Small Investments With Major Returns

That was the headline that caught my eye. I think we are all interested in "major return" on an investment, plus if a small investment would yield a major return then what would a major investment yield? What a disappointment the article was and here's why;

"And, unlike your typical investment tip, these returns are pretty much guaranteed. What's more, you won't have to call your broker to make any of these moves:
a. Buy a Bread maker, You can buy one for $55. If it saves you just $4 a week on store bought bread, that's 208 a year. A 208% return. Bread maker at Williams Sonoma - $149, bread mix from "JBDough" $13 per package. You eating your baked bread all the time = membership in a Gym to lose the 45 pounds of weight you've gained $39 per month. Nope not a good deal
b. Get a credit card with a great sign-up bonus. Like a AirTrans Visa card. Cost: $40 annual fee. After your first purchase you get enough reward miles for a free flight. Seems to me that people getting credit cards and obviously not having the fortitude to to cancel nor not to spend is one of the reasons this country is in a mess. Not a good idea.
c. Replace your premium cable package with a netflix subscription and a $100 set-top box. You can download movies and TV programs as well as getting DVDs through the mail. Cost $100 for the cheapest set-top box, plus $17 a month for a three movie subscription. If it replaces a $50-a-month cable package, that's a 98% return on investment. I haven't checked this out and this might be good assuming you can download as many as you want with the max three at one time.
d. Take out a local library card, Cost: Nothing. If it saves you $10 a month on books, that's $120 a year. Return: Infinite. Note: Some libraries now let you borrow electronic books over the Internet as well. I certainly hope people have a library card, whoops I don't. There are sites on the Internet to download books for free but unless you want to print it out you are stuck to the screen. The Madge reads one book every two days, and she buys them. A few times a year she drives over to Goodwill and drops them off getting a blank receipt for a tax write off.
e. Order a packet of seeds and plant them in a window box or garden. Growing your own herbs, spices and even vegetables - depending on the amount of space you have - is a great investment. If you spent just $10 on seeds and saved a mere $50 in the year, that's a 400% ROI. Huh???? Obviously this person is sitting in Kansas. We tried growing herbs and spices, you have to constantly water, feed and spray for bugs. If the bugs don't get em the heat will. My advice buy in a air conditioned store.
f. Switch to a prepaid cellphone, Cost $20 for the phone and maybe $100 a year for minutes. Move the rest of your talk time to free Internet call and stop hemorrhaging $60 a month on a cellular plan. ROI: 500% This is excellent advice assuming you are not a teenager. We pay $85 a month for two phones with 700 minutes between the two of them. Last month we used 28 minutes. We have a house phone with unlimited minutes of local and long distance for $39 per month. Go to the prepay phone and stop making unnecessary calls from you cellphones.
g. Start making your own coffee to take to work each morning. Cost: $20 for a Thermos, $10 for a filter and papers, and $60 a year for ground coffee. Then skip the $4 a day drive-thru. If that saves you $1,000 a year, the return is more than 1,000 %. I have a better idea - stop working or if you can't, stop drinking coffee.