The Japanese 'Rent-a-Grandma' Service

Need some 'motherly warmth'? In Japan, you can hire a grandma for as little as $60.

Woman with her contracted 'grandma' | Client Partners

When a Japanese handyman contractor faced an oversaturated market, they turned to a pretty unusual solution. With few other jobs available for women over 60 other than house cleaners, the company realized that for the same reason a person might want to hire a male handyman in his 60s during a homebuilding project, someone might want to hire a grandmother for a homemaking project.

So, Tokyo’s Client Partners started the OK! Obaachan (OK! Grandmother) service and it’s become a hit. “I never get bored,” 69-year old Taeko Kaji, one of the rent-a-grandmas, told the Australian ABC. “I get to go out and have these experiences and that’s why taking this job was the right decision for me.”

Client Partners allows customers to hire the services of guides and interpreters, but concern in Japanese society over run-of-the-mill, big city loneliness gave the company the idea to start renting friends, ‘aunts,’ and now even grandmothers.

Kaori Okano, a professor of Asian Studies and Japanese at La Trobe University, studies gender relations in Japan. She said the company provided valuable opportunities for some older women. "It gives a sense of self-fulfilment to these women who were previously unemployed that they can be useful and valued by other people."