Small Businesses Cater to Gray

From smSmallBiz

TO SCOTT NEAL , who recently lost his job at a Tampa, Fla., home builder because of the sagging real-estate market, a generation of about 77 million aging Americans sounds an awful lot like opportunity knocking.

Whether it is somebody moving across town to live in a managed retirement community, migrating to Florida from a colder state or just plain staying put, he says, "the vast majority of 62-year-olds won't want to run down to Home Depot, pick up a gallon of paint and hop on a ladder." That's why Neal and his business partner are confident about their decision to buy a CertaPro Painters franchise. Being in the business of home improvement and specifically catering to an older demographic, he predicts, "will be the brighter side of housing as we start to come out of this very down market."

Targeting the older customer has long been a focal point among big business, which regularly features older celebrities in advertisements. (Think: Isabella Rossellini gracing print advertisements for Lancome products or Peter Frampton strumming a guitar in a recent Geico television commercial.) However, says Matt Thornhill, president of the Boomer Project, a Richmond, Va., consulting firm: "The aging of the baby boomer demographic is a huge opportunity for businesses of any size."

According to Mintel Group, a market-research firm, the baby boomer