Cool Money Making Ideas For The Summer

Okay, it's summer. Everyone's getting hot and bothered, but instead of sweating buckets and letting the heat get to you, why not make the summer sun work to your advantage? Here's a couple of cool money making ideas you could try.

Sell and rent swimming pools
If the family can't go to the pool, why not bring the pool to the family? Go house to house with a catalogue of colorful kiddie pools and family sized portable pools. How to get your stock? If it's the smaller kiddie sized ones, you can get them from plastics wholesalers in bulk at a lower cost or you could act as an agent for companies that sell portable swimming pools. You profit by charging your own markup.

Beach gear
Set up a stall at the beach selling inflatable toys, sun tan lotion, swim suits and other beach gear. Don't confine yourself to just beach gear – use the breeze to your advantage – sell bubble blowers, kites and balloons.

Teach Water Sports
Since everyone's heading to the beach, if you're an expert surfer or windsurfer or jet-skier, teach those who can't. You'll need your basic training equipment – that means extra surfboards etc. for your students. Charge by the hour for express lessons or by the days for longer, detailed coaching.

Drinks and Fruit Smoothies
Everyone needs to drink lots of water when it's hot right? Set up a stall selling good old fashioned lemonade or healthy fruit smoothies. You'll need a heavy duty blender and a supply of plastic cups for this.

Flavored ice
If you know where you can rent a couple of meat freezers, you could make flavored ice tubes. Fill small hot-dog shaped plastic bags or ice cube trays with flavored drinks and stick them in the freezer. They're cheap to make and you can mark up the price for a nice profit. Sell them by the bags or tubes. Kids will love popping in a cube or two now and then to cool off.

Snowballs and snow cones
Shaved ice is a wonderful thing. You can scoop them into wafer cones or just pack them into snowballs and pour colored flavoring on them and voila! you have snow cones and snowballs. No limit to the number of flavors you can offer. You'll need an electric ice shaver if you expect a large crowd or the good old fashioned hand operated ice shaver which is cheaper. Both require careful handling lest you end up with red ice – if you know what I mean!

Cooling Station
Do you stay far away from the beach or local swimming pool? Do you have a front yard or open space with lots of shady trees? Open up a cooling station serving drinks, ice cream and snacks. Get a couple of wading pools for the kids to splash around in or maybe a couple of sprinklers. Make extra money by renting water shooters. Make it a family fun place.

Summer clothes
Sell summer clothes – vests, shorts, bandanas and slippers. Set up a stall to customize them with iron-on summer motifs or hand painted messages. Get your stock from clothing wholesalers or factories to keep your cost low.

Personal Cooling Accessories
Skin tends to get dry and hot in the summer. Ladies are more bothered about this, so sell face freshener sprays and mini battery operated fans. These are handy items that they can carry in their handbags and use to cool down. Contact your local novelty or electrical wholesaler to get cheap mini battery operated fans.

Pet Baths
Humans aren't the only ones who get hot and bothered in the summer. When dogs get hot and sweaty, they're ideal breeding grounds for fleas. They also start to smell. Help busy pet owners keep their pets cool and clean by offering pet baths.

Water adventures
Organize one-day water adventures – kayaking, trips to a waterfall, scuba diving, snorkeling. Make sure you're qualified to do this and take all the necessary safety precautions. You want this to be a money maker, not lose money with possible lawsuits!

Things you'll need to consider.
You'll need to keep your costs as low as possible. This means finding suppliers who can offer the lowest price. It would be ideal if you could work out an arrangement where you act as an agent for that supplier or only have to pay for stock that is sold. That way, you won't be left holding unsold stock when summer's over.

You may need to invest a small amount of money to obtain equipment or supplies. Work out your cost and price your products accordingly. You will need to check with local authorities about licensing or zoning laws governing your temporary business. Many local authorities issue temporary trading licences which are renewable every month. Check out your local laws especially with regards to food businesses. Keep things legal and you won't have to worry when you're busy making money! Cheers!