Editor’s note: This article was first published in June 2013; the amounts raised by the campaigns described, including one still open at the time, and Kickstarter’s recent apology over a seduction guide date from then.
If you want to raise money for your business idea, these days it’s easier than ever. All you have to do is ask people for it. You would be surprised at the kinds of ideas that end up getting the investment they need thanks to the many crowdfunding platforms (collective funding) out there.
Recently Kickstarter, the biggest and best-known crowdfunding platform (based in the United States), found itself having to apologise for not vetting a project that had received all the money it asked for. In principle it was a book that would give users advice on how to be more successful in the art of seduction. In the end, the book’s advice turned out to be deeply sexist and in poor taste, but it had already been funded. Below are some business projects, and a few non-profit ones, that probably no investor would have bet on, but which nonetheless managed to raise the funding they needed thanks to these platforms. At first sight they are somewhat crazy ideas.
1. Bug-a-Salt (the weapon against insects)
The story of this project is completely surreal. The entrepreneur behind it announced his product on Indiegogo: a shotgun that fires salt as ammunition and is used to kill insects. The idea was to raise 15,000 dollars, but he was surprised to receive more than 20,000 orders, so he ended up raising over 500,000 dollars to be able to meet demand.
2. The squirrel census
Who could possibly care how many squirrels there are in the parks? A group of people decided to carry out a census of the squirrels living in green spaces, complete with its own infographic.
To do it they received initial funding of 8,000 dollars. In this case, the team had no plans to make a business out of their work, but lots of people chipped in because they feel squirrels are part of their lives.
3. Creating a typeface
No city is complete without its own typeface. That’s what these entrepreneurs said when they presented their project on Kickstarter, which consisted of creating a unique font for Chattanooga, Tennessee, making history as the first custom typeface for a municipality. The font can be downloaded free of charge by users who meet a certain requirement, which changes from time to time. They managed to raise 11,400 dollars for the project.
4. Help a teenage pilot make aviation history
Within 24 hours of turning 17 in July, a teenage student pilot hopes to take the tests for both a helicopter licence and an aeroplane pilot’s licence. If he succeeds, he will make aviation history by setting a record, since not only would he be the first person to achieve it at that age, he will also be the only person to attempt it at that age. His project is still open. So far he has raised 4,500 dollars.
5. The pizza museum
Until now nobody had thought of paying tribute to what is probably the most famous food on the planet: pizza. If in a previous article we showed you “the vibrator museum“, in this case it is a pizzeria where, as well as eating pizza, you can learn about the history of pizza and all sorts of trivia about it. After securing the funding it needed, the project ended up becoming a profitable business.
Further reading
- 5 businesses you won’t believe exist
- Businesses that work during the crisis
- 10 internet business ideas that work in other countries
- 11 profitable micro-business ideas
Featured image: Rhododendrites, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
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