BY
Jorius Chuwa

Producer

Hype Issue #67

Published on

July 11

2025

Jorius Chuwa explores the ups and downs of hobby-led businesses in Singapore through the eyes of Jon Dale, the owner of model car store Gear Oil Cafe

Jon, pictured here showcasing some new model cars, enjoys spending time at his shops in Chinatown and Ubi interacting with customers. Photo courtesy of Jon Dale

Hobbies can provide a sort of “escape” from the monotony of our jobs. However, what happens when you turn your hobby into a career? 

This alternative career path has been steadily gaining traction among Gen Z and Millennial entrepreneurs. Since the pandemic, many home-grown businesses have sprouted due to their low overhead costs as well as their products and services being in line with the passions and interests of their founders. According to Channel NewsAsia, these entrepreneurs have commonly transitioned from traditional salaried employees to starting their own hobby or interest-led businesses.

Entrepreneur Jon Dale is one of them. He took the leap and started his model car business back home in Canada before expanding the business to Singapore.

A deep-rooted passion

Jon has been an avid fan of cars for as long as he can remember. As he watched cartoons and movies featuring iconic cars of the decades as well as collecting the occasional toy car here and there, he gradually became infatuated with them.

“I think growing up with cars in front of me, underneath me and over me for many years kind of brought me to the point where I love working on cars,” he added.

However, despite his interest, Jon did not pursue a career in the automotive industry as he cited a lack of interest in working for others as well as an influence from his family in the industry of law enforcement. Fueled by his goal to secure his family financially for the future, law enforcement also provided a more sustainable and consistent source of income for him and his family at the time.

“I didn’t even want to start my own business doing automotive stuff in the early days. I’d rather do law enforcement because it was a job, something that I was also interested in and then I had family that were in law enforcement and military [too].” 

Budding entrepreneur

After his stint in law enforcement, Jon began starting businesses in other industries. Unfortunately, he struggled to sustain the various businesses as he was not interested in the products or services he was selling.

“I’ve done all sorts of businesses and even though I’ve been in finance and I’ve been in nutrition, [they didn’t succeed] because if you don’t have the passion and you’re just doing sales, then in the end, you’re not going to give it your all because it’s just another sale.” 

However, he never forgot about his passion for cars. 

Beginning with a YouTube channel, Jon, together with his wife Zaneta, started Gear Oil Cafe as a way to share their passion for Canadian car culture. He started the channel as he got inspired by Cars and Coffee, an event where like-minded car enthusiasts get together and discuss their shared passion over a cup of coffee.

Screenshot taken from Gear Oil Cafe YouTube channel

Using this inspiration, Jon began growing his channel through producing automotive content online to cater to his primary target audience of local car enthusiasts. However, it was not all smooth sailing. Jon sometimes struggled with coming up with unique ideas to retain viewers and soon suffered from a creative block.

“I think that generally speaking, it was kind of difficult to be able to just think of things. And no matter how creative you are, no matter how spontaneous you are, it’s still a struggle to get that first hundred videos done.” Jon added.

Jon began creating automotive content on his channel by sharing the work done to his personal car, a Ford Fusion, as well as profile stories on notable car enthusiasts in his local area in Canada. (Screenshot taken from Gear Oil Cafe YouTube channel) 

.

Following a few years of relative success of his small YouTube channel, Jon began to explore other avenues of the automotive space to expand his brand image and to pivot his business in a different direction. It was during this period when he had also begun collecting model cars as a hobby that he suddenly had a brainwave.

“What ended up happening is I purchased a few things overseas for myself and I was like, you know what? I see so many people desiring all the same stuff I was collecting and so I [wondered] maybe if I’m going to spend so much money on this hobby, I best take it seriously. What really kicked it over was the fact that I was seeing a huge demand for Hotwheels and [model cars] and [a] light bulb came on.”

Pivoting the business

After his discovery of the market potential for selling model cars, Jon began looking for opportunities to purchase large quantities of model cars in order to sell and make a profit. Before long, an opportunity presented itself for him to shift the gears to launch his new venture.

“We had an opportunity to buy a bunch of inventory from a company that was closing out [and] made the decision to spend a couple thousand bucks to start that ball rolling.”

While Jon successfully obtained a supply of model cars, he had not yet found a sustainable way to sell them to potential customers within Canada. This was when Jon began thinking of a more creative way to reach his target audience

“[How] we ended up starting [the business of selling model cars] was by consigning our items through these different shops and businesses in Canada [and] once we got to about 10 locations, I kind of realised that there’s a high demand for these model cars.”

Expanding and promoting Gear Oil Cafe

Moving to Singapore posed a new but familiar challenge for Jon as he had to adapt once again and cater to a new target audience. This was when Jon decided to take advantage of social media to gain virality to promote his business. 

At this time, TikTok was a rising sensation and Jon caught the hype train at the perfect time. 

“TikTok was a big plus for us and we went viral in a couple of videos. It allowed us to reach a larger audience in a very short period of time compared to, I would say, YouTube or Instagram.”

Jon opened Gear Oil Cafe’s first physical branch in Singapore at the Fook Hai Building in Chinatown. Photo courtesy of Jon Dale

.

While social media algorithms certainly helped by pushing his content to relevant viewers, Jon believes his unique personality also attracted customers to his business.

“I’m not one to toot my own horn, but people feed off of my own excitement and I think that if I can transfer the excitement to somebody coming in through the door of the shop or coming online to watch my videos, then I think it’s the infectious excitement [that attracts them].” 

Jon credits Kuan Ying, founder of model car maker D Model, as one of his most successful business partnerships so far as Gear Oil Cafe is an exclusive distributor for its products. Pictured here from left to right is Zaneta Dale, Kuan Ying and Jon Dale. Photo courtesy of Jon Dale

.

Passion for the hobby

Almost included in every one of Jon’s answers to my questions was a single word. 

Passion.

Despite the long hours toiling behind a counter stock-taking, the sleepless nights where he communicates with suppliers and clients overseas, the one thing that powers him through the days is pure passion for his line of business. Something that he never really had in any of his other business ventures or even his previous career in law enforcement.  

This left me with a newfound appreciation for hobby-led businesses as I learnt how many of them are simply doing it for the love of the hobby. Much like how hobbies act as an “escape” for us from our working lives, these business owners have found a mutual harmony where their pastimes and working lives can intertwine such that a day of work can be equivalent to a day off.

Running such a business is summed up by Jon with a single statement.

“Every business can do good as long as you’re passionate and excited about what you’re doing.”