Don't Put All Your Eggs In One Basket

 This idiom came to me yesterday, in the middle of an Etsy meltdown!

I realised I've always done this with my businesses, relying on a single income source.

I've run a little English in Japan for 35 years; I supported my family, saved money for the future, paid (for the most part) for trips to the UK, paid for doctors, dentists and vets and assumed that I would be teaching until I dropped dead.

The pandemic, the rise of apps and AI and the falling birth rate in Japan have changed the face of small Eikaiwa Schools (English Conversation Schools). Some are still doing well, but moving to the middle of nowhere has basically finished my school off. I still have students- about 17 now. Mikey does most of the teaching, so he gets most of the money.

Looking back on things now, I think I should have thought of creating some other business or maybe making supplements to sell, little worksheets or something like that. 

The reason that Etsy's new rule hit me hard is that I'm really hoping that Etsy can replace my English school. But again, I'm putting all my eggs in one basket. I should think about other ways to make money.

I make a few 100 yen every month from this blog and my cat blog, but not a lot. I'm researching adding some affiliate links, but I don't want to have a blog where there are more adverts than content. 

I could start a new blog for my school, use it to get new students and sell prints on it, but just keeping two blogs going is a lot!

Also, I have my Ko-Fi page that I need to work on.

I need to organise myself a bit more. 

If anyone has any suggestions, drop a comment.

There's a possibility that Typhoon 30 will pass through here tomorrow evening. The weather will be bad overnight into Monday morning!  I don't think it will be very bad here; the wind won't be very strong, but a lot of rain.

It's been raining on and off for a couple of days. This morning the clouds were very low over the mountains.

I love when the mountains look like this!