Reunion Organizer

Startup Costs: Under $2,000
Home Based: Can be operated from home.
Part Time: Can be operated part-time.
Franchises Available? Yes
Online Operation? Yes

As a reunion organizer, you'll be a combination event planner and private detective, hunting down missing members of high school and college classes, large families, groups and associations, then planning and organizing the bash of the decade. To find those missing members, you'll pore through phone directories and computer databases and contact school and civic records departments and friends, neighbors and relatives. Reunion-organizing is a growing field--with all those baby boomers being joined by Generation Xers just reaching high school reunion age, there's no dearth of potential customers. And since just about everybody is out in the workforce these days, no one has the time to spend on tracking down former classmates or associates and then attending to all the details of the event. Which leaves lots of work for you. The advantages to this business are that you can work at home, it's creative, challenging and rewarding--you get to help people have fun and renew old ties every time you plan a reunion. As a reunion organizer, you'll have to be obsessive about locating attendees, as well as creative about ways to broaden your search. You'll also need to be extremely detail-oriented and organized--people will be traveling from all over the country to attend events you arrange and counting on you to pull it all together.

The Market

Your customers can be the Class of X for high schools and colleges, groups and associations, and large, far-flung families. Your best bet for selling to these groups is to establish yourself in your community. Introduce yourself to and leave brochures with vendors in event-planning industries who can refer people to you--caterers, hotels, florists, printers and photographers. Find out who's in charge of the reunion committees for your own high school or college class or those of your friends and relatives, then call and introduce yourself and your services.

Needed Equipment

You'll need a computer with the usual office software, a laser printer, a fax machine, a calendar, a planning book and a phone.