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If you have sweet gum ball trees on your property, you might see the seeds as a huge nuisance. They fall in abundance, they can stain cement if left for long periods, and they hurt if you step on them with bare feet. They can simply be an eyesore and a pain to deal with. But did you know you could possibly earn some money by selling them?
Some people see these large seeds as a beautiful part of nature. They are often used in home décor projects, crafts, and holiday decorations. There is actually a market out there for creative people who use them all year round.
So where does this selling process start? It begins outside with an evaluation of how much your trees produce. Gathering your sweet gum balls is made easy with the Bag-A-Nut Sweet Gum Ball machines. Which unit you’ll need depends on how many trees you have. If you only have a few trees, you might go with the Stab-A-Nut Picker. There are also the 12″ Sweet Gum Harvester, and the 18″ Sweet Gum Ball Push Harvester for a decent amount of trees and land. For a large quantity of trees, you could go with either the 36″ Push or the 36″ Pull-Behind. After gathering your sweet gum balls, sort and count them.
Once you establish you’ve got a significant amount, you can set up your sales ads. This can be done through many different websites. If you’re a Facebook user, you could search for Swip Swap pages in your area. There are a plethora of pages like this where you can sell your sweet gum balls to local buyers. If you don’t use Facebook, you still have many options. Craigslist is another site you can use if you want to sell to people in your area so you don’t have to ship the sweet gum balls. If you choose either of these methods, make sure to write “cash only please” in the ad so you avoid getting scammed.
You can also opt to use Etsy or eBay if you don’t mind shipping your sweet gum balls to customers farther away. This is a good option because you can reach people all over the country. Make sure you weigh your packages before you decide on a shipping cost.
Whichever place you decide to post your ad, take and post a high-quality picture of your sweet gum balls, preferably outside with natural lighting. Prices vary, but you can get as much as $20 for 100 sweet gum balls.
Hopefully, this has given you some ideas on how to make a little extra money, easily maintain a clean yard, and put those sweet gum balls to good use.
Check out all of our Sweet Gum Ball Harvesters
