Sharing Economy Business Ideas
The sharing economy continues to grow as more opportunities become available. You can launch anything from a jewellery rental business to errand running platform, here are 10 sharing economy business ideas:
241. Jewellery Rental
Beautiful jewellery for special occasions can be expensive. As an alternative you can rent jewellery of all kinds to clients for their once-in-a-lifetime events.
How to start this business idea
You’ll either need to negotiate with jewellery shops themselves or you can buy the items yourself and rent them out. Keep in mind you’ll need to take out insurance in case the items don’t return.
How to keep this business idea successful
Once you’ve amassed a collection or a network of jewellery stores, you can begin to offer other accessories and items to rent.
242. Flexible, Shareable Workspaces
Flexible, sharable workspaces are opening up all over the world as people want to be able to collaborate and don’t need static offices to work from.
How to start this business idea
You need to purchase a property and convert it into various styles of offices. You’ll need an open plan section, some offices for people who need privacy for client meetings and board rooms for larger meetings.
How to keep this business idea successful
To keep your building occupied, create a collaborative engaging atmosphere. Offer events in the evening where entrepreneurs can give talks and offer advice. You can even create brainstorming events.
243. Attire Buy, Sell And Swap
There are some men and women with cupboards full of clothing they no longer want to wear. You could create a business where you offer to buy, sell and swap clothing.
How to start this business idea
You can offer a subscription service for customers to have access to your clothing collection. This business idea allows people to clear out their cupboards and find great clothes on a budget.
How to keep this business idea successful
You can also diversify your business by offer rental formal or professional wear for both men and women.
244. Carpooling Marketplace
Develop a platform where people can meet new people during their daily commute to work. This is exactly what consumers are looking for to reduce their impact on the environment and reduce congestion on the road.
How to start this business idea
You’ll need to create a marketplace where passengers can meet drivers and organise their daily commutes. You can offer a subscription service for those wanting to use the app.
How to keep this business idea successful
You can even expand this business to include businesses, allowing employees to commute together.
245. Sporting Goods Rentals
There are many people who enjoy out of the ordinary sports, but the equipment can be expensive, and they don’t need to use it on a daily basis.
How to start this business idea
You can offer to rent sporting equipment to consumers who don’t need the equipment enough to warrant investing in it. You can rent items like skis, bicycles, surfboards, jet skis and golf clubs.
How to keep this business idea successful
Remember that different sports are popular at different times of year, so keep stock on offer and discounts in the offseason and pre-bookings in the on-season to ensure customers aren’t disappointed.
246. Peer-to-peer technology lending service
A high-tech product like a cooking robot, a drone or a cleaning robot are expensive. You can create a platform that allows users to try out high-tech products before they buy them.
How to start this business idea
You’ll need to create a marketplace where owners of high-tech products and users looking for high-tech products can meet. For every interaction the users earn points which give them discounts on product rentals and other gifts. This inspires people to lend out their own high-tech products.
How to keep this business idea successful
You’ll need to keep expanding the community, offer high quality insurance and create a safe community where users feel safe lending their technology to others.
247. Parking space rental platforms
In busy areas or near transportation hubs, parking can be in high demand. You can launch a platform that allows residents to rent out their parking spaces.
How to start this business idea
You can start a park sharing company in your community to improve convenience for those visiting your areas and maximise resources for residences not using the parking space and looking to make a little extra money.
How to keep this business idea successful
Once your platform is successful in your area you can expand it to include neighbouring suburbs or even neighbouring towns.
248. Education sharing platforms
You can start an education platform that offers courses from industry experts and helps students to learn in a convenient and affordable way.
How to start this business idea
Once you have the platform set-up you can approach professors and professionals in their industry looking to earn passive income from knowledge they already possess. When you have enough courses, you can advertise your platform at high schools and universities to attract student to pay for the course.
How to keep this business idea successful
Increase the variety of your courses and attract more students and users looking to upskill themselves.
249. Peer-to-Peer Bike-Sharing Start-up
Create a marketplace for bike-sharing to allow people to rent out their bicycles, while they’re at work or when they’re not using them.
How to start this business idea
You’ll need to find a large amount of people willing to rent out their bicycles to earn extra money. Once you have a marketplace you can start connecting owners to renters and charge a subscription for all those on the platform.
How to keep this business idea successful
Once you have the platform running in a specific area you can expand to cover the whole country and then you can expand what you offer on the platform.
250. Errand running platform
For people looking to make extra money doing errands or tasks there are companies like TaskRabbit in America. For South Africans looking to make extra money running errands and doing menial tasks there isn’t really a marketplace.
How to start this business idea
Create a platform where people who want to complete tasks and people with tasks can meet and help each other out. Through your platform you’ll offer a thorough vetting service for both parties and insurance in case anything goes wrong.
How to keep this business idea successful
The idea for this is to keep it growing so that people completing tasks could potentially make enough money to support themselves. To reach that point, you’ll need to advertise your platform to busy professionals and students. You want a balance of the amount of tasks on the platform and the amount of people completing tasks.