Could memoir-writing services for seniors be the next big trend in China's silver economy?

Every life story deserves to be chronicled.

I think it was back when I was in middle school, roughly 20 years ago, that my grandfather completed a personal memoir after some time spent writing. It wasn’t particularly lengthy, but I remember being struck by how unusual it seemed at the time. In my impression back then, memoirs were something only famous people wrote. For someone like my grandfather—a so-called “ordinary person”—to pen his own memoir felt quite rare.

As I grew older, I began to realize that history is, in fact, made up of countless stories from ordinary people, each one unique in its own way. Recently, a friend of mine shared a thought-provoking line: “Once you accept your ordinary life, your extraordinary journey begins.” It’s a sentiment I’m still mulling over, but it resonates with my belief that everyone’s life is worth documenting. This idea aligns perfectly with a growing trend in China—the rise of a niche industry dedicated to writing memoirs for elderly people, especially as the country’s aging population accelerates.

Perhaps one day I’ll hire someone to help write my own memoir. By then, though, the question might be whether that person will be human or AI. In today’s newsletter, I want to introduce you to the world of China’s burgeoning memoir-writing service market for senior citizens. The original article, titled 为老人代写回忆录，年入6位数？Writing Memoirs for Seniors in China: Making Tens of Thousands a Year?, was first posted on the WeChat blog of China Newsweek, a Chinese weekly magazine published by China News Service.

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Writing Memoirs for Seniors in China: Making Tens of Thousands a Year?

When 97-year-old Liu Dianqing received his memoir, he donned his military uniform and gave a heartfelt salute to the delivery person.

The red cover featured a profile of Liu in uniform, with the bold title “The Revolutionary Road: A Century of Trials and Triumphs.” This unofficial publication without an ISBN or price tag moved Liu to tears. His daughter, Liu Youzhen, remembered him sitting in the courtyard, cradling the book and flipping through its pages over and over.

“It feels amazing to see my life written down like this -- I’m so happy I cried,” Liu said loudly, his hearing now fading.

Born into an era of poverty and hardship, Liu, a native of central China's Henan Province, enlisted in the military twice and spent the latter part of his life in a remote county in Ganzi Prefecture, southwest China's Sichuan Province. While his story wasn’t one of battlefield heroics, Liu Youzhen was deeply curious about the life her father had led -- treasuring the details hidden in his stories and the dialect he still spoke.

This year, posts about ghostwriting memoirs for seniors have gone viral on social media and lifestyle platforms like Xiaohongshu and Douyin, with eye-catching headlines such as "Custom Memoirs for Seniors: Earn 60,000 Yuan Per Book” and “Make Six Figures Ghostwriting for Seniors."

Depending on the client’s budget, these memoirs vary in length but typically exceed 30,000 words. At rates of 5,000–6,000 yuan per 10,000 words, the cost of a memoir generally falls between 10,000 and 80,000 yuan.

This emerging market has attracted a variety of service providers, from small but growing companies and boutique studios with fewer than 10 employees to part-time writers and freelancers looking for extra income or a steady side gig.

By the end of 2023, China’s population aged 60 and above had reached 296 million, accounting for 21.1% of the total population. In this rapidly growing “silver economy,” could ghostwriting memoirs be the next big opportunity?

Preserving Memories

It’s often only after grandparents or parents pass away that people realize how little they truly knew about them -- and regret not capturing their life stories. Nearly every professional interviewed by China Newsweek shared this sense of remorse.

For many, this regret marks the start of their journey into the field. When an elderly family member falls gravely ill and their time begins to run out, families scramble to preserve their memories. They look for someone with writing skills to document these stories -- not necessarily a great wordsmith, just someone who can craft clear and coherent sentences. Often, the go-to choice is a friend who enjoys writing.

This is exactly how 36-year-old Ding Man got his start. In 2015, fresh out of grad school and searching for a business opportunity, he came across a U.S. platform specializing in ghostwritten memoirs. The platform connected clients with writers at different skill levels, with projects typically priced at around 30,000 yuan.

But it wasn’t until 2021 that Ding saw the demand in China take off. Over the next two years, he witnessed families rushing to preserve memories after an elderly loved one passed unexpectedly, finally compelled to act under the weight of urgency.

Interestingly, most clients aren’t younger relatives -- they are the seniors themselves. Han Meng, a writer active on the social media platform Douyin, discovered this while working on an assignment. During a National Day holiday, Han Meng was assigned by her institution to interview a retired official. Her task was to learn about his contributions to the institution, but the elderly man instead wanted to begin with the seeds of his story, planted in his youth and even childhood.

That’s when Han realized something profound: the elderly have lived through eras of immense change, and their stories are deeply interconnected. When someone is willing to listen, they’re eager to reflect and weave their lives into a meaningful narrative -- perhaps as much for themselves as for future generations.

“Work experiences need to be understood in the context of a person’s life story.” This perspective comes from Professor Chen Xin, a public history researcher and distinguished professor at the History Department of Shanghai Normal University. Professor Chen encountered a similar situation during his time at Zhejiang University’s Public History Research Center.

The university tasked him with urgently documenting the stories of professors aged 85 and above to fill gaps in the institution’s historical records. However, Professor Chen quickly realized that focusing solely on their professional ties to the university made it difficult to gain their trust. Ultimately, the research team interviewed dozens of senior professors and compiled an oral history for each one.

Ding also took a thoughtful approach, categorizing his elderly clients into different groups. Some are nearing retirement and want a memoir as part of their legacy at work, often inspired by an upcoming farewell ceremony. Others commission memoirs to help their children and grandchildren better understand them.

For instance, Ding once worked with his landlords in Beijing, a retired couple who had been professors at a local university. Their grandchildren, born and raised abroad, had little connection with them. To bridge this gap, the couple asked Ding to write a 200,000-word memoir of their life stories so their grandchildren could truly understand who their grandparents were.

In fact, most elderly clients who actively seek memoir services share similar motivations. These are often individuals with rich life experiences and a profound understanding of how societal changes intertwine with personal journeys. As they enter a slower-paced phase of life, they feel an increasing desire to reflect on their family roots and document their stories—leaving a legacy for future generations.

A Timeless Need

The idea of seniors documenting their life stories -- or hiring someone to do it for them -- is not new. Professor Chen considers this practice a form of personal history writing, placing it within the broader scope of public history.

Chen notes that as early as a decade ago, Chinese scholars and research institutions were already promoting personal history projects, including memoirs for the elderly, often on a nonprofit basis.

He also points out that writing histories for renowned academics or political figures has never fallen out of practice. These individuals, having participated in historic events or pivotal moments, have shaped the lives of countless people, naturally drawing a wide audience.

What’s new, however, is the growing awareness and ability of everyday people to reflect on and record their own histories.

“With the rise of the internet and new media, the cost of recording and sharing personal stories has dropped significantly, creating a surge in personal history writing,” Chen explains. “If someone can’t write, they can record audio. If they have the means, they can hire a writer.”

According to Chen, the biggest motivation for seniors commissioning memoirs isn’t societal recognition -- it's the desire to share their stories with loved ones.

“Whether it’s about legacy or inspiration, these memoirs focus on the individual and their family. They’re meant to strengthen family ties and bridge generational gaps. This is where their real value lies. For individuals and their families, these ‘small histories’ can often mean more than grand historical narratives,” Chen said.

The rise of the memoir-writing market is closely tied to the aging population. Zhu Ziyi, the founder of a mid-sized ghostwriting agency, initially entered the senior-focused industry by betting on online ventures rather than labor-intensive projects like memoir writing.

Zhu began with a niche project centered on elderly cheongsam (qipao) fashion shows. However, when in-person events abruptly halted in 2020, he pivoted to memoir ghostwriting. To his surprise, the new venture turned a profit in its very first year.

In recent years, young people looking for new career opportunities have become another driving force behind the growth of this industry. According to Han Xiner, a co-founder of a ghostwriting agency, many bloggers who reached out to her in the past two years are former professionals from the education and training industry who transitioned to online content creation but struggled to find success. After several attempts, they eventually turned to memoir ghostwriting.

China Newsweek reports that while top writers focus on biographies of celebrities and entrepreneurs, the market for elderly memoirs is still fragmented.

Most of the practitioners are young people who have been in the industry for less than three years, often working part-time. As a result, their client base and output remain limited. For example, after three years of part-time ghostwriting, Ding Man has written just six memoirs.

Han Meng said that there are no set standards for producing memoirs. Practitioners have a wide range of skills and aesthetic tastes, and the quality of the memoirs’ packaging varies greatly. The hardest part to control, however, is the writing itself.

Comparing memoirs from different ghostwriters, China Newsweek found that some were overly sentimental, turning the subject’s life into a legend, while others were more focused on fact-checking, cross-referencing the subject's oral history with archives and public records to create a more authentic, reliable, and accurate narrative.

“The market has already split into different segments. Some teams are targeting high-end clients, who view the memoir as a family history document and value authenticity, legacy, and readability. Other teams are focusing on the lower-end market, where the emphasis is more on packaging and the writing quality is less important. Different clients have different expectations when it comes to emotional value and ceremonial significance,” one practitioner explained to China Newsweek.

“Personal history should first meet the individual’s needs. Then, on a family level, the goal is for the children to read it and gain a deeper understanding or appreciation of their family history or the individual. Only then does it matter how it resonates on a larger societal scale,” Chen explained to China Newsweek.

The Challenges of Specialization

Industry insiders were quicker to recognize the rise of this new trend than the media or the public. Han Xiner explained that as early as 2022, various parties had already targeted this emerging business. Her agency has been receiving a steady stream of visitors looking for collaboration.

“People from all walks of life -- media professionals and content creators seeking a career shift, funeral photography companies, Chinese culture enthusiasts, family offices within insurance companies or law firms, and even AI companies,” Han Xiner listed, describing the types of people approaching her.

Everyone wants to enter the new market but with different approaches. Beyond traditional revenue streams like channels and content, AI companies are the newest players. On one hand, AI tools help improve production efficiency; on the other, these companies hope to use the memoir-writing industry to enter homes and create “digital avatars” of elderly or deceased individuals.

As this still-developing market draws attention and resources, practitioners remain both optimistic and cautious. Social media influencers, for example, want to use the content to promote themselves and generate traffic, and Han Xiner doesn’t mind, saying, “We see great potential in this market.” At this early stage, rather than worrying about competition, it’s better to focus on growing the industry.

That said, the commercialization of the memoir-writing market still faces significant hurdles, with the biggest challenge being customer acquisition. “Whether it’s the elderly or their children, they tend to invest with an eye toward the future, prioritizing spending on the next generation,” several interviewees explained. Much like senior care institutions in China, the high cost of the service -- ranging from tens of thousands of yuan -- makes both the elderly and their children hesitant to pay.

After six years in the business, Zhao Yuxi has lowered his pricing from 30,000–100,000 yuan to 10,000–30,000 yuan. Meanwhile, Zhu Ziyi has kept his minimum price at 28,000 yuan to stay close to the cost-line and cater to average families.

Ding's Douyin account regularly receives inquiries from elderly people across the country, but he admitted that he's yet to perfect converting these inquiries into actual clients.

In the early stages of his business, Zhu Ziyi tried giving speeches at senior care facilities, associations, and events, but the elderly weren’t interested. “Older people often have a low sense of self-worth. They don’t think their lives are worth writing about, and they’re reluctant to spend the money,” he explained. Eventually, he changed his strategy and started targeting the children of the elderly to place orders instead.

With market segmentation, the approach to memoir production also began to diverge. Higher-end clients, who tend to be more educated, have a greater willingness to pay and higher expectations for professionalism. Teams serving this clientele invest considerable resources to make the memoirs as polished as commercially published books.

“Authenticity and readability are the core requirements. It’s simple: this is a legacy for future generations, so there’s no need to lie or embellish. It needs to be something future generations will actually want to read, or it loses its value as a legacy,” Zhu Ziyi explained.

As memoir-writing becomes a business, the question of how to professionalize the industry arises. “For example, your writing should be supported by more research, similar to the technical expertise in history. You need to know how to find the right sources. Or, if the subject’s memory is unclear and they can’t tell their story effectively, how should the writer handle it to balance authenticity with readability?” said Chen Xin.

Chen Xin had once envisioned a scenario where ordinary people could write their memoirs with scholars providing guidance on methodology and standards. However, now he believes that training should come from the market, with professionals who have more experience in writing biographies leading the way.

“Abroad, there’s a certification for oral historians, issued by private companies rather than government agencies. This helps establish a professional framework for the field. Since this is a service to society, the service needs to be thorough, which requires comprehensive technical training,” Chen Xin explained. He believes the future of the ghostwriting industry will need training in social psychology, digital humanities, media editing, and more.

“Because what you’re doing may not just be writing a text -- you could also make a documentary. This could lead to a rich cultural market,” Chen Xin said.

Is memoir writing truly the new frontier of the “silver economy”? Zhao Yuxi once described the future of the industry in an interview: “Writing a memoir after retirement is as natural as taking wedding photos when you get married.”

After the market gained momentum, Han Xiner’s agency quickly found itself overwhelmed with requests. In her view, no matter how much the process is optimized or efficiency improved, memoir writing’s standardization will never be on par with fast-moving consumer goods. Moreover, since personal experiences and memories are inherently unique, it’s fair to say that this industry is, in a way, anti-scale.

Despite the promising outlook, Ding is conflicted, saying “Even though the market still needs development, considering China’s large population, I’m motivated. But the reality is that customer acquisition is very difficult.”

“If I want to raise my prices and target high-end clients, it’s not just about the channels — they have expectations about your knowledge and educational background. For regular customers, charging 3,000 yuan for 10,000 words offers a very low return on investment compared to my main business. I’ll have to wait and see.” Ding added.