Many senior communities pride themselves on welcoming new residents, but these days, they must roll out the red carpet for another group as well: the furry friends of those residents.
We’ve found through our own research that pets are extremely important to the next generation of retirees. As more and more Boomers turn 65, that trend is only expected to grow. Some communities already go beyond standard pet-friendly policies to offer added services catering to four-legged residents.
Pet-focused programs can also be offered in different forms at different care levels so that residents can continue to reap the important health benefits of interactions with animals as they age.
Here are ten pet-focused services communities may want to consider offering if they aren’t already:
Dog park
Yappy hour (residents bring pets to socialize during happy hour)
Pet-related merchandise in the community gift shop
Pet care program (walking, feeding, litter-changing, playful exercise, medication administration, etc.)
Pet salon or mobile grooming
Vet house calls
Day care or boarding for pets
Community dogs and cats
Pet therapy
Pet-oriented events like celebrations and adoption fairs
Marketing Insight:
As animal-loving Boomers enter the senior living market in droves, it’s time to fully capitalize on the health and financial benefits of providing their pets with creature comforts.
How would you like to make life easier for elders, from folding clothes to taking meds? Just come to the Aging 2.0 30-event, 30-city, 30-day pitch tour, going on now through October 8. Start-ups in cities from Beijing to Boston are pitching tech inventions to panels of senior care providers. Winners will move on to the semi-finals, and finalists will present in San Francisco, November 19-20.
By partnering with one of these start-ups, communities can try out helpful new technology for their residents on a trial basis. A few of the innovations include:
Reminder Rosie, a robot that helps elders remember medications and appointments
What’s the killer diagnosis your doctor won’t tell you?
It kills more people than breast and prostate cancer combined. It takes the lives of one in three seniors. And only 45% of people who are diagnosed, are told they have it. It’s Alzheimer’s, the sixth leading cause of death in the U.S.
More than 28 million boomers will get Alzheimer’s by 2050, and spending on this disease will eat up 25% of Medicare funds. It’s the only disease in the top ten we can’t prevent, cure or slow. But we can take action. And today is World Alzheimer’s Day, the perfect time to start. To learn more, watch the video.
We joke about it at the office: ”Oh, I’ll be paying off those student loans for the rest of my life.” But, for some people, it’s actually true.
According to the Government Accountability Office, 706,000 of households headed by people over 65 have outstanding student debt. They owed a collective $18.2 billion in 2013, up from $2.8 billion in 2005. Worse yet, people over 65 default on their loans at a much higher rate than younger people, and can have part of their social security benefits garnished to offset their debt.
Those stats strike close to home here at Varsity. A number of employees here are paying off student loans. One woman chose a 15-year loan period with a $600 monthly payment. “I wanted them gone,” she said. “I don’t want to be in my 60s and paying them off.” As it is, she’ll pay a total of $30,000 in interest. (Her friends who chose 30-year loan periods will be paying for a long, long time.) Another co-worker has an 8.75 percent interest rate. “It’s crazy that you can get a house at a lower interest rate than a student loan,” he said.
Student loan debt is becoming such a huge issue that it’s a hot topic on the presidential campaign trail. Learn where each politician stands here.
Which celebrity recently helped prepare meals and deliver them to seniors? A good egg who’s very tired of bacon jokes. His name is Kevin Bacon, and recently he did his part to fight hunger by volunteering at a NYC Meals on Wheels.
Since we work in an industry that serves seniors, it’s important to be aware that 6.4 million of them suffer from hunger. What better time to call attention to this life-threatening issue than World Hunger Month, going on now.
You can be six degrees away from Kevin Bacon and help your favorite hunger charity win $5,000 by taking the good egg challenge and spoofing his funny Web film and shorts.
What do many of the trends we’ve spotted lately have in common? They all do one important thing: nurture ties among people and communities.
Connecting to Generations: Avanti Senior Living brainstormed with kids to create meals, programs and events just for them.
Connecting to the Community: Smart design draws in locals through community centers, gyms, art galleries and restaurants, all of which are open to the public.
Connecting to Safety: Residents at Episcopal Senior Communities wear pendants that connect them to the staff via wifi, so they feel safe anywhere on campus.
Connecting to Discovery: “The Magic Table,” created by Dutch start-up, Active Cues, and reported in Mintel, allows residents to interact with words, images and games beamed down on a table from a smart projector.
Connecting to Nature: A multisensory immersion environment in The Goodman Group’s memory care unit includes plant walls, ocean scents and star-like lighting.
Music has been shown to enhance brain function, reduce stress and build relationships.
And the more connected people feel to the music, the better. One study found that seniors who sang along to tunes scored significantly better on cognitive tests than those who just listened.
In LA, a group of seniors has even formed its own band. “The Fifth Dementia” is made up of musicians with degenerative diseases and high school students. Watch the video to see how they find a common language.
The band is part of Music Mends Minds, Inc., an organization created by Carol and Irwin Rosenstein when Irwin, a musician, was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease and discovered that music was beneficial to him. The organization’s mission is to use music to help control the progression of cognitive decline in seniors and build support systems for students.
The program has been a huge hit, and more musicians are still needed. Know someone who’s interested? Learn more here.
How would you complete the sentence: “Getting older is getting better because ______.”? That’s the question we have been asking friends of ours to spotlight the 2015 White House Conference on Aging, which took place earlier this month.
So far, we’ve gotten some interesting answers, including:
Getting older is getting better because …
…my fishing license is free!
…I am healthier.
…I get to spend time with grandchildren.
…I’ve learned to cherish the little things.
…my newly discovered diet makes me feel better.
…every experience I have builds on the one before it.
The White House has held a conference on aging every decade since the 1960s. The 2015 Conference is an opportunity to look ahead to the issues that will shape the landscape for older Americans in the next decade. Some important issues that will be discussed at the conference are retirement security, healthy aging, long-term services and support, and elder justice.
We’d love to hear how you’d complete the sentence: “Getting older is getting better because ______.” You can tweet your answer to us at @varsitybranding. For more information about the conference click here.
From the Outside In: Gaining a Deeper Understanding of the Prospect’s Decision Process
A team of Varsity researchers brought Project Looking Glass and Project Looking Glass II to the field of aging services. In these nationally recognized studies, researchers moved into two retirement communities for 30 days; there they lived, ate, shopped and socialized alongside residents. We have now launched a third in-depth ethnographic study, called “Project Looking Glass III: From the Outside In.”
In essence, we are turning the looking glass around to dig more deeply into the decision-making process that prospects go through when choosing a community. We’ll learn what triggers people to start investigating senior living communities; what factors influence potential residents to choose or pass on a community; what their expectations were prior to moving into their new home; and the reality that they find as residents of the community.
We’ll evaluate the decision-making process to see how it may vary in different areas of the country and among different cohorts—the current aging generation of prospects (what we call “the transitional generation”) and Baby Boomers—each of which is at a different stage of investigation into retirement community living.
Silent Generation: Born 1910-1925
Transitional Generation: Born 1930-1950
Baby Boomers: Born 1946-1964
Insights from this study will assist senior living communities in further refining their marketing messages and targeting techniques to make sure they’re not only connecting with the right people, but are also having the most relevant, informed conversations that will lead to positive decisions.
If you are interested in participating in this study by having your prospective residents fill out an online survey and/or in having Varsity conduct focus groups at your community, please contact me at .
Once again, we participated in the LeadingAge PA Annual Conference & Exposition, which was held this June in Hershey, Pa. Key leaders gathered to discuss ideas that will shape the future of senior living.
We wanted to share a few of the inspiring solutions we heard.
Swimming with the sharks. On her sixth attempt, 64-year-old Diane Nyad successfully battled sharks, venomous jellyfish and hypothermia to swim from Cuba to Key West. Her motivating advice for reaching your dreams: build a strong support team, give it your all, learn from your failures and never give up.
Spinning stories into marketing gold. Asbury’s session emphasized the importance of finding the right human interest story and repurposing it in blogs, newsletter articles and social media posts, all linking back to your website. Strategic storytelling can be a gold mine of leads, publicity and brand awareness.
Tapping the independent living middle-income market. As the economic spread continues to grow, creating an affordable community for the “working class” is a concept worth looking at.
The end of advertising. Advertising isn’t going extinct—we just need to rethink it. It’s about finding new ways to have conversations with prospects, so we can discover and meet their needs. The engagement shouldn’t stop once residents move in; they need to be invested in the community so they’ll share their positive feelings with new prospects.
Our team would welcome the opportunity to discuss these insights or to simply begin exploring questions that will lead to solid strategies for your community’s continued success.
