If you do something because you have a passion for it, the end result tends to be far greater than anything that any boss could ever ask of you. Many people have taken to their hobbies in such a way that their commitment and talent has allowed them to build multi-million-dollar businesses.
Of course, they all endured the building period and some tough times breaking through, but now, you can see several people making a living from their hobby. It can happen to anyone when the passion that comes with enjoying a hobby is combined with a drive for financial success.
As a bit of inspiration for you, here are a few of the real big-hitting hobbyists that have turned into industry leaders.
Over half-a-trillion from connecting his friends
Perhaps one of the highest-profile success stories when it comes to modern hobbies is that of Mark Zuckerberg. Now, his company has a market capitalisation in excess of £500 billion, but it started as little more than a pet project to help him and others around him to connect online.
As Zuckerberg has said, he never started with the aim of building a company and was just trying to help connect people between colleges and schools. It didn’t take long for the 2004 project to explode, with ‘theFacebook,’ as it was originally called, now being the centre of the social lives of so many people. While other social media platforms existed beforehand, it’s Facebook that grew to set the tone for the new industry.
Over 100 million from playing games
Gaming hasn’t always been as openly mainstream as it is now, but there was always a vast audience of gamers who have historically enjoyed sharing their game experiences with others. Enter one Felix Kjellberg in 2010, who established a YouTube channel and posted videos showing him playing games along with running commentary from the Swede himself.
Under the pseudonym ‘PewDiePie,’ Kjellberg made his way to 1 million subscribers in 2012 and soon discovered that he was earning extra income from playing video games: a lot of extra income. He committed to the content creation full-time, which has since earned him a cool $12 million. Now a noted internet celebrity, many others have trodden the path paved by ‘PewDiePie,’ such as Adam Montoya, Toby Turner, and GamingWithJen.
Conquering Etsy with boho accessories
In 2011, Alicia Shaffer discovered her love of creating boho-inspired accessories and decided to share her creations online. This led her to set up a storefront of Etsy, and even though she was just trying to make a couple of sales per week, the users of the handcraft products site really took to Shaffer’s creations, which quickly saw Three Bird Nest selling out its stock.
Now five years removed from the platform, Shaffer’s shop is still going strong. It used to earn an average of $60,000 per month on Etsy. As its own entity, Three Bird Nest remains a popular online shop, expanding greatly to sell dresses, top bralettes, gifts, accessories, and much more.
These titans of industry have proven that, with talent and commitment, you can turn the hobby that you’re passionate about into a career.
