My Second Best Ideas for a Startup

Every day I try to come up with different ideas for a new startup business. The best ones I am keeping for myself for obvious reasons. However, I have many other startup ideas that I am rejecting for many reasons, and would like to share with everyone.

Some ideas have already been done and I just didn't realize it. Other ideas would take up too much of my time. And for some, I just don't have the expertise.

One idea that I came up with while making breakfast is a toaster with a timer on it. There is nothing I hate worse than standing there waiting for my toast to pop up. (Actually, there are other things I hate worse, but not usually at breakfast time.) It would really help if I could see a digital timer on the toaster, just like what a microwave has, instead of just staring at the lever on the taser. Unfortunately, Cuisinart already came up with a Toaster with Countdown Timer which I happened to find on Amazon. As a matter of fact, it retails for $130.00, but has been marked down to $39.99.

Another idea I had was a silent leaf blower. The gardeners in my neighborhood drive my dog crazy with the noise from those machines. I checked Amazon again, and although I didn't find a silent leaf blower, I did find a Husqvarna Back Pack Blower which is described as having minimal noise.

A politically incorrect idea I had would be a book about how to get out of jury duty. I've seen books on how to get out of speeding tickets but there are far more people that get jury summons than speeding tickets. Of course, the book has been written, 10 Ways to Get Out of Jury Duty. It's even written by an attorney.

I do a lot of tweeting. It would be nice if there was some software that could extract all my tweets, then sort them by hashtags, and make them exportable to Word or Excel. I haven't found any such software in my initial search.

One other idea I had was a child/pet/property finder app using RFID size transmitters to provide locations on your smartphone. The RFID could be sewn inside a child's clothing, attached to a dog's collar, or put inside a car or computer. Is it technically feasible? I don't know. Has it already been done? I've seen something similar.

Anyway, that's it for this week. I will try to come up with another set of second best startup ideas next week.