This is the third post in a series of seven inspired by the third episode of the current series of The Apprentice on BBC. These business ideas are aimed at anyone wanting to start a business on a budget of £200 or less.

Hat tip to JB of Multilingual Marketing for this idea that he/she posted on the UK Business Forums, I love it’s simplicity. JB suggested that the apprentices should have been selling hanging baskets door to door.

It’s a great business idea, people love those, but most can’t be bothered to go to the trouble of making their own – despite repeatedly commenting on how nice the neighbours baskets look my wife and I have certainly haven’t got around to making any.

It’s wonderfully cheap to start as you can buy the baskets, compost and plants for about £9 and should easily be able to sell them for £18, so £200 should allow you to make up 22 baskets which if you sell them all will net you a profit of £198. What’s more in many areas you should be able to sell them two at a time and you can upsell value added services such as fixing kits, possibly even installing the fixing kits. If you also take a note of who buys and get their permission to contact them again next year you can probably get a lot of yearly repeat business.

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