One night a few months back, I was sitting at home staring into the glowing screen of the household Mac, when the phone rang. It was a friend of mine, who works at a marketing communications firm, wanting to find out if I knew anything about computers.

"A little," I said, lifting my finger off the moose - er, mouse - button. "Why?"

"I'm thinking about getting a computer of my own," she said.

"Hmm, bad idea," I said. "You already go in to the office on weekends anyway, right? Why kill yourself? Trust me, you'll just end up bringing work home with you," I said, tapping out the end of a sentence.

"What's that noise?" she asked.

"That? Oh, nothing. I just brought a little work home with me..."

Now that personal computers, fax machines, modems, and copiers have made their way from the corporate office to the home office, working at home is more and more common. According to estimates by Venture Development Corporation (VDC), a Natick, Massachusetts-based management consulting firm serving the electronics industry, there are about 23 million "home office workers" in the U.S.

The level of home office work varies; some people - like me, for example, or my friend (who went ahead and bought a PC) - just use the equipment to catch up on work from their full-time jobs; others telecommute, working at home and using their telephone, fax machine, or modem to communicate with the "main office."

Keith Kuzmin, project director for VDC's Home Office Planning Service, a multi-client study of the home office equipment market, says that VDC' s definition of a home office worker differs from other industry sources. "We define the market as those people who have part- or full-time home office income, or people who telecommute. Because we eliminate the large group of people who do catch-up work at home, our estimates of the market tend to be smaller than those of other analysts. In 1990, we estimate that the market was around 23 million people, but I've seen numbers as high as 45 million."

As part of the Home Office Planning Service, VDC surveyed self-employed people on their office equipment buying habits, to find out, for example, how they get their product information, where they buy, and why. Some sample findings:

  • The respondents cited three items that every home office should have - the personal computer, desktop calculator, and telephone answering machine.
  • Quality, ease of use, and reliability are the three most important product features.
  • A PC was cited as the first product someone starting a home office should buy.
  • Copiers are becoming a very popular home office product.

Experience influences choices

The study found thathomeoffice workers haveawiderangeofoccupations: about one-quarter are in consulting; 20% are in sales; 10-15% are in accounting: 5-10% do secretarial work. An additional 20-25% work in blue collar occupations.

This past experience influences the product choices they make. Since most have had experience with many of the advanced office automation products, Kuzmin says, they know what they like and what product features will best suit their needs.

"A person from an advertising background might feel that he or she needs a better quality copier than some of the personal copiers that are available right now. Someone who's in investment counseling might feel that he needs better quality output from a fax than some of the curled up pieces of paper that you get from the cheap machines."

Though home office workers tend to be sophisticated consumers of technology, they aren'tearly adapters, Kuzmin says. Because their livelihood is on the line, they can't easily afford to take a chance on a new product without a proven track record - no matter how many advantages it offers. If it doesn't work, they don't work either.

Home office shopper

"The home office worker is becoming the home office shopper," Kuzmin says. Past VDC surveys showed that product demonstrations and the advice of sales staff were heavy influences on home equipment purchasers. But now, more buyers rely on past experience, articles and reviews in trade publications, and manufacturers' product literature for guidance, enabling them to make their final purchase decision without ever leaving their home.

Once they decide what they want, they look for the outlet offering them the cheapest price. More and more, those outlets are mail order, mass merchandisers, warehouse clubs and electronic superstores, the study shows.

This better-informed shopper may lead to erosion of brand loyalty, Kuzmin says, because as buyers shop features and specs they may pass over better known, higher-priced brands for lesser-known brands that offer the same capabilities at a lower price.

But while home office workers are price sensitive, they don't necessarily want cheap products, because reliability is very important. "This buyer is going to consider the low cost options because he is now the purchase decisionmaker. When you work in a traditional office setting, you're not a part of those decisions. But in your home office, you know exactly what your expenses are, so you're very careful." Like to change

Although the VDC study doesn' t examine the reasons behind the increase of home office workers, Kuzmin feels that employers are realizing that allowing people to work in their homes can increase productivity and lower overhead. Also, he says, Americans just like to change, whether it's their lifestyles or their jobs, and working at home is an aspect of that. But even working at home isn't forever, he says.

"It's interesting, because even though the people that we interview for the most part claim they plan on being in a home office for the rest of their working life, we find that after a ten year period, there's a noticeable group that drop out and go back to the traditional office setting."