When I first hired a nanny to help to look after our children it placed me in a small and privileged league. These days that's nothing. Two nannies, I understand, are de rigueur in certain circles, while the numbers of personal trainers, therapists, nutritionists and their ilk are growing all the time. But the array of services available to the cash-rich, time-poor (or even the not-so-rich but very time-poor) doesn't stop there. New niche services are being thrown up all the time. Latest are those who will build up music and book collections for those who are too busy to create their own.

Take Gibson Music (020-7384 2270 and www.gibson-music.com), which caters mainly to those who think nothing of spending £30,000 or more on kitting out the house with sound. Angus Gibson, who founded Gibson Music and is still its managing director, though he has since sold it on, tells me that whereas once they would be asked to supply just the system, these days ongoing services are asked for by the new young rich. So these days he has a “Music on Demand” service, which puts together playlists to suit the client.

Many of his clients like many sorts of music - often they want loungy music for, say, a party, romantic music for a bachelor going a-wooing, something different for the yacht or the country houses, opera or classical music for other times of day. All these are put together after close consultation with the clients but many of them want this topped up every six months or so, when somebody from Gibson Music will come round to chat about what's missing, what's new, what other genres of music they might like to explore. While this service used to be available only to those with Gibson Music systems, these days it's offered to anybody who wants their help and is prepared to pay for it. For a £2,000 starting price you would get a consultation and then 200 discs would be uploaded for £2,500, 500 discs for £6,000.

More accessible is Audio Sushi (Audio for obvious reasons, Sushi “because we're eclectic”, says Kerrin Wallace, one of its founders). Audio Sushi is an online provider of bespoke music lists. You check into www.audiosushi.net (or telephone 0870 9770025 for help) fill in the questionnaire and, for a minimum charge of £130, you get a consultation and a musical styling session and end up with two hours of music that suits your needs. More popular is what it calls its Bento Box (that Sushi reference again) which offers four hours of music. They call in experts for any genre, no matter how obscure. In London they will visit you, outside London they do it all online but they do all the hard work - all you have to do is to switch on your computer, plug in the iPod and you'll find it all done. They also provide iPod loading lessons - £75 an hour and it usually takes between one and two hours to make somebody iPod-savvy.

And if your music's sorted but you want help with your book collection, a newish company called Designarta (www.designartabooks.co.uk ) does for books what the other two companies do for music. You discuss with Designarta's founders - father Mike Wilson and his daughter Charlotte - what it is you're after and they set about getting it. They will either track down a single rare book (the Foster 40 at £100 a time, Earth from Above, a limited-edition collection of fantastic photographs by Yann Arthus-Bertrand at £1,000 a time or Valentino's Collector's Edition at £600 a time are popular choices) or do as they've just done for one lucky yacht owner and put together an entire library of 800-1,000 books, including children's books, poetry, travel, novels and biographies. They specialise in art, design and fashion books and are very interested in the quality end of publishing. They charge only for the books, making their money from the difference between the wholesale and retail prices of the books.

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