to buy or sell any assets or to make any financial decisions. Please be careful and do your own research.