(Writing from the Netherlands)
Just wondering: are there any Zope projects are available in the Netherlands/Benelux/Europe? We did one last year but they seem hard to find. Are there commercial projects available or is Zope mostly used on internal projects? Is there any demand for Zope expertise around here?
From the (spontaneous) requests I have had over the last year about Zope expertise, I can assure you that there is plenty of demand for Zope expertise. The problem is mainly that it is harder to find (commercial) expertise than to have projects available. Zope not (yet) being such a widespread Web developing alternative, needs are less visible. We are using Zope in our institution and there is too much work for me to handle, but I have had a hard time finding developers who can help me out. I'm sure this applies to more institutions and companies in the Netherlands (and Belgium for that matter).
And, btw, not to be nitpicking, but how would people know you have Zope expertise? Is it in your company profile, are you on the Zope service provider page, have you offered your services somewhere visible. The second point is of course that you could also prove Zope to be a viable alternative over other web developing tasks, by just doing projects in Zope. Or are all you customers asking for applications in specific technologies rather than solutions with the highest quality/for the best price/in the shortest time possible?
Reason I'm asking is that I'd love to continue working with Zope, but it's hard to justify in a company focused on Microsoft and Oracle, especially if there is no money to be made. I can learn Perl on company time and Linux is our internet server OS of choice, but JSP/Java and .NET (the latter is not that bad, uses SOAP/XML-RPC) is next if we don't find a use for our Zope expertise.
I'd say: just do it and make yourself heard. You might be surprised. Rik