Creative Business Ideas..

How to Start a Travel Service

          Downturns in the economy can't stop it. Weather conditions can't shut it down-at least, not for long. Even the catastrophic events of 9/11 couldn't derail it. It, of course, is the travel industry, and while the economy and unforeseen incidents that tragic day in September have tended to slow down the pace of travel, the industry continues to enjoy robust activity despite challenges that are enough to send other industries into tailspins. No doubt that's because people will always want or need to go places, whether it's to a business meeting or conference, to spend the holidays with Grandma in another state, or just to enjoy some much deserved R&R.

    This overall need to travel that's shared by average citizens and corporate denizens alike means that this is an excellent time to launch a travel services business. The travel industry is huge. Research by the Travel Industry Association of America (TIA) indicates that the travel and tourism industry generates $1.3 trillion in economic activity in the U.S. every year. That's equivalent to $3.4 billion a day, $148 million an hour, $2.4 million a minute and $40,000 a second. No wonder the opportunities for aspiring travel services business owners abound.

   Today's travel services experts offer a wide array of valuable and time-saving services to individuals, groups and corporate clients. Besides acting as ticketing agents for the airlines, cruise lines, railroads and other modes of transportation, they also engineer complex itineraries. They suggest exotic destinations that might appeal to adventurous customers, then dole out advice on how to get passports and visas. They offer timely information about important travel advisories. They help coordinate all the details necessary to stage a special event, like conventions or weddings in tropical locations. And they know exactly who to contact to arrange a lei greeting at an airport or to have the body of a client's loved one shipped home.

Different Paths

   Here's a brief look at the five different types of travel service businesses covered in this article, and in Travel Services start-up guide:

1. Homebased: If you want to keep your overhead low and your profits high, this could be the type of business for you. Thanks to the internet, homebased agents have at their command all the same tools that used to be available only at a traditional brick-and-mortar travel agency. The internet also has delivered another important advantage to homebased travel services: Such businesses are no longer expected to be brick-and-mortar. After years of buying books online, bidding and selling in online auctions, and paying bills online, customers today are very comfortable buying all kinds of services via the internet-and in fact, they look rather askance at companies that do not have an internet presence since they want to surf for information day and night.

It's also important to note that it's possible to run any of these five types of businesses from the comfort of your home, although specialty/niche businesses, corporate businesses and franchise business are the most likely to be based in a brick-and-mortar facility.

2. Independent contractor: If you like working in a traditional travel agency but love the freedom of being your own boss even better, then working as an independent contractor in the travel industry could be the right move for you. Independent contractors make their own hours (with the needs of the travel agency in mind, of course), build their own client list, and are solely responsible for paying their own way at tax time. At the same time, they benefit from having a physical office where they can meet with clients, pick up walk-in business, and drop the name of an established agency when they make cold calls or follow up on leads. That gives you the type of credibility that can be very valuable when you're just starting out on your own.

But you don't have to be present physically in someone's office to be an independent contractor. Some travel agents, like Bill Jilla, an independent contractor in Florida, handles travel arrangements and other services for an established company right from the comfort of his home office, although he also has worked as an independent contractor in a brick-and-mortar travel agency.

3. Specialty/niche business: Since leisure travel makes up 80 percent of total sales in the travel industry (according to Plunkett Research), there are plenty of opportunities for entrepreneurs who want to offer specialty travel services. You can get into the field in more than one way. First, you can offer tours and packages tailored to the interests and needs of particular groups. Second, you can choose to offer very specialized niche services that will appeal to a very narrow demographic. For example, California entrepreneurs Michael Chu and Ying Liu offer a highly specialized set of services to business travelers to China. Third, you can offer luxury travel services. For example, on entrepreneur we've met offers charter airline services to top-level business travelers and another arranges stays in luxury villas in both the United States and abroad.

4. Corporate travel: Actually a type of niche travel service, corporate travel has been singled out in this book because of the various opportunities it offers. But beware, it can be difficult to break into this particular field. A lot of companies already have their own in-house staff or have been dealing with the same travel agency for eons. However, new companies of all kinds with no previous travel agency ties spring up all the time and may be open to the idea of having their own travel service, while others may be looking for a new company because they aren't entirely happy with the job their existing travel agency is doing. Conversely, you might be able to land a spot as an independent contractor or homebased agent on a travel agency team that already has an established clientele. Either way, there is money to be made for the right entrepreneur.

5. Franchise: If you like the idea of launching a "plug and play" business that is ready to go right out of the box, then a travel services franchise could be your ticket to success. With a franchise, you purchase the rights to use a tried and true concept, as well as the name recognition and business procedures that come along with it. However, you do have to conform to the franchisor's established methods of doing business. In addition, the best franchisee is a person who has been successful in a previous career, because, of course, franchises don't run themselves and a basic knowledge of established business practices is necessary.

Creating a revolution with honeycomb paper

Honeycomb Packaging Education and Training

      Honeycomb manufacturers offer various types of honeycomb packaging, such as reverse slit score packaging, honeycomb cookie-cut packaging and die-cut packaging. If you want to buy honeycomb packaging, you will need to have some basic information on the different types of honeycomb packaging products and their applications. 

     If you want to establish yourself as a honeycomb packaging distributor or manufacturer, you will need to understand the fundamentals of honeycomb material and the honeycomb packaging process. If you are a honeycomb packing material supplier, you will need to keep your knowledge up-to-date in order to stay ahead of the competition. In addition, constant communication with other professionals in the industry will help you to expand your business. 

    To educate yourself and/or your workforce about honeycomb paper packaging, you can:

1. Browse through various resources that provide basic information on honeycomb packaging material
2. Read magazines and periodicals
3. Interact with experts in the packaging industry
4. Join associations for professionals in the packaging industry.

• Understand the basics of honeycomb packaging and the relevant terminology

If you have very little exposure to honeycomb packing, you can learn the basics by browsing through different resources, such as websites of manufacturers of paper honeycomb packaging and online knowledge resources.

• Keep up-to-date on information about developments in the honeycomb packaging industry

If you are a honeycomb packing manufacturer or distributor, you will need to keep your knowledge up-to-date. Magazines dedicated to the packaging industry provide important updates that can be useful for your business.

• Join associations to communicate with professionals in the honeycomb packaging industry

Associations for professionals in the packaging industry provide a platform for communication. You can join these associations to interact with other professionals, to keep up with the pace of the industry.

Creative Business Ideas

Make yourself obsolete or your competitors will

              Here is a great story about how the leading American consumer electronics manufacturers fumbled away their technological advantage during the early days of the transistors.

“In 1947, Bell Laboratories invented the transistor. It was at once realized that the transistor was going to replace the vacuum tube, especially in consumer electronics such as radio and the brand-new television set. Everyone knew this; but nobody did anything about it. The leading manufacturers--at the time they were all American--began to study the transistor and to make plans for conversion to the transistor “sometime around 1970.” Till then, they proclaimed, the transistor “would not be ready.” Sony was practically unknown outside of Japan and was not even in consumer electronics at the time.

   But Akio Morita, Sony’s president. read about the transistor in the newspapers. As a result, he went to the United States and bought a license for the new transistor for a ridiculous sum, all of twenty-five thousand dollars. Two years later, Sony brought out the first transistor radio, which weighed less than one-fifth of comparable vacuum tube radios on the market, and cost less than one-third of what they cost. Three years later Sony had the market for cheap radios in the United States; and two years after that, the Japanese had captured the radio market all over the world.

   So why did American manufacturers reject the transistor when it was clear that it was going to replace the vacuum tube? Drucker thinks the manufacturers rejected the transistor because of a “not invented here” mindset in that it was not invented by one of the electrical and electronic leaders at the time--RCA and General Electric. He felt that it was a typical example of pride in doing things the hard way. The American manufacturers were so proud of the way their products were built that they viewed the new transistors as “low-grade, if not indeed beneath their dignity.”

   My take is different. I think that the American manufacturers were scared of introducing the transistor too early because it would make their existing product obsolete. The problem, of course, with this strategy is that if you don’t continue to innovate and make your own products obsolete, then somebody else will. In this case, their fear of cannibalizing themselves allowed Sony to step-in and devour their high-margin radio business. Here’s the takeaway: if you don’t continue to innovate and make your own products obsolete, then somebody else will.

Creative Business Idea..

Creative Idea.. Get it Patent..

           If you have a bright new concept or an innovative idea, don’t be afraid to approach a big company and offer them your proposal. Be prepared to face people who may tend to dissuade you, as they are more likely to tell you that those topnotch company executives will never take interest in talking with you. Truth be told, now isn’t the right time to lose hope.

The key to piquing their attention is by thoroughly preparing for the coming of that day. You don’t expect to win their favor all at once, or hear them praise you for a job well done. Many of those executives will have to let you wait for long hours, or even weeks before they finally find the time to meet you. Many of them will certainly require you to do a bunch of rigid legwork before they even attempt to take a look at what you have to offer them.

Whether you are eyeing foreign exchange brokers, food chain executives, or SEO specialists, you must focus your attention on the procedures you have to start with. It is when the significance of patenting comes into the picture.

You must be asking why there is a need for you to go through the hassle of dealing with legal stuff when in fact all you will be selling is no less than a business idea—a concept which you may think isn’t worth any fuss. But wait. I hope you care to stop for a moment. It is at this point that you should begin to understand the vital role that patenting has to play.

Patent means you are officially and legally protected against people or organizations who may try to steal your business—whether it is a brand name or a mere idea. You don’t want other businesses to exist with a name that doesn’t only sound alike with yours, but rather actually carries the same name with yours, right?

Even when what you are selling to investors is your business idea, and no stocks or any product or service in its physical form, you still ought to secure your exclusive rights to it. To be properly assisted, you may visit the Patent Office anytime.

Creative business..

Differentiate or Die

        

         When someone starts a company (be it product or services but more so in a product startup) they will be so enamored by the technical details and the features of the product that sometimes they lose sight that someone actually has to know about it in the first place and then they have to shell out dough to actually buy it.  General rule among techies who start a startup is that you build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door step. In an ideal world this might be true but in the real world this is far from truth. Today we are spoilt with choice and you take any product and there are 1000s of choices if not hundreds and be it in anything and when such a choice exists it becomes even more critical to let know people what are you are trying to sell and why your product is better and different than the competing ones. Then again due to constraint in the budget and the resources, you find a smart way to letting people know about your product. You will let know only those who might be interested in buying your product and you let them know in only those places where that section of people go. You are now talking about marketing and you are now talking about how to slice and dice the market and how to position your product so that people will notice your product, feel has value and finally might buy it. This was of slicing and dicing the market is what I call GTM strategy or “go to market” strategy which I feel is very critical as much as the product and its technical capabilities are, if not more and if not less.

Peter Drucker who is considered the father of marketing said which I quote here: “The purpose of a business is to create a customer. Business has only two basic functions: Marketing and Innovation – they produce results and all the rest are costs.”

As people who know market say that it is not the best product that wins but the best perceptions tend to be winners. Hence marketing is very critical and since we all belong to that startups or SMEs with limited budget and limited reach, we should always create a very clear GTM strategy (slice, dice the market and attack a narrow segment to start with) as we all know there is a unforgiving world out there and it is very tough to survive there.

Remember another thing. In the written history of mankind of 3500 years or so, wars have been waged throughout and only in a handful of such wars, a better weapon was responsible for the victory and in most cases it has always been the strategy. Our marketing is no different than any wars waged winning or losing has pretty much the same dynamics here too. Which brings to another point of mine which is, don’t always assume that a better product wins but it is the better strategy that wins. Please don’t take me wrong. Neither am I diminishing the engineering activity (I myself am from an Engineering background) nor enhancing the importance of marketing. It is always an advantage to be able to offer your customers “a better mousetrap.” However, it is also very true that all other things being equal, a product that offers equal value in the customer’s eyes will win if you can better communicate its value and uniqueness.

Remember when I say strategy it is really a strategy and not doing something cheaper or faster. Making it cheaper means you are running the same race faster but choosing a strategy to run a different race because it’s one you set yourself to win. If you just live by the price, remember you die by the price and hence a strategy to make run a different race is very critical.

Creative Business Ideas..

Paper Making Business..


        Paper is used for writing and printing, for wrapping and packaging, and for a variety of other applications ranging from kitchen towels to the manufacture of building materials. In modern times, paper has become a basic material, commonly found in almost all parts of the world. The development of machinery for its production in large quantities has been a significant factor in the increase in literacy and the raising of educational levels of people throughout the world.

The basic process of making paper has not changed in more than 2,000 years. It involves two stages: the breaking up of raw material (which contains cellulose* fiber) in water to form a pulp (i.e. a suspension of fibers*), and the formation of sheet paper by spreading this suspension on a porous surface, and drying, often under pressure.

Records suggest that paper was first made in China around AD 105. The technology was practiced solely in China for the subsequent 500 years, and then spread to Japan in 610, and later into Central Asia. It appeared in Egypt about AD 800, but was not manufactured there for another 100 years. A variety of raw materials were used and these included mulberry bark, old rags and hemp.

Paper was introduced to Europe by the Moors on their invasion of the Iberian Peninsula, and the first mills were established in Spain in about 1150. The craft then spread into most of the rest of Europe during the next two centuries. The development of printing technology in the 15th century saw the start of the widespread publication of books and this greatly stimulated the paper-making industry. The first paper mill in England was established in 1495, and the first such mill in North America in 1690. A crisis arose in the early 19th century as raw material for paper production was in shortage. European papermakers had grown used to using rags for paper manufacture and the shortage forced manufacturers to seek alternative raw materials. This gave rise to the use of wood for paper manufacture.

The solution to the problem of a cheap, readily available, raw material for paper making was achieved by the introduction of the groundwood* process of pulp making about 1840. At the same time, technological advances in paper making technology were taking place with the development of the first practical papermaking machine by Nicolas Louis Robert in 1798. Later, this machine was further improved, and put into manufacture, by the British brothers, Henry and Sealy Fourdrinier, their name still being closely associated with paper-making machinery today.

Fact File

• More than 286 million tonnes of paper and board were produced in 1994

• 34% of all paper produced is derived from recycled materials

• 10 to 17 trees are required for one tonne of paper (approximately equivalent to 7,000 national newspapers)

• It takes 2.7kg of wood, 130g of calcium carbonate,8g of sulphur, 40g of chlorine and 300 liters of water to produce 1kg of paper in a large scale paper mill.

• The pulp and paper industry is the fifth largest industrial consumer of energy, accounting for 10% of all industrial energy consumption (although energy efficiency within the industry has improved greatly, and continues to improve)

• In the USA, the papermaking industry is amongst the highest polluters, the major outputs being biochemical oxygen demand and total suspended solids, with significant outputs of CO and volatile organic compounds.

Today’s paper-making plants are capable of producing 1,000 tonnes of pulp and paper per day, using sophisticated technology based on chemical as well as mechanical processes for reducing raw materials to pulp. Modern day raw materials are many and varied, depending on availability, cost, geographical location, etc. These are covered more fully in a later chapter.

Hand paper-making has enjoyed a major revival over the past 30 years, using new and innovative approaches to this ancient craft. Handmade paper has a unique texture and an individual quality that makes it not only a surface to write, paint, or print on, but an object of beauty in its own right. In addition, the versatility of paper in its wet form has led artists to experiment with paper-making as an art medium, creating two- and three-dimensional images of textural richness and diversity, some on a vast scale. This Technical Brief aims to cover only the area of small-scale papermaking technologies for application in developing countries.

For this purpose we will define scale in paper-making as shown in Table 1 below.

Category / Output (tonnes of paper per day – t.p.d.)

• Large scale / More than 100 t.p.d.
• Medium scale / Between 30 and 100 t.p.d.
• Small scale Less / than 30 t.p.d., including hand-made paper

Typically, a hand-made paper producer will manufacture only a few tonnes of paper per year (depending on the number of employees) often for a highly specialized market. Mechanized plants, on the other hand, only become economically feasible when dealing with an output above several tonnes per day. In India, where paper making machinery is manufactured indigenously, and hence costs are kept lower, mechanized paper making on a small scale is very common, with plants operating at outputs of 5 tonnes per day and upwards.

Creative Business Ideas.

Innovative Business Ideas...

Scope for business is everywhere in a country like India where the consumer volume is huge. You just have to think about some creative business ideas which early works out.

Reading is a hobby and there is always market for well provided words. With development in technology, people have access to internet from almost everywhere. Thus blogs are one of the best innovative business ideas which help a writer to earn. A writer can either write on the topics which suit his taste and if he grabs enough traffic, he can apply for Google ad sense. But this may take time. The other option in case of such creative business ideas is promoting. If he uses his blog to promote a product or service and leads his visitors to their website, he will be paid.

There is not any compulsion that the innovative business ideas should always be online. If you have other means offline, trying them would never be unhealthy. The fact can’t be denied that Indians are day by day becoming more beauty conscious and this has led to the increase in demand of fashions. Starting a beauty parlor would surely be one of the nicest  creative business ideas if you are confident about competing with those are presently there in the market. This business if taken seriously will assure you great success. Uniqueness is always noticed and you can start with the name itself. If everyone gives the name as beauty parlor, you can choose a more unique and attractive name. Many times it is said that it is not the looks but the service offered which matters. But for any newly starting business, looks are equally important because you can showcase your quality of service only if you get customers. Later the customers are your mobile advertisers if you succeed in satisfying them. Your dress, interior decorations and the display must mesmerize your customers. Your behavior to the customers also have great role to play in these types of innovative business ideas.

Another among the creative business ideas suits the best who love to spend time with children. Entertainment is a part of children’s life and using this fact in a sensible manner can help you earn. Avail an area where children can gather for playing games with the children belonging to same age group and gaming taste. There should be enough game materials, monitors for games, strict timings and the safety should be assured. You can charge them on hourly basis or monthly basis. This is not just an earning for you but also an entertainment and service for the children. The reasons for success of these types of innovative business ideas are many. First and foremost reason is that with the disintegration of combined families to nuclear families, children fail to find playmates of their same age. Parents usually have no time for their children in nowadays corporate world and they will promote their children towards you if you can assure them safety.

Innovative business ideas are never restricted and as long as you can think in a creative manner, new types of creative business ideas will continue to emerge.

Battery recycling business...

  

Battery recycling business...

       The growing consumer attraction to going green is producing businesses that focus on green services, such as a battery recycling business. Since Americans alone use millions of electronics each year that require batteries, millions of batteries wind up in landfills around the country. The acid in these batteries and the materials that compose them are not biodegradable, and can contaminate the soil and other areas of the environment. When you start a battery recycling business, you are not only starting a business that can make you money, but one which may also help to make the world a better place to live.

Small Business Management

Step 1

Write a business plan. Write a business plan to describe the different aspects of your business, including start-up and operating costs, the source of funding for starting and operating the business until it becomes self-sufficient, the location of your business (home office or a rented space), the marketing plan, a description of your ideal customers and your projected income from recycling batteries.

Step 2

Register your business with the state in which it operates. Contact the secretary of the state for the state in which your business operates. The business structure you choose for your company (sole proprietorship, partnership, corporation or limited liability company) dictates the paperwork the state secretary will require you to complete in order to register your business.

Step 3

Determine which types of batteries you want to recycle. Some battery recycling businesses limit the types of batteries they accept, such as only cell phone batteries or computer batteries. Determine if you want to specialize in specific batteries or if you want to operate the business as more of a general battery recycling business.

Step 4

Establish accounts with government-approved battery recycling centers. Recycling centers, such as Rechargeable Battery Recycling and Battery Solutions, exist around the country to accept recycled batteries. Identify and contact various recycling centers to see how much the center charges you to recycle the batteries and how you can get the batteries to the center (mail, drop-off, pick-up, etc.).

Step 5

Identify your target market. Determine which customers are most likely to use your recycling business. For example, you may decide to focus your efforts on electronic businesses that are willing to pay your business to handle the recycling of their batteries. You may also choose to target automotive businesses or cell phone retailers.

Step 6

Create a battery collection plan. Depending on your target customers, determine how you intend to collect batteries from your target market. This may entail installing collection bins in your customers' locations and creating a pick-up schedule once a week. You may also decide to create packaging for customers to ship the batteries to your business location or directly to the business recycling center.

Step 7

Create and implement marketing campaigns to attract customers. Create email marketing campaigns, place online banner ads and send out marketing postcards to businesses and customers that fit into your target market. Creating and implementing marketing campaigns should include online and offline efforts that permit you to get your battery recycling business information in front of the customers who are most likely to use your services.

Business Ideas..

Fashion Design

     A fashion designer creates and produces clothing, such a dresses, shirts, pants and coats, as well as accessory items, including jewelry, purses and shoes. He identifies and analyzes fashion trends, applying that knowledge to the designs he sketches. Although a formal education is not required to open a fashion design business, entrepreneurs must be creative. Attention to details, such as color and proportion, are must. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported in 2008 that many of the 22,700 fashion designers working in the United States were self-employed. In addition, most of these professionals are concentrated in New York and California, the country’s two fashion centers. In 2008, fashion designers earned an annual salary of $61,160.

Graphic Design

      A graphic designer is hired by clients to communicate messages in visually appealing ways. She may design advertisements, postcard, websites or even business cards. Formal education is not required to establish a graphic design practice, although many degree granting programs exist. A successful graphic designer has a creative sense of visual detail. She must also be well versed in a variety of computer-based graphic design software. In 2008, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that the 286,100 graphic designers employed in the U.S. earn a yearly income of 42,800. In addition, an increased demand from advertisers and computer design firms is expected to cause the industry to grow at a rate of 13 percent between 2008 and 2018.

Photography

     A photographer is hired to take pictures of people, objects and events. He chooses the appropriate camera and adjusts lighting to assure that each photograph is taken with the desired effect. He may photograph his clients in a studio, or travel to their respective locations, as is the case with wedding photographers. Although there are no degree-granting photography programs, many schools offer coursework in the subject. More than 50 percent of the 152,000 photographers employed in the U.S. in 2008 were self-employed, according to a report issued by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The majority of these individuals work in metropolitan areas. The median income paid to those in this profession in 2008 was $29,440 per year.

Create Unique Business Card for your business.

Unique Business Card 

Promote your business through Unique Business Card Design

          One of the most powerful, yet ignored weapons in your marketing weapon store is your business card. There are many ways that a person can attract customers to one's business. Some do this by launching a marketing campaign in the form of an ad in the paper or on a billboard. Some don't use marketing at all and just flourish through word of mouth. On a more personal level if that person travels around, the best thing to carry and give out is a business card. Business cards are used by people in big and small time business. It reflects who the person is. It gives people an idea of what the person is capable of doing in the event that the service one offers is needed in the future.

       Business cards help business people present a good company image by highlighting the services provided by a particular company. They can also help to enhance the personal image of a businessperson. Production and printing costs of business cards are low, but benefits are high, as they make a statement in the business world. As a result, the market value of business cards is high. Businesses survive due to a regular customers and having new clients. This will bring additional revenue for the company and allows the company to grow. By using the resources one has such as the use of business cards, this will happen.

        What information should I put on my business card? It will all depend on you. The common information that can be found on a business card includes your name, position or occupation, company or business, address of the company or where you do business from, your work phone number, home phone number, mobile phone number, and email address. However, you need not put each of these items of information on your card. It is highly recommended that you put a picture on your business card. Studies have shown that people are more likely to hold on to a Business card with a photo on it. It could be your picture, a picture of your product, or a combination of both. Picture cards get attention! A tagline is a one sentence benefit statement. So using this is also valuable for your business.

            Your business card should represent the perfect image of your company; in fact, it is the one item that will be remembered on that first encounter! Having a design that does not reflect what you do, could have a negative impact on your business sales. With that in mind, we strongly believe that doing your own business card design is not the right way to go. Leave the designing to the professionals and use you time doing what you do best … selling your product or service!

Here are some examples-

        Front side of card contains Google search image which includes your business name, and back side contains your business information. 

 If your business is related to green or recycling waste then you can use business card design like this.

There are lots of websites which give you unique business card design follow them and make successful journey of your business.

Creative business

Creative Business Ideas that Made Millionaires!

The man who created a million dollar business of dog poop-scooping:

The most noted pioneer in the poop-scooping business is Matthew Osborn, who runs Pooper-Scooper.com. He never knew that this business would one day make him a millionaire. Osborn got started back in 1987 when he opened Pet Butler in Columbus, Ohio. At the time, Osborn was working two full-time jobs and making less than $6 per hour at each. He had a wife, a daughter and a son on the way, and was desperate to make some extra money. He learned that there were about 100,000 dogs within 15 miles of his home. The business slowly took off, and despite the dirty work, Osborn says he enjoyed satisfying the customers and working outdoors in some of the nicest backyards in Ohio. Eventually Osborn employed seven people and owned a fleet of six trucks serving about 700 regular customers. While Osborn may have put poop scooping on the map, Matt "Red" Boswell is taking it into the future. Boswell owns the Texas-based Pet Butler. Today, Pet Butler is the largest pet waste removal service in the country, and serves about 3,000 clients.

The housewife who invented a microwaveable pillow:

Kim Levine, invented Wuvit, little bags that come in various patterns and provide soothing penetrating moist heat. Kim realized that if she put some corn in cloth, sewed it together and then put it in the microwave; a warm relaxing pillow would be created. She rushed to create the simple product idea with her sewing machine and her multi-million dollar empire was born! Initially, Kim thought the Wuvit® concept would just be great gift for her kids and for people in her local area. But soon she realized her idea had huge potential. When local parents started calling her in the middle of the night asking for another soothing pillow because their kids could not sleep without the Wuvit®, she knew she had a fabulous opportunity. She started going to local retailers and craft shows, and then eventually got a major break when Saks Department Store decided to put the Wuvit® products in their stores! Now she's a millionaire and has even written a book about her retail endeavors.

The guy who sold pixels at a webpage for $1 Million:

Back in 2005, a 21-year-old student in England named Alex Tew launched The Million Dollar Homepage, through which he sold the pixels of a 1000×1000 grid for $1 each. Although it was an extremely simple idea, the unique project attracted enormous amounts of press coverage, and eventually earned $1,037,100 in a matter of months - the final slot on the page went for $38,100. It also spawned countless copycat websites that virtually all failed, since the idea was no longer novel.

The guy who created a company that provides excuse letters to miss work:

Do you need an excuse to miss work? A company has launched an excuse absence network service for U.S. employees and students which offers a load of excuses you can use to be absent from work. The Excused Absence Network provides all your excuse letter needs for just $25 per excuse note. These can be notes which appear to come from professional doctor or hospital and even fake jury summons and authentic-looking funeral service program with poems and pallbearers. The founder started the business for $300 and currently runs it off a laptop in a small Oklahoma town. The site gets about 15,000 hits a month.