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Side hustles for the summer: Develop a product to help save the environment, like Remind bamboo straws
[Welcome to summer! Let's try to kill boredom with cool activities at home, awesome travel itineraries, and TV and movies! This week, let's talk about side hustles and trying to earn some extra cash.]
Ah summer, that time of year when most of us make more time for our personal lives. We can always do the cash-burning usual — go on a trip, go to the beach, go visit lola in the province.
Or we can turn time into tangible gold, step on the gas of your passion projects and perhaps make some extra cash.
We've told you about how creator Lance Florentino makes about P7,000 in extra cash from his Pundesal stickers, and how Ila Sison became a homebaker making P10,000 a month, when she chooses to.
Today, we turn our attention to Meryl Ligunas, a content producer and specialist who is doing something real for the environment: she creates reusable bamboo straws with her best friend Andee Aragon under the brand Remind.
"Since we graduated college, we would talk about ideas on how we can contribute to society. We would have grand plans that never really came to fruition, and eventually realized that big ideas should start small,” Meryl says.
It started with Meryl and Andee getting irked with plastic straws that restaurants always use. They bought the idea of bringing metal straws with them, which never failed to prompt a conversation among people they're with.
They thought they'd try and sell straws so people can do the same, but "after some research, we found that bamboo was the more environmentally friendly option because it's biodegradable."
They initially invested their weekends, weeknights, and P20,000 to the idea. Time was mostly spent one more research and processing orders.
Like Pundesal, the little side business relies more on the Internet, with a peppering of consignments to a few physical stores. "A spot could be free or cost up to P3,000 monthly," Meryl adds.
While they can make as much as P15,000 a month — and as little as P5,000 — the bigger reward is advocating for the earth.
"Some favorite moments include hearing loved ones ask for their drinks without straw and bring out the bamboo straws they got from us, or them tagging us in photos of them using it. These simple things make us giddy and even more challenged to raise awareness about the things we can do for a better, cleaner earth," Meryl says. — LA, GMA News
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