$800 to $20 Million: A Side Hustle With Full Time Job Lessons
She took business calls while stocking bananas at Trader Joe's. Her $800 camper idea became a $20 million company. What this side hustle with full time job story teaches.
She was stocking bananas at a grocery store when the phone rang. It was a customer for her side business. Jaime Holm would take the call, then go back to her shift at Trader Joe's.
That side hustle started with one old camper bought for $800. More than a decade later, it is Tinker Tin, a $20 million design and manufacturing company with no debt.
If you are trying to run a side hustle with full time job hours, her story has some useful, and honest, lessons.
Quick answer
- Holm and her husband bought a vintage camper for $800, fixed it up and rented it out.
- Clients pushed them from rentals to branded trailers, then retail displays, then whole stores.
- She kept her Trader Joe's job until the inquiries became too many, then went full-time.
- Her brother Matt Hannula joined as CEO in 2018, when yearly revenue was around $650,000. The company now reports $20 million, with no debt.
How an $800 camper started it all
Holm had just got married. She was remembering the time she lived in a camper and surfed in Australia. She and her husband looked for vintage campers or quirky vans to rent in California for a road trip, and found very few options.
So they decided to make their own. They would buy an old trailer, fix it up and rent it out. Her husband had worked on hot rods in high school, so the fixing part was covered.
Their first camper cost $800. They became the first vintage trailer rental company in the U.S., Holm said in an interview republished by IMS Fund.
Keeping the day job while the side hustle grew
This is the part most readers will relate to. Holm did not quit her job to "follow her passion". She kept working at Trader Joe's while the business found its feet.
She took calls about the business between stocking bananas. Only when there were so many inquiries that both could not fit in one day did she leave the job and go full-time.
The company earned a couple hundred thousand dollars in its first year, The Economic Times reported, citing her May 2025 interview with Entrepreneur. That was enough to support her family, earlier than she expected.
In the early days, the team was one employee on payroll and a whole family of volunteers.
The pivot nobody planned
The plan was camping rentals. The customers had other ideas.
Hollywood studios started renting the vintage trailers for movies and commercials. Then beauty brands like LUSH and Pacifica wanted branded trailers for road shows. Projects followed for Facebook, Pepsi, Williams Sonoma and New Belgium.
Each brand asked for a retail display to go with the trailer. Soon they stopped asking for trailers at all and only wanted displays. Then more displays. Then entire stores.
"We've been really good at pivoting and seeing what the market wants and needs," Holm told the San Diego Business Journal.
The growth, in numbers
Hannula, Holm's brother, joined as an owner and CEO in 2018. The business had done $650,000 the year before, he said. Holm stepped back to focus on design, and he built the processes.
Source: San Diego Business Journal
Over that same stretch, the company grew from three to 30 employees, and revenue was on track for $20 million, according to the San Diego Business Journal. It runs over 500,000 square feet of manufacturing space in the U.S. and Mexico.
Clients now include Barnes & Noble, Redbull and Boot Barn.
What went wrong along the way
The founders were open about their mistakes, which is the most useful part of the story.
They stayed too small for too long. Holm said they should have hired for key roles faster. Being a zero-debt company meant slower growth and burnout from running a skeleton team.
They gave away work for free. Early on, they designed beautiful store concepts for free to win clients. Some clients then took those designs to factories in China, or used them to impress investors, and never came back.
One bad partner cost a truck. Hannula recalled a supply chain partner in Mexico that left a truckload of products worth more than $250,000 missing for about two weeks.
Hiring and firing. Hannula said he wished he had interviewed people longer and let poor performers go faster.
Lessons for a side hustle with full time job in India
You will not buy a vintage camper in Indore or Pune. But the pattern travels. Here is what to take from it, as ideas, not promises.
- Start small and cheap. The first bet was $800, not a big loan. Test demand before you spend more.
- Keep your salary until demand forces a choice. Holm left her job when inquiries made it impossible to do both, not before.
- Listen to what customers ask for. The money was in displays and stores, not the original rentals.
- Do not work for free for too long. Free samples can win trust, but put your design or idea work on paper with a contract.
- Bring in the right partner. Growth took off when someone with a different skill took over operations.
Also check your employment contract. Many Indian companies have moonlighting or conflict-of-interest clauses, so read yours before starting paid work on the side.
Tax note
Side business income must be declared in your income tax return in India. This is information only, so speak to a CA about your own situation.
FAQs
How did Tinker Tin start? Jaime Holm and her husband bought a vintage camper for $800, fixed it up and rented it out. Demand later shifted to branded trailers, retail displays and full store builds.
Did she quit her job right away? No. She kept working at Trader Joe's and took business calls on the job, leaving only when the inquiries became too many.
How big is the company now? The founders say Tinker Tin is a $20 million company with no debt. It grew from three to 30 employees after Hannula joined in 2018.
Can a side hustle with full time job really grow this big? It can happen, but it is rare. This took more than a decade, several pivots and a lot of mistakes. Most side hustles stay small.
Are you running a side hustle alongside your job? Tell us what it is in the comments.
Results vary; nothing here is a promise of income. Business figures are as reported by the sources below.
Sources
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