Part Time Painting Business = Full Time Income

Today I'm responding to some feedback we received from the latest edition of the "Painting Contractors Perspective" Newsletter...

Steve Writes:

Hello Andy,

I am just doing my research now about starting a painting business. My hope is to do it part time, no more than 2-3 days a week. Could you devote an issue to the part time business start up and the best ways to ease into the trade with little prior experience?

Looking forward to your reply, thanks Steve Johnson

Thank you for your question Steve!

The first thing I will say is that starting a part time painting business is a GREAT way to earn extra income and realize some fantastic tax benefits...

In fact, it is entirely possible to earn a full time income painting 2-3 days a week, however in order to do that you must focus on a few key things:

Here are three of them:

1. Specialize & Target "specific" kinds of jobs - for example you will want to focus on small one day (two day's max) jobs like bathrooms, kitchens, and bedroom repaints...

Keep your marketing message and promotions focused on "one room at a time" offers.

For example: You could run an "Exterior Door & Trim" promotion where all you would do is repaint the front door, shutters or the accent trim around the house rather than the entire exterior.

This type of job is more cost effective for the home owner and offers an outstanding improvement on curb appeal and can be done in just a day or two. (not to mention these jobs can pay really well)

2. Network with larger painting contractors to paint the jobs that are to small for them to take on...

Large painting contractors typically like large paint jobs and will not even consider doing small one or two day jobs. A lot of times they will sub out work to a small or part time painter.

3. Advertise "No Job Too Small" or "We Specialize In Small Jobs" -

This is a simple way to market your part time business and set your self apart from the crowd... Write up a benefit rich direct response flier and canvas a neighborhood... Create a short newsletter about the benefit of updating one room at a time, or painting "Walls Only"

With the shift in the marketplace and homeowners buying habits the trend has been toward small updates more often rather than having the entire interior or exterior painted all at once.

The market is perfect for the good "Part Time" painters to gain market share and create a very nice income for themselves.

Whether it's part time or full time... Do the painting yourself or hire a crew to paint for you... the process of finding and landing jobs is the same. The only difference is the message.

I'll give more tips to help the part time painter in future posts, however if you are just getting started you will benefit greatly from the proven step-by-step information laid out in Painting for Profits.