We turned our macabre hobby into side hustle and make £17k a month – people think it’s grim but we won’t stop

A COUPLE has shared how they managed to turn their macabre hobby into a profiting side hustle that brings them a whopping £17,000 a month.

And while many deem their business grim, Vivian Thamher and her husband Jivan Jothi love their job and vowed to continue offering their services.

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The pair run a pet preservation studio using taxidermy to help pet owners with their pet’s death.

Vivian, 29, who works at a veterinary hospital in Singapore during the day, told CNBC: “Serving animals, whether alive or the dead, is very meaningful to me.

“Through taxidermy, I help [pet owners] with their grieving.

“There are a lot of cases where animals [go through] premature death, or a sudden accident … We help to beautify the face, cover up the stitches and give owners … better closure.”

The 29-year-old who has a bachelor’s in zoology and a master’s in pathology started taxidermy “as a hobby” when the pets of close friends had died.

The pair used £11,000 to launch Black Crow Taxidermy & Art back in 2021 but were able to break even quickly.

Jivan said: “At that point, we figured that to take on more [and] bigger stuff, you will need a physical space and if we get a physical space, then we need to treat it like a business and run it like a business.

“That was the natural progression.”

The couple estimates they make between £5,000 and £17,000 depending on the month.

While they believe there are “plenty of people” who would prefer not to cremate their pets after death, Jivan said they have received negative comments and were even associated with witchcraft.

He said: “We also had a situation where people reported to authorities because they thought we were killing the pets to do taxidermy.” 

He clarified they have a strict no-catch and no-kill policy.

“Everything that comes to us has to die naturally or have a vet put it down,” he said. 

Vivian explained it is hard to estimate the amount of work they have each month, as it depends on the number of animals that pass away.

However, she notes that a heat wave can impact the number of animals that die by accident while many birds die of pneumonia during wet seasons.

Their work can be limited as the pair both have full-time jobs.

Customers who want their pets preserved need to join a waiting list that could be six months to a year.

They explain that the animal would need to be brought to them within the first hours of passing and they would then store it in freezers.

The price of preservation varies- generally dogs and cats start at £1400, while smaller pets like hamsters start at £210. 

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