Businesses You Can Start from Home

Ann Turner is Financial and Budget Manager, University of British
Columbia Library.

Calling all entrepreneurs and would-be entrepreneurs! There’s bound to
be a business that’s right for you in this vast smorgasbord of
suggestions for marketable products and services. From raising pheasants
to writing story plots, these are realistic ideas that could be
developed into full- or part-time home-based businesses with relatively
little start-up capital and varying amounts of hard work. But that’s
all they are—ideas. It is left to the reader to research the idea,
examine the marketplace, check out suppliers and distribution systems,
and prepare the business plan.

The ideas are grouped in broad categories, such as “Appliances,”
“Retail,” and “Special Services,” and arranged alphabetically.
It is possible to scan them via the table of contents, but an index
would have been very helpful in guiding readers to particular types of
business or product. Each idea is accompanied by coding that indicates
the range of estimated start-up costs; whether the business would be
appropriate for handicapped persons; whether the idea requires
permission from local authorities; and whether it is suitable for rural,
urban, or other locations. The book’s introduction outlines the steps
in setting up a home-based business, the legal considerations, and the
self-discipline required when you are your own boss, and your home is
the workplace.