Sell Digital Products

Plans you made in the past can be packaged and sold repeatedly through a simple drag-and-drop e-commerce website.

A little while ago I heard the concept “selling your sawdust”.

Selling your sawdust is the idea that the leftovers of your paid work can be repackaged and sold as a separate product. Extra income from work you've already done once.

I understood that Henry Ford came up with the term. The Model T used a lot of wood, and instead of throwing away the scraps, he turned them into charcoal briquettes and sold them under another company name: Kingsford Charcoal.

For me, that mainly means my AutoCAD work. Like the dynamic blocks, templates, and details I draw for client projects. Those can be bundled into a ZIP and sold as a digital download again and again, with almost no extra effort.

Another example is the plans I created when I built a steel squat rack for myself. I found leftover steel at a company I was working for. I designed a squat rack in 3D based on the materials I had, then fabricated it. I listed the 3D plans on my Shopify website.

I have made a bunch of sales already.

And don’t get overwhelmed by the thought of making an e-commerce website. They’re easy to set up. No coding is required and there are plenty of pre-made templates you can use.

The Big Takeaway

The easiest way to get extra income is to sell something you have already made as part of your main work. When you package your “sawdust” into a simple download, you can earn from the same effort again and again without taking on more clients or adding more hours. Start small with one useful file bundle, list it on a simple platform like Shopify or Etsy and let it become a low-maintenance income stream in the background while you keep doing your core work.

Business Model Breakdown

Here is a simple breakdown of how this business model works. The numbers below are fairly accurate, but they will fluctuate depending on your niche, pricing, platform fees and how much traffic you can drive to the offer.

Software

Shopify or Etsy

Service

Sell digital downloads through your own e-commerce website or on Etsy. These can be CAD library items you have drawn, or technical designs in PDF format you have made. Drive people to the website through social media.

Income

You make money from each digital product sold. Once created, sell it many times.

Simple finances (per product)

Time to hit milestones (using €30 net per product)

My website where I offer a downloadable How-To Guide.