Starting a business as a student carries a few extra challenges: you’d likely be working with a very small starting budget and you won’t have much work experience. But this doesn’t mean you have nothing to offer. Like any other place, a school campus is filled with people who need things—things that you can provide, even if you don’t know it yet.
Ready to find out what you can offer? Here’s our list of some of the best business ideas for college students.
1. Tutoring
Since you’re already in a university, why not continue the theme of learning? If there are academic subjects or courses you’re especially good at, you can offer tutoring services for fellow students who are struggling. There’s a lot of flexibility with this business idea: you can tutor one-on-one or in a group, incorporate your own exercises and tests, and make the format anything from a sit-down lecture to a discussion while walking in the park.
Source: Pexels
- Difficulty: Low to medium. If you’re already experienced with the subjects you have in mind, teaching the same concepts to others won’t be too difficult. You’ll need to coordinate tutoring sessions with other students who may have schedules different from yours.
- Initial investment: Low. You won’t need much besides the subject matter knowledge you already have, and a few hours per week (or whatever schedule you set for yourself) to teach it.
2. Creating Study Guides & Summaries
What if you want to share your knowledge or help other students learn, but don’t want to offer in-person tutoring? An alternative is to create and sell study guides or lesson summaries. You can condense lessons and lectures into short one-page guides or bullet-point summaries that students can use to supplement their own learning, review tricky material, or prepare for a test.
- Difficulty: Low to medium. You’ll need to take some time and effort to go through each lesson and summarize the key points for a study guide. However, once you’ve done this, all that’s left to do is advertise and sell your product.
- Initial investment: Medium. If you’ll be selling hard copies of your study guides, you’ll need to print enough copies for all your buyers. If you plan to deliver your product via soft copy, you’ll need access to a computer and a file-sharing system.
3. Paper Editing & Proofreading
Schoolwork often means writing long and complicated papers or theses, and students often end up cramming or rushing these due to their heavy workloads. You can help them improve the quality of their work (and thus their grades) by offering editing and proofreading services for the papers they intend to submit. You wouldn’t be writing the papers for them, of course—just checking their work for grammatical errors, clarity of ideas, and efficient structure. You can also choose to give as much or as little input as you’d like about the actual content of each paper.
- Difficulty: Medium. While the proofreading or editing process itself isn’t overly difficult, you may end up needing to do this for many papers, each with a submission deadline. Be sure to balance these deadlines with your own schedule and available free time, to avoid overcommitting yourself.
- Initial investment: Low. You won’t need anything besides a device on which to read and leave feedback on each paper; a laptop, or even your smartphone, will work just fine for this.
4. Freelance Writing or Design
If you’d like to expand your customer base beyond just fellow students, you can try your hand at freelance writing or design. This can include copywriting for marketing or sales, technical writing for products, reviews, ghostwriting, academic writing, creating graphics and visual elements of a website, and more. As you complete writing projects, you’ll gain skills and experience that will make you more attractive to bigger clients down the line.
- Difficulty: Medium to high. The difficulty will depend on your current skill set and experience level, as well as what kind of writing you’ll be doing and the clients you’ll be working for. In any case, you’ll need to adapt to a significant workload, deadlines, and changing client needs.
- Initial investment: Low to medium. You can perform freelance writing and design tasks with just a laptop, though having various software programs will make you more effective. You can also look for free or paid training courses to help you improve your craft. Canva, a free online template editor program (with paid premium features), is a great choice for creating graphics and presentations for design work.
5. Food Preparation & Delivery
While the image of a penniless student living on ramen noodles might be a common stereotype, it doesn’t have to be the reality. Everyone needs to eat, and busy students may appreciate a service that prepares healthy, convenient meals and delivers them straight to dorm rooms or study halls.
There are lots of marketing possibilities with food preparation: you can emphasize the speed, convenience, or nutrition of your meals, as well as cater to student-athletes, vegan eaters, large groups, and more. If you’ve got some skill at whipping up a nice cup of coffee, this is a potential food product as well.
Source: Pexels
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- Difficulty: Medium to high. Food preparation can be labor-intensive, depending on the kind of food you are making as well as the quantities. You’ll also need to factor in the time and effort required when delivering your meals to various spots on campus. You may also need health department certifications and insurance.
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- Initial investment: Medium to high. Your starting capital needs will depend on what kind of food you plan to make, but at a minimum you will need ingredients, basic cookware, and lots of food containers, as well as a licensed space in which to work. In many locations, you’ll also need a health department permit. It is also a good idea to get food vendors’ insurance. This will protect you and your business if one of your customers develops a food-borne illness.
6. Cleaning Services
As with preparing your own food, cleaning your living space is something we should all be doing—but often just can’t find the time to do. Get paid to solve this problem for your fellow students by offering cleaning services for dorm rooms or other living spaces. If you’re willing and able to expand beyond the university campus and offer cleaning services to nearby residential areas, by all means, do so. In either case, be sure to bring a large bucket of elbow grease.
- Difficulty: Medium to high. Cleaning services are all about physical labor, especially if you start out as your only employee. Exactly how much work you’ll be putting in will depend on the type or depth of cleaning you offer, the size of the space, and how many clients you’ll be serving per week or month.
- Initial investment: Low. Basic cleaning equipment is all you’ll need to begin—think brooms, mops, rags, and cleaning solutions. If your clients have their own cleaning supplies and are willing to lend these to you, that’ll reduce your starting costs even more.
7. Errand Running
“Convenience is king” is a phrase that will never be far from true in business, and that applies to students as much as to busy working professionals. Make your clients’ lives a little easier by running errands for them—doing laundry; walking or looking after pets; getting vehicles filled up, maintained, or cleaned; picking up packages; doing groceries; and more.
Everyone always has a million errands to get done, so you won’t lack for tasks to perform. Be sure to stay on top of time management, deadlines, and keeping track of all the things you need to do.
- Difficulty: Low to medium. You may not know exactly what your client needs done until they tell you on the spot, so be as flexible as possible. Juggling a dozen small errands in the space of a few hours will likely be a bigger challenge than any single task you need to perform.
- Initial investment: Low to medium. The only thing you’ll really need is a smartphone to stay in touch with clients and update them on your progress. Having your own vehicle might be useful, but may not be strictly necessary (depending on the errands you’ll be running).
8. Child Care/Nannying
One advantage you have as a student is that you might have a more flexible schedule than a person with a full-time job does. That means you’ll often be available at times when they’re busy. This makes child care services for busy full-time workers a great business choice for a college student.
Of course, it’s not as easy as signing up and getting the job. You’ll be looking after children, so you need to sell yourself as trustworthy. Start with your own network to get your first few clients—friends, family, or friends of family. Do a good job, and you’ll likely get recommended to others for more work.
- Difficulty: Medium to high. The difficulty will vary based on several factors: the number of hours, number of children to look after, and even the temperament of the children. Be as patient, reliable, and flexible as you can, and don’t underestimate the difficulty and importance of keeping a bunch of tiny humans in line.
- Initial investment: Low. You will need a smartphone to stay in touch with the parents, and it may be helpful to have your own vehicle so you can get to your clients’ homes. But aside from these, you won’t need much in the way of starting capital.
9. Photography
If you have a passion and skill for taking great photographs, plus a quality camera, you’re in business for offering photography services. This can range from contract work for clients or organizations, to commercial photography for companies, to something more personal like pet photography or even online dating profile pictures. Be sure your equipment and photography experience match what the client is looking for. As you get more work under your belt, build a portfolio to showcase your work to potential new clients.
Source: Pexels
- Difficulty: Medium to high. Your clients will have high expectations, so you’ll need to really know what you’re doing to sell your skills as a photography specialist. You should have an understanding of photo composition, background, and lighting principles.
- Initial investment: Medium to high. You’ll need a high-quality camera at the very least. Depending on the types of photography you offer and your clients’ needs, you may also need flash equipment, camera stands, and other accessories.
10. Name, Image, & Likeness (NIL) Collaborations
On the slightly more ambitious end of businesses to start in college students are name, image, and likeness (NIL) collaborations. This refers to acting as a brand representative for certain companies and businesses and using or promoting their products. A common example is a student-athlete teaming up with a sportswear business and wearing their apparel or footwear for a certain period of time, such as the length of a college sports career.
- Difficulty: Medium to high. The difficulty of this endeavor will depend on the exact terms laid out by the sponsoring company. You should expect to have to show a certain level of commitment, such as using certain clothing or equipment for a couple of years or acting as a representative or brand ambassador at events.
- Initial investment: Low. You will likely not have to put up any initial investment for this kind of deal; in fact, it may be a surprise to you that you get picked at all. The sponsoring company should take care of most or all expenses involved in the deal.
How to Start a Business as a College Student
The basic guidelines for starting a business don’t change much if you are starting one as a student. You’ll be working with a few extra limitations such as finances and mobility, but you can absolutely blow through these hurdles with enough dedication and planning.
Here are some steps you can take to maximize the assets you do have when starting a business as a student:
Take Stock of Your Assets
While you may not have a ton of starting capital, you possess other advantages that full-time working professionals may not have. Depending on your class schedule, you might have some free time during the hours when your clients are busy working. This means you can run errands for them, work on writing and design tasks, or perform cleaning services while they are away.
If your clients are students as well, then you already have an idea of what kind of services they want. That means it won’t be difficult to set up tutoring services or study guide products.
Prioritize Services Over Products
While you can build a successful business from either selling products or providing services, the latter is a better option for students with busy schedules, little capital, and not much experience.
By offering services, you’ll avoid the costs of purchasing large quantities of products, as well as the headache of storing and maintaining an inventory. You’ll also be able to choose when to provide the service you are offering, meaning that you can fit your business around your class schedule. Finally, offering services is a simple and low-risk way to practice basic business skills like marketing, obtaining and interacting with clients, and setting and negotiating prices.
Market & Network Aggressively
Because this is likely your first serious attempt at starting a business, you don’t have much experience to fall back on, and no reputation or standing to speak of. This might sound like a limitation, but it’s actually a good thing, too! You don’t have much, but that also means you have nothing to lose. So market your services as energetically and creatively as you can, and network as extensively as possible.
Print out funny posters and plaster them all over your campus. Tell all your family members and friends about your business ideas. Stand up in front of all your fellow students after a class, and announce your new tutoring or dorm-cleaning or errand-running gig. At the very least, people will remember your boldness; and at best, you’ll net your first few paying clients.
Related reading:
- Local Marketing Ideas to Attract & Retain Customers
- Direct Mail Ideas to Market Your Small Business
- Creative Digital Marketing Ideas
Embrace Feedback
Because you might not have much business experience yet, it’s possible (even probable) that you’ll fumble a few things at first. You might underestimate the time it takes to clean a dorm room or prepare 10 meals for delivery. You might overbook yourself and nearly run late for a client or two. You might miss a crucial point when editing or proofreading someone else’s paper.
If your clients aren’t too happy with your first crack at doing a task for them, they’ll let you know. When this happens, don’t lose heart. Listen to their feedback, make adjustments to the way you do things, and be sure you don’t make the same mistake again. And remember that a few instances of failure aren’t the opposite of success, but a part of the whole process.
Don’t Give Up!
Starting a business is never easy, and it’s not going to be any different if you are a student. You’ll face challenges like miscommunication, annoyed clients, lack of time to get everything done, and just a whole lot of unpredictability and chaos.
Take a deep breath, and take a step back to look at everything as a whole. This is your first big business venture; it was never going to be a smooth ride all the way through, and that’s okay. Even seasoned entrepreneurs sometimes make mistakes and feel like they’re drowning.
If you need to, scale back or press pause on your business in order to find your feet again. Don’t sacrifice your grades just to keep your business afloat. You can always let your clients know that you need to pull back for a bit to prioritize your schoolwork—they will understand (especially if they are students themselves). And if they don’t understand and get angry instead, then maybe they aren’t really clients worth keeping.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Click through the sections below to learn more about possible business ideas for students, as well as how to start a business as a student.
Service-based businesses are the simplest and easiest options. Try tutoring, editing and proofreading papers, freelance writing, preparing and delivering food, cleaning, or running errands.
Take stock of all your assets (time, flexibility, knowledge of fellow students’ needs and wants); choose what kind of product or service to provide; market your business creatively and boldly; gather all the feedback you can; and don’t give up!
Starting a business is challenging for anyone! As a student, you’ll probably be working with less initial funding than someone with a full-time job. However, you do have some advantages, such as a flexible schedule, more free time than a busy professional, and a better understanding of what your fellow students want and need.
Bottom Line
Being a student with an unpredictable class schedule and limited experience and capital doesn’t have to be a roadblock for starting a business. You have little to lose and everything to gain. Use our list of business ideas for students to choose a service you can offer, connect with your first few clients, and get the ball rolling!
