One size doesn’t fit all

I always found it strange that companies are told by marketing professional to create a personas, that being what their standard customer is to ensure any campaign is correctly targeted. I see the sense in it, but recently when asked I had no choice to but to reply in a rather vague way, “a parent or carer of someone with a disability” or “someone who wishes to be able to go to the beach and has difficulty walking on sand or uses a wheelchair”. I was asked their age, status, income, and a whole lot of other items. there is no simple answer.

When we initially designed the Junior Getabout Buggy it was to be simple and cheap, as usual life gets in the way. We found most people who called us had tried others, and had issues, many the same as we originally found with other equipment of it suited to one condition and not another. So we created a larger unit. Then we has so many requests we added the ability to fit laterals and hip guides as standard, then a pommel, then the adjustable foot plate… Then came the requests for a young adult who is almost 2m tall but weighs 40Kg, and then a smaller person weighing 60Kg. By his time it was more sensible for us to say 2 sizes (Junior and adult) and a couple of different widths (30 & 50cm) that both take all the same parts. It was the requests for smaller children that then became more interesting, ret using a small block cart on an uneven surface and it bucks everywhere and is unstable, so that brought about the capsule to reduce a junior to allow it to be comfortable for smaller people.

So when someone calls the first questions are height and weight, I tend to not ask age as that’s irrelevant, then its what are their special needs after all everyone is different and many of you already know what will work best and its finding out from you!