Hospitality Connect: the role of local hospitality businesses in connecting lives and building communities
Start date
September 2022End date
December 2025Project website
Overview
The aim of the research was to develop our understanding of existing and potential opportunities for hospitality businesses to play an influential role in supporting social connections within communities. The project employed a participatory action research (PAR) approach to identify the challenges and benefits of older people visiting local cafes and pubs. These venues provide important social spaces where people come together to connect with others. The UK鈥檚 high street has undergone significant change in recent years, from mostly retail-focussed environments to increasing numbers of cafes, presenting an opportunity to explore the ways in which many of these might be transformed into age-friendly spaces.
Working with research partner, Toynbee Hall, and a community-based team of older peer researchers (PRs), the project conducted go-along interviews with older adults (aged 65+), hospitality businesses and policy influencers. The findings from the research were used to co-create resources with PRs and business owners/managers to help hospitality businesses become more age-friendly and to empower older adults to stay socially connected. These resources took the form of an age-inclusive toolkit for hospitality venues and a short promotional film. Data generated from the interviews will continue to be presented at conferences and workshops, and through academic articles and the findings disseminated by our partners at Toynbee Hall and via the project webpage.
The project was funded by the as part of the (SBDRP).
Teaming up once again with colleagues and PRs, the project team subsequently trialled the 鈥榃elcome ALL鈥 toolkit with hospitality businesses in an ESRC IAA funded research project called Age-inclusive Hospitality (AiH). In addition to monitoring impact, the team worked with , to create an animated short film which highlights how the toolkit can help businesses address some of the challenges older people may face when using hospitality venues. Both resources are available to download via the Resources tab on this webpage.
Funding amount
拢124,511
Funder
Team
Principal investigator
Dr Lorna Wang
Associate Professor in Marketing and Revenue Management/Co-Director, Centre for Research on Ageing and Generations
Co-investigators
Professor Andrew King
Associate Dean (Doctoral College) Faculty of Arts, Business and Social Sciences, Professor of Sociology
Dr Kimberley Smith
Associate Professor in Clinical Health Psychology
Dr Xia Lin
Head of Research at Toynbee Hall London
Research partner
is a community-based charity with considerable experience working with local communities in East London, including marginalised and deprived communities, and delivering participatory action research (PAR) projects that involve local communities at every stage of the research process.
Researchers
Frances Sanders
Research Fellow
Outputs
Hospitality Connect: A short film
Co-creating age-inclusive hospitality venues for healthy ageing.
Resources
- The Age-inclusive hospitality animation highlights some of the factors that can restrict an older person鈥檚 experience of hospitality venues and features recommendations from the Welcome ALL toolkit to help business owners create a more age-inclusive environment for the enjoyment of all their customers.
- The Welcome ALL Toolkit is a resource for hospitality business owners/managers and employees as well as professionals working within the hospitality sector to promote the benefits of and support creation of more age-inclusive hospitality venues such as caf茅s and pubs.
How to access the resources:
The Hospitality Connect project resources are free to use but we ask you to have regard to the following conditions of their use:
- Do not distribute these resources to anyone else 鈥 if anyone asks for a copy, please direct them to this web page so they can download them.
- If you use these resources or any part of them, we would be grateful if you would please:
- Acknowledge the authorship team
- Send copies of any reports/papers that are produced to Dr Lorna Wang (lorna.wang@surrey.ac.uk)
- Let us have any comments that you feel might improve these resources so that your experience/suggestions can be incorporated into subsequent updates.