Honor Home Care: Changing the Dynamics of Senior Care Delivery

By Rob Chess, Susan Pohlmeyer, Gelila Bekele
2022 | Case No. SM331 | Length 14 pgs.

Honor Home Care, founded as an on-demand home care company, evolved into the leading home care technology and operations platforms for home care agencies across the U.S. In the last quarter of 2020, the Honor leadership team raised $140 million in Series D funding to accelerate the company’s geographic expansion. Seth Sternberg, CEO of Honor Home Care, must decide between two options– acquiring one large home care franchise or buying several smaller home care agencies.

In this case, students are encouraged to explore the advantages and disadvantages of different partnership and acquisition opportunities to scale technology companies in the home care market. The case highlights the complexity of customer acquisition and employee recruiting, management and retention in the industry, and lays out how Honor sought to tackle these challenges, as well as the strategic decisions they faced along the way. The case also chronicles the evolution of the home care industry in the United States, highlighting the market structures that impacted the company’s growth.

Learning Objective

This case is designed to help students:

  • Develop perspective on how to evaluate business opportunities at the intersection of aging and healthcare.
  • Understand the challenges of, as well as tools required for, recruiting, training, managing and retaining a large, remote and low skilled workforce.
  • Evaluate the benefits and tradeoffs of acquiring franchise businesses.
This material is available for download by current Stanford GSB students, faculty, and staff, as well as Stanford GSB alumni. For inquires, contact the Case Writing Office. Download