With Baby Boomers rapidly aging past 65, elder care is in high demand.
11,000 Baby Boomers turn 65 every day. Globally, the number of people over 80 will triple by 2050. Confronted with these statistics, it is obvious that the demand for elder services is at an all-time high. Women take on most of this burden. According to the AARP, two out of three American caregivers are female. When caregiving needs become too demanding, women tend to drop out of the workforce, draining companies of talented, senior-level female execs.
Naborforce is the only network in the country leveraging sophisticated matching technology to connect older adults with the support and caregiving they need – from a vetted member of their local community. The so-called “nabors” provide on-demand assistance with household chores, rides around town, and a friendly hand when needed. Experiencing rapid growth, the company recently closed a $9 million Series A financing round led by Translink Capital, which it is harnessing to expand into Northern Virginia.
Paige Wilson is the CEO and founder of Naborforce.
Paige Wilson, CEO and founder of Naborforce, had a demanding career and was raising a teenage daughter when her mother broke her hip and suddenly needed more attention. In managing that challenge, Wilson was inspired to launch a company to help the huge number of other people in similar situations.
“I like to think of us as the Uber of help for seniors,” Wilson says. “What we do is sorely needed – and it’s a total white space. There is no one addressing this issue in this way. Every other provider is coming at this from a healthcare angle. We feel this is a community issue. Nabors helping older neighbors. It’s as simple as that!”
While Wilson did feel “called” to start Naborforce, she explains that she did not think that way in the beginning. She believes that most entrepreneurs likely feel the same – as though they stumbled into their life purpose. More likely, they experienced a problem and then set out to solve it, as she did.
After beginning a career in finance, Wilson climbed the corporate ladder quickly until she was serving as treasurer and CFO of a Fortune 500 company. “Everything in my life was humming along well – and I could control most of it! And then my mom broke her hip,” she says. “All of a sudden, I was the daughter who lived five minutes away, but also I was juggling a demanding career and raising a teenage daughter on my own, having been widowed. I learned first-hand how stressful caregiving could be on both the family and the older parent.”
This is when Wilson began looking for resources – and found there were none. Either you were fully independent or you turned to your family, friends or neighbors for help, or you could hire home care. There was a gap. Her mother did not need an aide or nurse yet. She just wanted help with everyday things like changing an overhead light bulb, bringing the bridge table down from the attic, rides to the beauty salon, or reprogramming the remote.
Naborforce provides older adults with care from a trusted member of their community.
“I got through it, but it was one of the hardest things I have done,” Wilson says. “After my mother passed away, I came to realize that I was not alone. There are 54 million family caregivers just like me out there, sandwiched between raising kids and helping their aging parents. Most of them also work full time. The answer became as clear as day. The answer was right there in our neighborhoods. We could repurpose empty nesters, retirees and others to serve as ‘backup’ sons and daughters.”
Wilson has faced her share of challenges, especially raising outside capital for Naborforce. She was surprised to learn that it is significantly more difficult for female-founded companies to raise funds because they are more capital efficient, they exit faster, and they provide higher ROIs for investors. And yet only around 2.2 percent of venture capital goes to women-founded companies. She feels blessed to have attracted venture capital partners who believe in Naborforce’s ability to build a profitable company while also solving a very large and growing societal problem.
To those looking to tap into their purpose, Wilson says, “be open. You don’t have to know all the answers or the perfect path in the beginning. One thing leads to the next as long as you are open to it.”
