March 2002

Bright Futures
Despite challenges, home modification providers say
business is great and tomorrow looks even better.

Home Health Care Dealer Provider, March, 2002
by By Liz Finch

Home modification has traditionally been a difficult niche within HME. Building ramps, installing elevators and lifts, and just generally making homes safer intuitively makes sense, but this service and product category has suffered from a lack of Medicaid coverage, uneducated consumers, and a high cost of doing business.

Reinforcing bathroom walls when building allows more options in grab bar placement.

However, population trends, such as the aging Baby Boom generation and greater life expectancy, are on the side of home modification providers. Those businesses that have remained committed to this field are confident of a bright future, and their work history supports this belief.

Dallas-based AABCO Equipment and Supplies deals in bath aids, stair lifts, home elevators, vertical lifts, inclined lifts, and ramps. It does installations throughout Texas, Oklahoma, and Louisiana. According to AABCO salesman Joe Williams, the demand for accessibility equipment in the home has increasingly steadily over the past 20 years and these products and services now make up 70% of the company’s business.

“We are still a full-service HME store; that’s how we started, but we have experienced this gradual shift over the years due to client demand,” Williams says. “People didn’t know who to go to for these types of supplies, especially elevators. Our customers came to rely on us for other equipment through the years, and now we do their lifts and elevators too.”

Nashville, Tenn-based Life@Home is into its fourth year of providing home modification services. Its core business is modifying thresholds and selling and installing grab bars, handrails, and bedrails. Home modification makes up 68% of Life@Home’s business, with another 7% to 8% coming from related consulting work.

Good Neighbors
Both of these companies have realized that their specialization not only brings them a niche clientele, but also makes it possible for them to work on friendly terms with other HME providers. While AABCO does offer grab bars, Williams notes that another company in town has built a very good business in that specialty. “Another just does bathroom renovations,” he says. “There are a lot of different niches to get into, and I think the whole market is moving in that direction rather than into a general provider market.”

Life@Home also has a good relationship with other local HME providers because it does not compete for their core business, says company vice president Ella Chadwell. “Some HMEs in our area send us all the grab bar work and we send them all the wheelchair business,” she says. “You have to have that ability to get along in the same town to be successful.”

AABCO relies on referrals from previous or long-time customers for its business, although it also runs an advertisement in the yellow pages. Life@Home’s major marketing tool is its presentations to rehabilitation groups, hospital support organizations, and agencies that are in contact with people who have different maladies, such as the Multiple Sclerosis Society.

“I think what has been most successful for us is getting to know the home health industries and hospitals, because they are working with our future clients,” Chadwell says. “We try to communicate to discharge planners what our business is about, and we do an educational series of roundtables in our office once [every fiscal] quarter when we look at different people serving our clients.”

Another element that has helped companies like Life@Home and AABCO maintain their success is growing public awareness about home modification. New buildings are using “universal design” principles to become very handicap accessible, and aging Baby Boomers who care for infirm parents have driven up public interest.

“Awareness has increased a lot, especially in people who are building homes and planning for accessibility issues later in life,” Williams says. “It used to be that we would set up a residential elevator at our trade show and people would laugh. Now many will stop and say that’s what they need for their mother or their aunt or even for themselves. Others come to us with building plans and want to do it in the future in their own homes. Many of us have our parents coming to live with us today so this type of thinking is becoming much more commonplace.”

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