[NFBWATlk] 5 Simple Ways To Make Your Business More Welcoming To Disabled Customers

Tue Aug 2 16:19:56 UTC 2022

5 Simple Ways To Make Your Business More Welcoming To Disabled Customers
Andrew Pulrang <https://www.forbes.com/sites/andrewpulrang/>
Contributor
Exploring disability practices, policy, politics, and culture.
Jul 22, 2022,02:05pm EDT

Businesses need to strive for more than accessibility. They need to work at
being more welcoming to people with disabilities.

July is Disability Pride Month. The latest annual Disability Equality Index
Report <https://disabilityin.org/2022-dei-report/> on disability inclusion
at major corporations jus came out. And on July 26, 2022, people with
disabilities across the U.S. will celebrate the 32nd anniversary of
the Americans
with Disabilities Act <https://adata.org/factsheet/ADA-overview>.

While the ADA is still a source of hope and pride — a remarkable example of
what disabled people and their allies can achieve in the public policy
sphere — each anniversary tends to raise similarly mixed feelings of pride,
frustration, and determination
<https://disabilityphilanthropy.org/resource/a-letter-to-the-americans-with-disabilities-act-on-its-32nd-birthday/>
in
the disability community. It also raises some of the same questions that
prompted the ADA in the first place: “Why are so many places still
inaccessible to us?” and, “Why do so many supposedly accessible places
still feel so daunting to us, so exhausting and unwelcoming?”

These questions about everyday retail accessibility can at times seem old,
even trivial. They often sound like merely the lifestyle concerns of
otherwise privileged and comfortable wheelchair users and elderly retirees
with mobility issues — least compared with some of the more dire freedom
and confinement, life and death issues millions of disabled people still
face.

Still, ordinary business accessibility is as relevant today as it was in
the early ‘90s, when the ADA was new and seemed to promise making
accessibility in every neighborhood’s stores and offices something like an
ironclad legal requirement. It’s still relevant because while the ADA and
its accessibility guidelines <https://www.access-board.gov/ada/> have
helped make most areas of the U.S. far more accessible than they were in
previous generations, 32 years later, accessibility still too often feels
like an afterthought. Accessibility is still treated like some kind of
premium feature rather than a civic responsibility for businesses, or a
civil right for customers. It may be even *more* relevant now than before,
as the population overall continues to skew older, and as the population of
disabled people is likely to rise in the wake, (or continuation), of
Covid-19 and its variants. Also, comparatively easier and more accessible
options like online shopping and delivery services make it easier for
disabled people to simply reject inaccessible businesses, now without
material loss except in socialization and choice. Accessibility of brick
and mortar businesses may soon become a genuine and significant competitive
necessity, as it has always promised to be.

But if businesses want to benefit from doing the right thing, they must
look beyond mere compliance. They need to focus on more than physical
access, more even than equal service, but also on fostering feelings and
experiences disabled people in particular crave — capability, freedom, and
appreciation.

Here are five ways any business can start to create or improve on its
accessibility, and offer a more welcoming environment for disabled
customers.
1. Easy parking and entrance

Disabled people who drive choose businesses with the most accessible and
available parking spaces. Sometimes it really is that simple — a deal
breaker when parking is a pain, a deal-maker when it’s a breeze.

Designated handicapped parking spaces
<https://www.access-board.gov/ada/guides/chapter-5-parking/> need to be
laid out and marked in a certain way, something still often overlooked or
misunderstood. The spaces themselves need to be as close as possible to the
main customer entrance. They have to be wide enough, generally 8 feet. And
they need to have marked “access aisles” adjacent so disabled drivers have
room to get out of their cars and away, without banging into a neighboring
car. These are some of the simplest accessibility standards to follow. Yet
they are still often only partially or sloppily implemented.

Enforcement doesn’t have to be a big issue, but businesses need to take a
positive interest in it. One of the weaknesses of the whole “accessible
parking” laws is that it’s hard to find anyone willing to take
responsibility for enforcing them. Aside from occasional high-profile
efforts by police or volunteers, enforcement of accessible parking is often
a low priority. And informal, citizen enforcement, though usually
well-intentioned, often ends up being mishandled and generating more
hostility towards disabled people than accessibility. Businesses can help
by monitoring the spaces their customers use, ditching neutrality on the
issue, and weighing in on the side of respecting and properly using
accessible parking.
2. Wide pathways, less clutter

Disabled people, especially those with mobility impairments, need space to
move. For a start, they need wide, smooth sidewalks to get easily into and
out of your business. This is important for people who use wheelchairs of
course, but also people using crutches or canes, with a guide dog or human
assistant, or just with somewhat more delicate balance and limited stamina
for physically taxiing walks.

Accessibility of this kind can’t stop at the door either. Inside, disabled
customers want to find wide, clear pathways, product aisles, and gathering
areas. Disabled people need enough clear space to walk, wheel, stop, and
turn around without crashing into product displays or other customers.

This is why layout and even decor matters. Keep in mind that some aspects
of that charming, cluttered, “general store” look and feel can make a
business distinctly uncomfortable as well as inaccessible for disabled
customers. It’s one of the reasons why “big box” stores often have an edge
over some smaller businesses, at least on physical accessibility. And don’t
forget that lighting and sound dynamics can either make a business space
more or less comfortable and usable for people with visual or hearing
impairments — in ways that you might not think of at first.
3. Reachable, usable, well-lit interiors

High shelves, service counters, and tables are bad for wheelchair users,
and for Little People and others who have more trouble than most reaching
high up to see, grab, and operate things in a business.

Try to be as creative as you can to keep the things you want customers to
see, use, and buy on a lower level. Check for specific accessibility
standards, but as a general rule, think in terms of keeping things to be
reached and handled below 4 feet high. This applies to product shelves of
course. But high-top tables and stools in restaurants and bars are also
especially loathed in the disability community. They are hard for shorter
people to deal with, and almost entirely exclude wheelchair users.

As already noted, dark “moody” environments, like in some restaurants and
bars, create problems for visually impaired people. Likewise noisy
environments that are exciting for some customers, such as in nightclubs,
can be as bad for deaf and hard of hearing customers as un-ramped steps are
for wheelchair users. If these aesthetic factors can’t be completely
eliminated, businesses should at least offer some good, targeted
accommodations, like additional spot lighting or designated quieter areas.

Above all, try to make all of your business both accessible and *enjoyable* for
people with all kinds of disabilities, and as seamlessly and naturally as
possible.
4. Wheelchair accessible restrooms

For restaurants especially, good, accessible restrooms are key. Wheelchair
users really do develop internal maps in the heads of where in their
communities they can go to the toilet, and where they can’t. And visitors
in wheelchairs are almost always anxious about it in unfamiliar towns and
cities.

Anyplace you want your customers to stay more than, say, half an hour, they
need to be able to go to the restroom. People with disabilities will not
patronize those that don’t have them, and they will remember. Their
families and friends will remember too. It is an absolute deal-breaker. And
especially in neighborhoods with overall poor accessibility, a genuinely
accessible and comfortable restroom is an asset for any business.

Restroom accessibility
<https://www.access-board.gov/ada/guides/chapter-6-toilet-rooms/> is also
one of the more complicated and exacting areas in terms of proper design.
Take the time to look up and fully understand all the requirements. And get
both professional help *and* actual disabled people’s input before you try
to approach it as a DIY project.
5. Aware, responsive staff

It shouldn’t need to be said, but it’s worth repeating — physical
accessibility is only part of making a business welcoming to disabled
customers. It’s harder to measure or fix than door widths or toilet
placement, but *staff attitudes and practices* are probably *more* than
half the game. Helpful and considerate staff can even help compensate for
at least some aspects of less than ideal physical accessibility.

Staff issues and customer relations skills deserve whole articles on their
own. And it can take awhile to change workplace cultures. But businesses
should at least begin to focus honest attention on avoiding the most common
and bothersome habits of ableism disabled customers tend to encounter:
neglect, condescension, and rigidity.

When a visibly disabled commuter comes into a business, and staff don’t
know right away how to help or what kind of help might be called for, their
first reaction is sometimes to ignore them. This is a major turn off for
disabled customers, for obvious reasons. On the other hand, being too
sweet, attentive, and solicitous — too overtly condescending — can also
make disabled customers feel uncomfortable and insulted. Disabled people
notice both extremes, even when staff are entirely unconscious of them. Try
to strike a balance between letting disabled customers set the agenda and
explore independently, and being receptive to their requests for help when
they come.

The other major risk for driving away disabled customers is when staff is
too rigid, too reluctant to break routines. As already noted, providing
equal service often means providing different or extra help. Nothing drives
away a disabled customer quite like hearing fairly reasonable requests for
help answered with, “I can’t do that,” or “I’m not allowed.” Staff should
feel empowered to step at least a little bit out of their usual roles and
beyond usual procedure in order to serve a disabled customer.

Even if you think your business is accessible already, it can’t hurt to
take a day to think methodically about any unnecessary barriers or
unwelcoming practices you might be able to fix.

And unless you have a disability yourself, try to get some help from people
with disabilities. If possible, more than one kind of disability. And offer
to pay them for their time, even if it’s a close friend, family member, or
an already loyal disabled customer. Making a business accessible and
welcoming to people with disabilities is an important undertaking. It’s
worth doing well, both thoughtfully and professionally.

5 Simple Ways To Make Your Business More Welcoming To Disabled Customers
(forbes.com)
<https://www.forbes.com/sites/andrewpulrang/2022/07/22/5-simple-ways-to-make-your-business-more-welcoming-to-disabled-customers/?sh=2c6b47de648d>

Beth Greenberg