Firm Provides Access All Areas From L’Oreal HQ To Small Shops
Marketing in the United Kingdom
Published by the North West Evening Mail
Adapting your business to meet the requirements of disabled people can deliver a double boost to the health of your firm.
That is the message from Stewart Noble, architect and partner in Diseno Associates, based at Silecroft, near Millom.
First of all, it means a company can avoid falling foul of the Disability Discrimination Act, which is enforcing tighter regulations for access for disabled people.
Secondly, Mr. Noble points out, a reputation for good service and easy access can open up a vast market of disabled customers.
He says: “One in seven of the population are classed as disabled people under the Act.
“Disabled people spend £50 billion a year, so from a commercial sense it’s absolutely colossal spending power. When shops say it’s not viable to make our building accessible, it makes commercial sense along with a moral obligation and a legal duty.”
Mr. Noble is one of just two registered access auditors in Cumbria.
His career has taken him from designing headquarters for cosmetics giant L’Oreal in London to working on high-profile disability renovations, including Park House, Princess Diana’s Sandringham birthplace.
On the latter job he was a project associate for C. Wycliffe Noble and Associates.
Mr. Noble said: “The Queen gave it to the Leonard Cheshire Foundation and we converted it to a country house hotel for disabled people. It won an EU award for access.”
After moving to the Lake District he went on to work for Copeland Borough Council.
He says: “We came up here for the quiet life and failed.”
He formed Noble Design for Access in November 2003, and having recently been joined by building surveyor David Taylor as a partner, renamed the firm Diseno Associates.
He says: “We are a general purpose architecture service as well.
“We’re doing these access audits which is what I’m qualified as a specialist in.
“We do audits for all of Copeland Borough Council.
“We have done Barrow Town Hall and Walney Community Centre.
“It’s not just the public sector — we have done Chetwynde School, the Abbey House Hotel, and the Knights of St Columba Club on Queen Street in Millom.”
A large part of the role is raising awareness of how easily access problems can be solved.
Mr. Noble says: “We visit a business, talk to them about the legislation.
“We do an inspection and make recommendations. It’s not just wheelchair access, it’s all disabilities. It’s visual and sensory impairments, learning impairment and long-term illnesses like cancer.”
Mr. Noble highlights the ease and relative lack of expense with which a business can both comply with the Disability Discrimination Act and boost its customer service credentials.
He says: “I think what troubles most people is how much it’s going to cost.
“People are worried that they’re a small shop and they’re going to have to put a lift in.
“We are not going to say to a shop with a small turnover ‘You have got to put a lift in.’
“But if it’s a major operation or a major company you may say they have to make more serious alterations because they have got a higher turnover.”
He emphasizes that any recommendations made would be tailored to the size and scale of the organization involved.
He says: “The Act doesn’t try to put people out of business. The requirement is for ‘reasonable adjustments’. Anybody providing a service to the general public are covered by the Act.
“Certainly in business you want to help your customers and you want them to come back.
“It is like tactile signs, with braille, for example. It’s making things more visible so people can see things, moving things out of the way so people don’t trip over them.”
Mr. Noble said: “For example, if you put a contrasting coloring on a step or a staircase visually impaired people can see where the stairs are.
“It doesn’t cost you much but it makes a huge difference to a huge number of people.
He uses the examples of wheelchair users struggling to reach cash machines, and people who are hard of hearing trying to communicate through glass screens, to illustrate easy solutions such as ‘induction loops’ to help people with hearing aids.
He says: “Induction loops are inexpensive but they make such a difference to people who have got hearing aids. I installed one in the council offices at Millom.
“You don’t have to spend a lot of money to make a major impact in helping disabled people.”
Published on 05/30/2005 North West Evening Mail
http://www.nwemail.co.uk/business/viewarticle.aspx?id=247511