19 Witty People Who Can Make Money Out of Thin Air

Not everyone can boast that they love their job, and the salary often leaves much to be desired. That is why the stories of people who managed to turn a hobby into a source of income or figured out how to make money out of thin air are fascinating. This article features resourceful heroes just like this.

• My sister and I grew up poor, our parents didn’t give us any pocket money. In fourth grade, my sister came up with the idea of selling handmade bracelets at school to raise some pocket money. However, she quickly got bored with it, and then she asked her craft teacher for advice.
  The teacher decided to help: she showed my sister how to use epoxy glue and how to process wood. Now my sister has a small workshop where she makes handmade jewelry and other fun things for home decor. © Caramel / VK
• A friend makes beaded handbags. I honestly don’t understand what they are for, but people buy them — and sometimes for a lot of money. The friend says that she found the idea online and decided to start her own business. She learned how to make these bags in a fortnight.
  Now, she jokingly says, “And why did I spend 5 years of my life working as an accountant? It turns out that money can be made much easier!” © Caramel / VK
• A Canadian guy, as a joke, put a ziplock of air from near Banff, Alberta on eBay for 99 cents. When he realized he lost money on shipping, he priced the next one at $168 and somebody bought it. He and his partner are now selling a few hundred thousand dollars of bottled Canadian air every year. © Nanojack / Reddit
• Once, neighbors complained that the stairwell smelled like pies for days. It did smell, and for a good reason, because I was testing recipes from my grandmother’s cookbook and baking every night. I jokingly put a note on the door, “Pies to order — call.”
  The next day, I received a call. They ordered 3 pies. Now I have a mini-bakery in my kitchen and regular customers from my own building.

• I couldn’t find a good eyebrow tech! They just couldn’t make my eyebrows right: either the shade was terrible, or the shape was so bad that I wanted to cry.
  At some point, my patience ran out: I watched a ton of videos, bought some paint and tweezers and made my own eyebrows. There were mistakes, of course, but even so it looked a hundred times better.
  Then I went to a training course, studied and found my passion! I gave up my boring job and started doing eyebrows for my friends. Now I already rent an office, and in a couple of years, I feel, I will open my own studio. © Caramel / VK
• I decided to open a new business and bought 2 ordinary vending machines like for coffee, only they didn’t make coffee. They didn’t make anything at all, and they didn’t sell anything. The only thing they had was a compartment for coins and notes.
  The sign said, “The machine doesn’t dispense anything, but you can give it your money.” Sounds silly, but in a week the machines could collect a few thousands. I still have no idea why people threw money into the machines. © Chamber 6 / VK
• I got a mini-income literally from thin air when I worked in an office with panoramic windows. The view from the 25th floor was amazing. I once photographed a sunset over the city, posted it on social media, and got likes and questions, like “Where is it?”
  And one guy even offered me cooperation in a private message — he had his own printing studio, and, as it turned out, there was a demand for panoramic photos in nice frames: some hotels prefer to cover empty walls in corridors with photo art like this. Now he and I have a webpage with customized views and a good income.
• 5 years ago, my grandpa bought a half-collapsed shed for pennies. Everyone laughed at him, “What do you need that wreck for?” And he was saying, “Money is not in the shed, money in marketing.”
  He dismantled the shed to boards, cleaned them, and neatly stacked them and posted an ad, “Selling a rare eco-friendly material for stylish interiors.” The boards were sold out in a week.

• I am 23, and I have my own business. My parents didn’t help me, we have always lived modestly. It all started as an ordinary hobby: I just helped my friends find jobs. I knew who was needed where, who had what talents, and just brought people together.
  One day, a friend jokingly said, “You could start a recruitment agency!” And I decided: why not? I started with a small group in social media, took pennies for recommendations, and then word of mouth did its work. Now I have a company, clients are queuing up, and I’m just happy! © Chamber #6 / VK
• I often order frozen food online, and it always comes in foam boxes. At one point, I had a whole mountain of these containers piled up. For a long time, I thought about how to use them, and then I found out that some people buy them online.
  I posted my ad on a local marketplace, and in a few weeks I got rid of them all. Now, when another order arrives, I immediately put the containers up for sale. It helps me save money. © Sara Tung / Quora
• Once turned up to an office for an interview, however they gave me a pass, desk and access to a laptop and archives after I walked in the door. They kept calling me by my name, so I never thought anything of it. I was there for a couple of weeks indexing and digitizing old documents and once I’d finished the allocation of work my temp contract was up as it was only 2 weeks.
  On leaving, they were going to cut me a check and asked, “How do you spell your surname?” I said, “How would I know I’m called...” The shock on their face as they realized they had given a job to the wrong guy and had called me for the job instead of the knock back. Easiest but dumbest way of making money ever. © Unknown author / Reddit
• In junior high, I bought cinnamon oil at a pharmacy on the walk home. I soaked toothpicks in it and sold them for 5 cents each. I made a lot of money off one bottle considering the cost of it and the boxes of toothpicks. © Hoax13 / Reddit

• When I was a kid, my folks had a little office that had a few staff for their business. Sometimes when they had to work late, I would be bored and crawl under the desk and floors just looking around.
  I would gather all the crud I found. Mostly lost pens, paper clips, staples, the occasional posted notebook... usual stuff people might drop on the floor. I would then gather this stuff and sell it for a few cents, usually to the staff or my folks, I was really young at the time might have been in pre-school and thought I struck rich. I mean 5 cents for a pen!
  I even chose to expand my business to selling water from the cooler for a penny, usually having to run between floors of the building to do it... I don’t think I had the best concept of labor at the time, but boy, that penny felt valuable... © Alex Dolphin / Quora
• About 4 years ago, I noticed we started running out of Ziplock bags quickly every week. Turned out my 10-year-old at the time was mixing gummy bears/worms with Hispanic spices and Chamoy sauce, then selling them at school for $5 a bag. She was bringing in about $100-$150 a week.
  She is now about to turn 15, and I helped her build her candy business, and she has her candies in stores in our city and is still expanding. © TheWizardry90 / Reddit
• I’ve been going to the gym for a few years, and recently a friend joined me. But she didn’t go there to work out, she went there for content: photos, selfies in the mirror, videos with dumbbells, etc. It pissed me off. And then she suddenly said, “Imagine, they’re going to pay me to be a content manager — they liked my stories very much!”
  Now she goes there every day, but it’s for business — she shoots content and gets paid for it. And I’m still sweating and working out. © Caramel / VK

• One day, my wife asked me to make her a necklace out of beads and a hemp twine. I didn’t know how to do it, but I read the tutorial, practiced, and finally I succeeded. I decided to create a website to sell my jewelry, bought a camera, and it was off and running.
  Soon I got orders in thousands, and I bought hemp and beads in containers. Now, when my wife asks me for something, I always remind her that I tend to get carried away sometimes. © Matthew T. Waterhouse / Quora
• I once met a handsome man in a café. I told him about myself and my hobbies, we had a nice chat and exchanged numbers. The next morning, he texted me. I thought this guy liked me.
  But it turns out he was interested only in my paintings. It’s just that I’ve been fond of painting since childhood — I paint for fun, which I told him about in the evening. The man asked if he could look at my work.
  The same day we met, he bought 4 paintings at once and asked me to paint 2 more. He also advertised my work, so now people come to me for paintings from other cities. As a result, I even quit my main job. © Work Stories / VK
• 6 months ago, I was made redundant. And I couldn’t find a new job. To save money, I started to cook my husband food for work: pies, buns, etc. Then in the evening, my husband embarrassingly said that his boss wanted to meet me.
  I thought that they would order lunches from me, but it turned out to be even better. The boss’s wife is in the catering business and she needed a baker. I’ve been working with her for a few weeks now — and so far so good.
• I first went camping with my parents, then with friends, I was a guide in tour companies, and for the last few years I have been organizing tours on my own — from start to finish. And I have come to this conclusion: nothing helps better to sift normal clients from dubious ones as a decent price tag for the work.
  But I have a system of all sorts of funny achievements that give a discount on future tours. For example, “Scout of the Month” for participation in scouting a new route, “Chief Environmentalist” if a person helps to collect and remove trash, “Rain Man” if a person was caught by a downpour, and so on. © Glendor / Pikabu

And these people here have some secret hobbies. Check them out.