Find Financial Freedom

When times get tough, like they are at the moment, it makes sense to look at ways to mitigate the effects of a downturn in the economy and the potential risk of losing one’s job. It was with this in mind that I thought it would be a good idea to examine some of the various ways we can all build an additional income alongside our main source of income.

There are only really two ways that you can earn extra money in your spare time, and they are either from getting a part-time job, outside your normal working hours, or starting up a part-time business that can be run around your day job.

Part Time Jobs

The great thing about part-time jobs is that there are always lots of part-time jobs going because, by their very nature, the role isn’t suited to longevitiy. Most people will use a part-time job as additional income or to fit in around their other commitments. Part-time jobs rarely lead to better positions, so when workers get dissolusioned or need to earn more money, they move on and find a more suitable vocation.

Below is a list of potentially easy to do, low skilled (and low paid) but ultimately readily available part time jobs that for most people (assuming they work a nine-to-five) can fit around their existing work:

• Bar work - pubs, wine bars, hotels, night-clubs are always looking for new bar staff. If you live in a university town, the summer holidays will be a time when a lot of these jobs come up as the students return home for the summer.
• Waiter / Waitress - restaurants, cafe’s, hotels will always need waiting staff. In certain establishments, there will be a small amount of skills required (silver service), however it’s not exactly rocket science - you simply serve food using a spoon and a fork - which can be trained very easily.
• Baristas - the posh word adopted by the Starbucks / Costa / Coffee Republic’s of this world, used to give their coffee serving staff a sense of importance, however, there are always jobs going at these places, as with bars, the summer holidays will see a big transition of workers, so is a good time to pick up this kind of work
• Kitchen assistant - sometimes referred to as a KP (kitchen porter), this is general ad hoc duties working in a commercial kitchen. This could include washing up or food prep (though generally the unskilled stuff like peeling potatoes). Hotels, restuarants and larger pubs will always have a high staff turnover for these kind of jobs, so they are a good place to look. There are also specialist catering services recruitment agencies, one that springs to mind is Berkeley Scott (I used them myself when I was a student).
• Evening merchandiser - the most elaborate way of describing a “shelf stacker” that I’ve ever heard, but it is an actual job description from an old client of mine, who stacked shelves overnight in a well known discount retailer. Plenty of work to be had here, not going to be well paid, but if you want easy, mindless work with a bit of exercise thrown in, then this would suit well.
• Fast food delivery - work for a well know chain, like Dominos or Pizza Hut, or your local takeaway, there is always work for delivery drivers. Peak hours are after normal working hours so easy to fit around your other work, and for some reason, for this kind of work, the pay is usually around £7 an hour, plus all the tips you’ll likely get (usually the spare change from a £10 or £20 note, but it mounts up).

Granted none of these jobs will earn you masses of money, but you may be able to scrape together £40 for an evening’s work that can be fit around your other work, which could over a month be more than enough to pay for the mortgage.

Part Time Businesses

There are a multitude of different business opportunities that can be reasonably lucrative, relative to the amount of time spent on them, thus making them well suited to supplementing your income from a full-time job. There are some opportunities that are what’s called “turn-key”, while others are slightly more complicated and will require a small degree of business sense to get going. However, having said that, none of these opportunities are capital intensive and so the barriers to entry are really your own motivation and belief in yourself and your ability to run a part-time business.

• Leaflet delivery - local businesses are always looking for reliable people to deliver their marketing communications (fancy word for leaflets) to their potential customer base (fancy way of saying local houses). Here’s a great article and discussion about how to start a leaflet distribution business for under £200 which I’ve also commented on.
• Network marketing - sometimes also known as multi level marketing, network marketing leverages the power of your personal contacts as a sales channel and also by signing up contacts as distributors, with you making a small commission on your distributors’ sales. I wrote a post about this, please read passive income opportunity in the health and wellbeing market for a breakdown on a real life network marketing opportunity. I’ve also in the past looked at becoming a distributor for a company called Utility Warehouse, I even set up a website for it at Piggy Bank Savings.
• Hobby business - if you already have hobbies that you are passionate about, then why not try and make some money out of them? You’ll never find the work to be a chore if it’s already something you are passionate and excited about. With the internet, it’s even easier to start a small web-based business around your existing hobbies. I run a blog about my own hobby, though it’s not a traditional hobby, my body building and fitness blog is a way of me keeping a training diary and writing posts about fitness and weight training and in doing so, making a bit of money from it to help pay for my gym membership and the various supplements that I take each month.
• Franchise businesses - there are a lots of different franchise opportunities, ranging from McDonalds restaurants (which are capital intensive and full time) down to snacks and chocolate vending machine businesses that require little capital outlay and minimal effort - the vending machine does all the work - all you need do is re-stock every week. I found a useful website for browsing the various franchise opportunities that are available, http://www.franchisedirect.co.uk/ and here’s some more useful posts and discussion about franchises.

So you can see that there are a lot of different opportunities available to make an additional income around your existing work commitments. Some of these may not be suitable for you, and some of them you may think are beneath you (I certainly wouldn’t want to be stacking shelves, but I would if I had no other option). The thing to remember is that a part time job or businesses, is just that - part time, it’s not your full time role, it’s not what defines you, merely a way of earning a little extra money to supplement your income during the testing economic times ahead.

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