2 brothers started a junk-removal side hustle as teens with a $4,000 truck. Last year, they brought in about $3 million.
Two brothers, Kirk and Jacob McKinney, built a successful junk-removal business called Junk Teens, growing from a $4,000 truck to a multi-million dollar enterprise. The business originated from Kirk's discovery of reselling discarded items found at a local dump.
Why it matters
It highlights the potential for grassroots entrepreneurship and the scalability of service-based side hustles into significant business ventures.
Kirk, 22, and Jacob, 21, McKinney are the founders of Junk Teens. Courtesy of Kirk and Jacob McKinney Brothers Kirk and Jacob McKinney started Junk Teens with a $4,000 pickup truck. A turning point came when they reinvested early profits into an $80,000 dump truck. They now operate in multiple markets and are on track to top $5 million in revenue in 2026. Kirk McKinney was riding bikes near his Massachusetts home about six years ago when he came across a goldmine: A dump filled with plenty of junk, sure, but also speakers and electronics. "Someone had thrown away this perfectly good pair of speakers," he told Business Insider. "I asked the guy at the dump if I could take them and he said yes. I just couldn't believe that."
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