Lucy Zheng has been building flank businesses since 2012, whenever she was looking to supplement the earnings from her archetypal job out of law academy and pay downward pupil loans.
Her archetypal project was a manner blog. "Blogging was a huge item rear in 2012," she told Business Insider. It was additionally cheap to get into. Aside from a "semi-decent camera," she said, "there was practically no cost."
Over the former 14 years, Zheng and her hubby have tried a range of ventures, from Etsy shops to a bounce-house business.
Not all of them worked, but all project gave Zheng skills she used to communicate the next. Her manner blog taught her website-building and graphic-design skills, which she and her hubby used to create a bodily wedding planner. Later, their cognition importing the planners and operating alongside abroad factories helped them commencement a genuine asset sign business.
"Everything builds on material we did in the past," she said.
Her biggest flops
More than a decade of flank hustling has inevitably brought failures.
Zheng and her hubby formerly tried to market tote bags made from recycled plastic. They bought concerning 50 bags, built a website, and promoted the endeavor on social media, but following concerning three months alongside no sales, they close it down.
A men's leather-hat endeavor additionally unsuccessful to obtain off.
"Businesses alongside bodily products and inventory, particularly in the manner space, are not an uncomplicated item to get into," Zheng said. "If you don't have a really good, firm scheme of action, it can be extremely difficult to keep running."
The shove toward additional passive earnings streams
Zheng has additionally close downward businesses that made prosperity but proved too time-intensive. Her manner blog, for instance, generated earnings through sponsored posts and advertising, but lone whenever she was actively creating content.
"If I wasn't operating on a blog post, afterward I wouldn't be making money," she said. That realization led her to YouTube. The longer-form videos took period to make, but could continue to create ad income equal years following she uploaded them.
Zheng additionally ran a profitable Etsy planner shop for five years, marketing digital inserts and bodily accessories. It generated six figures, she said, but she close it downward in 2025 following fulfillment, inventory management, and the betterment of new designs became too time-intensive.
Just since item is profitable doesn't average it's automatically value scaling, she said. When she close downward the planner shop, her goal was: "How can I create additional prosperity using small of my time?"
That led her rear to satisfied creation, which now brings in prosperity through five chief channels: brand deals and user-generated content, affiliate marketing, digital products, phase payments, and a paid community. Zheng stated the endeavor has grown to equivalent her lawful income, although it remains energetic work.
"You have to create the videos and create the content," she said. "If I go on vacation, if I get sick, I can't create the videos — and if I don't create videos for lengthy enough, the money's going to stop."
Her long-term goal is to build earnings streams that don't depend on her regular output. She plans to keep investing in rental properties — she owns long-term rentals in Detroit — and is operating to build a paid community and newsletter that are small reliant on her.
"The day that I awareness really financially autonomous is the day that I can shield my family's living expenses through passive income," she said.
A low-cost way to commencement earning flank money
Zheng stated the finest location to commencement depends on the resources you have. For group alongside excess funds but small liberated time, she stated she's had achievement alongside options trading, focusing on covered calls and cash-secured puts. Those strategies necessitate chief and transport risk, however.
For group alongside period but small prosperity to invest, she recommends satisfied innovation — specifically, user-generated content, or UGC.
UGC creators create videos for brands to use on their own social-media accounts or in advertising. Unlike traditional influencer deals, the creator does not necessarily need to have an spectators or article the video on their own account.
To get started, Zheng recommends making three or four example videos that display your editing and storytelling skills. You can afterward use them as part of your portfolio whenever pitching to brands or applying for gigs.
The equipment requirements are modest: a smartphone, a approximately $10 tripod, and, if you need to movie at night, a $15-to-$20 circle light. Editing tools specified as CapCut and Instagram Edits are free.
"You fair movie videos on your own time," she said, "edit them alongside liberated software, and afterward commencement pitching yourself."
