A Student Made $850 in a Month Selling AI-Generated Coloring Books

You won't believe this, but a student just made $850 in a single month selling digital coloring books - without drawing a single line by hand. That's right, they used AI art tools to create unique, printable coloring pages and turned them into a thriving Etsy side hustle.

If you're looking for a low-effort way to start earning extra income, this could be your ticket. Let me walk you through exactly how they did it, and how you can replicate their success.

The Discovery

It all started when the student, let's call them Mike, was scrolling through TikTok one day. They kept seeing videos about people making money with Etsy side hustles, and the coloring book niche caught their eye.

After some research, Mike realized there was huge demand for printable coloring pages, especially ones with unique, modern designs. But creating all those illustrations by hand seemed daunting. That's when they stumbled upon the world of AI art tools.

Creating the Product

Mike started experimenting with free and low-cost AI art generators like Midjourney, Stable Diffusion, and DALL-E. They were amazed at how quickly the AI could produce high-quality, one-of-a-kind line art images - perfect for coloring books.

The process was simple: Mike would input a text prompt describing the kind of coloring page design they wanted, tweak a few settings, and within minutes have a fully generated image ready to go. No drawing skills required!

They started building out themed collections - florals, animals, abstract patterns, and more. Then they bundled the individual pages into cohesive coloring book designs, added a cover, and exported them as printable PDFs.

Selling Strategy

With their AI-powered coloring books ready to go, Mike turned to online marketplaces to start selling. Etsy was an obvious choice, as it's a hub for digital downloads and creative products. They also listed on Amazon's Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) platform, as well as a few niche coloring book-specific sites.

The key was optimizing their listings for search. Mike did keyword research to find the most popular search terms around coloring books, then incorporated them into their titles, descriptions, and tags. They also offered their books at a sweet spot price point of $9.99 to $12.99 per download.

The Numbers

In their first month of selling, Mike managed to sell around 85 coloring book downloads across their various platforms. At an average price of $10 per book, that added up to a cool $850 in revenue.

Not bad for a side hustle that required minimal upfront investment or ongoing work! Mike was able to generate those sales with just a few hours of work per week - mostly spent on creating new product designs and optimizing their listings.

Why It Works

There are a few key reasons why this AI-powered coloring book business model is so effective:

1. High Demand: Coloring books, especially digital ones, are hugely popular among hobbyists, parents, teachers, and more. The market is massive and constantly growing.
2. Low Overhead: With AI tools doing the heavy lifting, Mike's costs were extremely low. No need to buy art supplies, pay designers, or rent studio space.
3. Passive Income: Once the coloring books are created and listed, they can continue generating sales with minimal ongoing effort. It's a true passive income stream.
4. Scalability: Mike can easily create new coloring book designs and expand their product line. They can also experiment with seasonal themes, themed bundles, or even a subscription model.

Scaling Potential

Looking ahead, Mike sees huge potential to scale this business even further. They're already planning to create coloring books for different holidays and seasons, as well as themed packs around popular characters, animals, and more.

The beauty of this model is that the AI art tools make it easy to rapidly produce new designs. Mike can simply tweak their prompts, generate new pages, and bundle them into fresh coloring book products.

They're also considering a subscription model, where customers pay a monthly fee to get a new coloring book pack delivered digitally each month. This could provide a reliable, recurring revenue stream.

Start Your Own AI Coloring Book Side Hustle

If Mike's story has inspired you, I encourage you to start exploring the world of AI-generated art and see how you can turn it into a profitable side hustle.

Head over to the Golden Star Guide to check out our free resources on using AI tools for product creation, as well as tips for launching and scaling your own Etsy or Amazon KDP business.

With a little creativity and hustle, you could be the next student to make hundreds of dollars a month selling AI-powered coloring books. The opportunity is there - all you have to do is seize it.