Your Side Startup starts here.
You can be good at your job and still want something of your own.
You’ve spent years learning, working, and getting better at things. Now you want to see what you could build with that experience: a product someone chooses to use, a customer who pays you, a business you get to shape.
But you also have a calendar, bills, and a life you want to keep. Choosing an idea, finding time to build it, and asking someone to pay can feel like three separate mountains.
That’s the starting point for this newsletter.
A Side Startup is a business you build alongside work or school, starting with a small product and a real customer.
It can stay a small source of income or grow into something you want to spend more of your life on. You get to make that decision as you learn what works.
I write about how to take the first steps—and what happens after the excitement of starting wears off.
What you’ll get
A starting point that fits you. Find business ideas in the problems, people, and work you already understand. Work out which one deserves your next few evenings.
A way to build with limited time. Use AI to turn an idea into a useful app, choose what belongs in the first version, and keep the project small enough to finish.
A path to your first customers. Find people to test it, talk about what you’re making, try a price, and learn from what people actually do.
The decisions behind a sustainable side business. What to spend, what to simplify, and when a project deserves more of your time.
An inside look at my own products. The launches, experiments, mistakes, and maintenance work that shape how I build today.
The aim is to help you turn “I could build that” into something you can put in front of a customer.
Let’s build your Side Startup.
Start with a free subscription for practical guides, business experiments, and honest notes from building products people use.
— Benji
