Honest side hustle you can start outside your full time job
Honest side hustle you can start outside your full time job

Demand-Driven Success: How Jerry Grew A $2000 Monthly Kid's Basketball Side Hustle Organically

Jerry Chen sidestarters.co coaching kids basketball

Jerry Chen • Published December 30, 2023

ABOUT

Jerry Chen sidestarters.co coaching kids basketball
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Jerry Chen

Kid’s Basketball Coach

From Milpitas, CA

Side Hustle Started 2021

Full-Time Job

Business System Analyst, Intuitive

Started October, 2023

SIDE-HUSTLE STATS

11

Hours Worked Per Week

$2000

Revenue Per Month

1

Founders

0

Employees

$200

Startup Cost

30

Days Before Profit

Word of Mouth

Main Growth Strategy

95%

Net Profit Margin

Table Of Contents

Working As A Business System Analyst + Kid's Basketball Coach
Jerry’s side hustle is an example of an “entrepreneur by popular demand.” In 2021, a friend was starting a kid’s basketball coaching business and asked Jerry to help coach.
 
As parents started witnessing how well Jerry worked with kids and his teaching style, they started requesting him to start a kid’s basketball coaching program of his own.
 
Here’s how Jerry combined his passion for basketball and teaching into a profitable side-hustle in California’s bay area.
Starting Your Side Hustle

How did you start coaching kid's basketball classes?

So I was running out of money, and a friend of mine was starting this kid’s basketball coaching business and asked if I would like to coach. And so I started off coaching for him, which wasn’t great money, but it was working in terms of a little bit of extra cash.
 
What happened from there was that the parents started really enjoying my basketball training classes and my coaching style. They were like,” Are you willing to do your own thing?” And I was just like,” Of course.”
 
And they were like,” Well, if you’re willing to start it, we’ll advertise for you and get all the kids for you.” That’s kind of how I started my own thing. When some of the kids started not showing up, all of a sudden, my friend was like,” Why are you taking clients from me?” And I was just like,” I’m not.  These clients are leaving you, and if they find out I have a coaching class, then come to me.”

It wasn’t like they left him for me. They left, and they still wanted to learn basketball. That’s their choice. I wasn’t asking them to leave yours. I’ve never done that, and I wouldn’t do that because that’s really unfair for him.

I still coach for my friend of mine. But now I also have my own side hustle, which is like the major side hustle.

What Sets You Apart?

What do you do differently that makes parents want you to coach their kids?

A lot of the parents would prefer me over him because of my coaching strategy and the fact that I relate to the kids really well. My coaching. method works. It’s a little different than his, because his is all about doing everything to win. I’m more about having the kids listen, have great fundamentals, but also have fun. It kind of translates to winning, right? I’ve also been coach of the year twice in a row.

I also teach the kids discipline and good sportsmanship. This is what I think the parents like. In this day and age, a lot of kids are just always playing video games or on screens. Basketball is something their kids enjoy while exercising and learning at the same time. So it really attracts those types of parents.

Also, a lot of the kids want to learn how to shoot three-pointers. And I’m just like,” No, we’re not learning that yet. We’re going to learn the fundamentals. Then, as you guys get better, you’ll start stepping back a little bit.”

Growth Strategy

How are you growing your side hustle?

My side hustle grows 100% from word of mouth. Because the kids have fun, a lot of the parents will actually video record my sessions and post them on their social media. I’m not asking them to. They’re just doing it on their own.

The video will be like, “look, my kids are having so much fun.” From there, other parents are like,” Oh, I see so-and-so is taking your class; do you have room in that class for my son?” Once a class gets too packed, I open up another day.

I didn’t used to do Saturdays. Now I’ll have a Saturday class, and that’s another five students. And another five kids is $150.

Growing Organically

Were you always thinking of starting your own coaching program? Or did you start because you saw the demand grow?

It was more of the latter, right? There was demand, and I filled it. And it combines my passion for basketball, my passion for teaching kids, and making sure kids understand the fundamentals.

I’ve always loved kids, and I’ve always loved basketball. So my side hustle basically came out of my passions for sports and bringing up kids to be competitive.

I’m pretty competitive, but I’m also pretty fun. And that’s the kind of entrepreneur that I want to be and the kind of training that I bring to the kids. I want them to be super competitive, but I also don’t want them to be sore losers.

Startup Costs

How much does it cost to start coaching kid's basketball?

In terms of startup costs, it’s very minimal. You do have to buy a couple of basketballs. You have to buy some cones. And it would be great if you bought an agility ladder. 
 
It cost me somewhere around $200 to start.
 
In terms of the basketball courts, I personally teach out of elementary school because I teach younger kids. The elementary school courts are a little bit lower, which for me attracts more of the little kids because now they could actually make a shot rather than out of nine-foot or ten-foot basketball hoop.
 
By doing it at a school, I don’t have to pay for facilities, unless it’s raining. If you want to be really serious, it would be great to actually run out of a gym. But that’s an overhead cost that I don’t want to take on.
 
So I found a school where they had basketball courts that were not used very often. It was open to the general public and that brought down my startup cost by a lot.
Recommended Tools

What equipment do you need to start a side hustle like this?

I have 4 or 5 basketballs inside my car, a set of cones, which was $20, and a backpack.

I also bought some penny jerseys because that makes the kids feel like,” Oh, we’re a team.” We’re all one color compared to just wearing a regular t-shirt.

Side-Hustle Lessons & Advice

What tips do you have for people who want to start coaching kid's basketball?

In terms of advertising, the best thing to do for me was to use word of mouth—you know, go to these basketball courts. Go to schools, especially private elementary schools, because my target clientele is engineering parents who are too busy to play with their kids.
 
I picked up clients just by coaching other kids, and then parents will see me and be like,”Oh, are you teaching basketball? Can you teach my child, too?” I’ll give them my phone number, talk to them over the phone, and let them know my philosophy of teaching.
 
And for anybody that’s starting up, make sure that you don’t run it like a business. It’s kind of like daycare plus basketball training, because some of the parents will literally drop off their kids to me and be like,” We’ll be back in an hour” when they realize I’m really good with kids. They’re like,” We’re going to Costco, have a good one.” And I’m like,” Are you serious? I am not a babysitter, but okay, have a great time.”
 
I end up being a lot of the kids’ uncles. It’s really weird. Some of them will give me a hug.
Balancing Career And Coaching

Does your full-time job make it easy to balance your basketball coaching side hustle?

Well, not recently. Prior to this job that I have now, I was a consultant. So being a consultant made it a lot more reasonable. As long as you got your job done as a consultant and you met your deadlines, you were good. The only time there were any conflicts was when I would have to travel for work, which, as a Salesforce consultant, was few and far in between.

Now that I’m going to an office, it makes it a little bit harder. So I made sure to tell my boss, I wanted to start working from 7 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. during the winter months so I could go coach. During the summer, it’s not a big deal because you could coach until like 7 p.m. or 8 p.m. 

How To Book Jerry's Classes

Where can we find you?

The best thing to do is to reach out on my phone right now. That’s all. By the way, this is for people in the Bay area, specifically San Jose-ish.

My work number is (408) 883-1992.

Connect with Jerry on LinkedIn.

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