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Austin Zaback

Pet Waste Removal

Video published Apr 9, 2026 by Austin Zaback

Startup cost: Very low startup cost (~$500 for basic equipment)

Source video

Austin Zaback · 9 Service Businesses You Can Start Under $1,000 (No Experience Needed) ↗

One of 2 gigs covered in this video

What It Is

Offer a recurring weekly service that shows up at a customer's home, cleans up dog waste from the yard, sanitizes the turf, and leaves, using simple tools: a rake, scoop, waste bins, disinfectant, and gloves.

The Pitch

Zaback cites U.S. pet-ownership data (66% of households own a pet, 65 million own at least one dog producing over 20 billion pounds of waste a year) and a real example he watched personally: a scooper who built a 300-customer route, did about 30 jobs a day per employee, and grossed roughly $20,000 a month, over a quarter million a year, charging an average of $69 per customer per month.

Who It’s Best For

Someone comfortable with genuinely unglamorous, hands-on outdoor work who's building toward a recurring-revenue route rather than one-off jobs.

The Truth (as we see it)

The $20,000/month example is a single real operator Zaback says he personally observed and spoke with, a specific and checkable-in-principle account rather than an anonymous claim, though it's still one data point rather than an industry average. The pet-waste-removal market size and growth figures cited ($537 million market by 2035) are framed as industry projections, not something Zaback personally verified.

Our assessment, based on the video and what’s typical across similar videos. We don’t independently verify income claims or prices.

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