Alive Ventures Presents Report "Co-Designing with Older People," Revealing Incredibly Bright Silver Lining of Aging and Market Opportunities for Better Design

LOS ANGELES, Oct. 8, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Alive Ventures today announced the publication of "Co-Designing with Older People" a report of the findings of a year long study commissioned by nonprofit funding agency The SCAN Foundation and conducted by design studio Birsel + Seck. Alive Ventures was incubated within The SCAN Foundation and recently launched as a stand-alone startup studio, inspired in large part by the results of the study. Alive Ventures presents the report as part of its mission to foster a community of entrepreneurs and designers that work co-creatively with adults aged 65+ to develop new companies, products and services for older adults.

The "Co-Designing with Older People" report summarizes the findings of a year long study comprised of a series of 15 interactive workshops hosting more than 250 people age 65 and older in New York City, New Jersey, Long Island, Los Angeles, Pasadena, San Diego, Chula Vista and northwestern Mississippi. The study and workshop series were produced in collaboration with Birsel + Seck, conducted over the course of 2019 and 2020 and are based on the concepts of co-creation and the design process featured in designer Ayse Birsel's book "Design the Life You Love" and methodology.

"We set out to investigate what really matters to older Americans - and how to best engage them in that question. We started with open minds and a co-design framework and were completely blown away by what we found," said John Zapolski, founder of Alive Ventures. "Older people do not define their lives by decline and decay and neither should we. It's time to reconsider old ways of thinking about seniors and recognize the beauty and vitality of our later years."

"We're onto something big when we recognize how much life we have to live in our third act and how much older adults have to contribute. Those concepts are foundational to Alive Ventures and our decision to build a community of designers and entrepreneurs around older adults themselves - and we welcome them to join us in that vision."

Transforming Aging, One Workshop at a Time

Why embark on an experimental, interactive national tour to engage older adults in a collaborative design process? Because none of us are getting any younger, and everyone likes good design.

In 2020, 55.9 million Americans will be 65 years of age and older. That number is projected to nearly double over the next three decades as life expectancies continue to improve. At the same time, it's no secret that our consumer economy - and the greater design world - has fixated on youth culture, looking to the tastes of up and coming generations to set consumer trends. That fixation has nearly bankrupted the cultural currency of the generations that came before, who are now enjoying longer life spans than ever and continue to wield spending power, not to mention a sense of style and aesthetic taste.

Opportunity was the focus of the co-design study, in stark contrast to the perspective taken by the vast majority of providers to the aging industry, which look almost exclusively at aging in terms of decline and how to mitigate it. Starting with that positive lens, study resulted in three major outcomes:

1. Market Insights About the Wants and Needs of Older People: 28 specific desires that fall under 11 recurring themes that are defined by four major topics - Love, Vitality, Work and Friendship.
   
   Full report "Co-Designing with Older People" available here.
   
   
2. A Repeatable Co-Design System: a co-creative experience design framework of methods and tools that encourages older adults to share their experiences and desires freely and candidly.
   
   Design kit and facilitators guide available here.
   
   
3. A Community of Middle Income Older People: a geographically disparate group of middle-income older Americans who live in diverse communities, from metropolitan areas to rural towns, with a range of backgrounds and outlooks on life.

Alive Ventures welcomes adults in later life to join the Alive Community to co-design a more beautiful future. Visit aliveventures.co/community to learn more.

Additional Insights:

• Older people cannot be reduced to, or defined by worries. Our community of older people is optimistic, interesting, resilient, dynamic, curious and courageous.They are thrilled to be alive.
  
  
• Older people have the most experience in living and we all have much to learn from their experiences. The time period older adults are living in today–an additional 20 more years of life–didn't exist 50 years ago. In many ways, people who live long are the astronauts of life, charting unexplored territory. And, since good design for older adults is good design for everyone, we can improve our future lives, too.
  
  
• The problem and the opportunity are the institutions, services and social constructs that have failed to serve older people. Aging isn't inherently a problem. The challenge is the failure of that which is supposed to support us as we age, and therein lies the opportunity to reimagine what's possible for the 20+ years of life post-retirement.
  
  
• Older people are looking for different kinds of experiences. Experiences that are designed for them and by them, rather than someone else's ideas of what older people should be doing.

About Alive Ventures

Alive Ventures is a startup studio that imagines and builds companies, products and services that help older adults live, work and love. Exclusively serving an audience of 55 million older Americans, Alive Ventures brings together design talent, seasoned entrepreneurial talent and older adults themselves to co-design and launch new generations of beautifully designed products that older adults love to use and share. By marrying the wisdom and lived experiences of older adults with deep consumer insights, proven customer acquisition strategies and valuable early stage resources, Alive Ventures helps de-risk the traditional startup process while attracting high-caliber design and entrepreneurial talent to its mission. For more information, visit www.aliveventures.co.

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SOURCE Alive Ventures

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