These are probably products that come out of freelancing. You see a pattern of a problem that needs to be solved in a domain and couple the product with you consulting. You get a bit of revenue from the product, but maybe also from an ongoing consulting relationship.
Ask HN: What are 100K dollar ideas but not million dollar ideas?
121–130 of 208 posts
Re: Ask HN: What are 100K dollar ideas but not million dollar ideas?
#122Earlier quoted context omitted.
Custom gaskets and orings seems like a great and relatively simple business. Have you tested the idea?
Other than asking my mechanic if he would buy from me (answered strong yes), no, I have not tested it. I look forward to seeing the Launch HN or product hunt launch if you or someone runs with it. It could be run out of a small town near to an airport somewhere, 2-3 employees. Website could have where in the queue your job was. Complementary goods for extra margin could be in small, specific lubricants (food grade, h…
I had this same idea a few years back while rebuilding my classic Suzuki GS850 motorcycle. Parts and gaskets are not hard to find for most old Suzukis (thankfully) but there are plenty of older motorcycles, cars, and other engine-related equipment where if you need a gasket, your only option is to make one. Many gaskets are intricate enough that making one by hand is extremely time-consuming, and that's assuming you have the tools and skill to make a gasket. (Even many experienced mechanics don't.)
I hit on the idea when my wife bought a vinyl cutter, which is basically a 2D plotter with a knife instead of a pen. I don't know if anyone makes an affordable cutter that can cut through gaskets (the material is thick and full of knife-dulling materials like fiberglass, metal, and carbon) but if they do, this is a totally doable business. I envision a web site where users can select an existing gasket from their database and have it cut and shipped. Or, if the gasket they want isn't yet in the system, they can draw it out using a vector tool (perhaps tracing over an uploaded photo or scanned image of the gasket). Select the material, provide credit card info and shipping address, and you get a gasket in a week or less.
I wouldn't mind working with someone on this. My strong suit is not coding but I'm okay at project management, research, and architectural stuff. If anyone is interested in chatting about it, feel free to contact me.
Re: Ask HN: What are 100K dollar ideas but not million dollar ideas?
#123I've got a whole bag full of em: https://unvalidatedideas.com/archive The only problem is I can't tell you which ones are the 100k ones... I've got a hunch that this one is solidly 100k and not million+: https://unvalidatedideas.com/editions/11 Got all the hallmarks of an idea that is hard to profit/scale: - selling to developers - content-based (so often very manual at the beginning) - absolutely boring (to some peo…
There are lots of players in the enterprise space for compliance and security of software, e.g. Black Duck. I think the trick would be to figure out where those solutions are lacking for smaller dev teams and try to serve them
Re: Ask HN: What are 100K dollar ideas but not million dollar ideas?
#124If your company is paying you $100,000 a year, then whatever it is you're working on this year is worth $100,000 to your company.
Not really, that is just a lower bound. Companies are incentivized to pay the least amount possible for labour regardless of productivity, so long as it profitable. If a company pays somebody 100k a year, it means that (1) the value produced by this person is larger than 100k and (2) the company is confident that they can find somebody else to do the job for 100k in case the worker asks for a raise.
> the company is confident that they can find somebody else to do the job for 100k in case the worker asks for a raise.
More like, the company is willing to pay more but won't do so until the worker asks for a raise, in my personal experience.
Re: Ask HN: What are 100K dollar ideas but not million dollar ideas?
#125Earlier quoted context omitted.
> the ability to expand to multiple employees/crews is there as you expand. Finding reliable, motivated employees who will work for you and not themselves is the challenge that makes this type of business exceptionally hard to scale, from what I’ve been told.
You're well beyond $100k/yr at that point. A single person with a lawn mowing company can make $100k/yr.
How much is profit on that?
Re: Ask HN: What are 100K dollar ideas but not million dollar ideas?
#126There was one I looked into building to solve a problem, which was gasket printing. If you are having motorcycle or other engine repair done, waiting for a gasket can take a week or sometimes more depending on supplier location, and it's something printed from gasket paper. A website where you can print aftermarket gaskets on demand, and even do it with CAD files or derive them from edge detection in photos would mak…
I love this idea. I've been desperate enough to reuse gaskets in a few repairs, and suffer oil leaks down the line. Usually it was because of back ordered gaskets that would be weeks or months out. Riding season in Canada is short, so... Take the risk and reuse. If you can ship in a week, I'm a customer.
Re: Ask HN: What are 100K dollar ideas but not million dollar ideas?
#127There's always room at the bottom in logistics and scheduling. Find a local business that currently depends on guesswork, intuition and experience in managing their inventory or supplies or other shipments. Every bakery and independent pizza shop has point-of-sale software now, but how many have back-end software that reads the sales figures and can tell them to order [sugar, flour, cheese] before they run out? Even…
> Every bakery and independent pizza shop has point-of-sale software now, but how many have back-end software that reads the sales figures and can tell them to order [sugar, flour, cheese] before they run out? Huh, I basically just spent my entire week working on this for our bakery (and the last 6 months on other software and systems like recipe management, team messaging, online sales, social marketing and more). W…
You should check out Toast and Xtrachef.
Re: Ask HN: What are 100K dollar ideas but not million dollar ideas?
#128Not looking to promote my site here but I will do it anyway because it may be useful for you: https://microfounder.com There are currently 200 founders making $1.6M per month with their solo startups.
Why should i join microfounder and not stick with indiehackers which is free?
Why not both for SEO and backlinks?
Re: Ask HN: What are 100K dollar ideas but not million dollar ideas?
#129My startup ideas :) I've been designing and building audio software and hardware components for musicians since I was a teenager. VST plugins to start, then moved on to digital guitar effects and now Eurorack synth modules. I've also built custom midi controllers, traditional guitar pedals, you name it, I've designed and built it. I have absolutely no doubt that I could build a small, semi-successful company around t…
Fascinating! Every time I read articles or papers on advances in ML I always daydream about their application to guitar tone, synth and sound design. I wonder how long until I can analyze a song section as input that allows me to play that exact tone/synth?
Re: Ask HN: What are 100K dollar ideas but not million dollar ideas?
#130Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're well beyond $100k/yr at that point. A single person with a lawn mowing company can make $100k/yr.
How much is profit on that?
It's mostly profit. You have the upfront cost of equipment but then you're just paying for consumables like fuel. Its basically a manual labor job of converting your time and effort into money.