Household Management

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Care Economy Overview

About the
Investor’s Guide

HOUSEHOLD MANAGEMENT

Families want to buy back time. There’s a $217 billion opportunity to be unlocked.

$122B

Current
Market SIZE

$339B

POTENTIAL MARKET SIZE
cooking-, cleaning-, and laundry-related tasks

*Source: IBISWorld Euromonitor International, all data used in current terms, USA: Consumer Appliances 2020 Edition and Home Care 2020 Edition

There's pent-up demand to buy back time.

The household care segment grew 6% annually between 2016 and 2020.* Families are desperate to offload household care—especially chores. They’re willing to pay for it... and it’s not just rich families. Most middle and lower-income households say they’d pay a minimum of $10 each week to eliminate an hour of household tasks like cleaning, cooking, and laundry.

*Government sources: acf.hhs.gov (TANF), acf.hhs.gov (CCDF), eclkc.ohs.acf.hhs.gov (Head start), NIEER.org

American households across all income brackets are willing to pay up to $50 to eliminate an hour of household chores

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Source: A national survey with n=2485 respondents to understand household willingness to pay for products and services that reduce the time spent on household management tasks. Conducted in April 2021 by McKinsey & Co.

Both women and men are eager to pay to offload chores and the mental load of running a household.

The 2020 pandemic year laid bare our household burdens for all to see (over Zoom!). Although women still spend more than twice the time that men do caring for loved ones, men are willing to pay top dollar for products and services that would give them (and their co-parents and/or partners) back that time and mental space.

Men are more willing than women to spend $50+ for time and stress-saving products and services for the household

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But people still feel like they’re supposed to do it themselves.

We loathe the weekly grind of running a household--meal planning and cooking, grocery shopping, dishes, laundry--but we don’t yet pay to have our load lightened at the level one might expect. Why?

It may be a matter of mindset or identity: 44% of households surveyed reported that feeling like they “should do these tasks for their own household” was a top factor holding them back from paying to offload household chores.

Identity is a top factor limiting additional household  management purchases

saving time

Survey respondents' biggest desire was to rescue their time from the black hole of planning and doing chores.

Markets within the care economy primed for more dynamism in the next decade

Food-tech

‍Automation of meal planning,  food delivery, and grocery shopping

Family-tech

‍Outsourcing the management  and coordination of family  chores and tasks

Connected home

AI-powered appliances that can better understand and meet our needs

Home innovation

On-demand home maintenance and repairs, gig economy marketplaces for cleaning and laundry services