The New Household: Rethinking How We Live Together and Alone
The vision of what ‘household’ means is changing rapidly. In the UK, households consisting of two or more families have risen a huge 75% since 1999, an amount defined by the ONS as ‘statistically significant’ and in the US, multigenerational living has increased steadily to a current estimate of 20% of households.
There are obvious financial, physical and mental health benefits to several generations sharing space, responsibilities and bills, however, the need for patience, personal space and individual demands in this kind of scenario presents a challenge, particularly as living space does not necessarily expand at the same rate as the household. The same applies to the rising number of same generation co-livers.
Conversely, there is also a huge growth in single living which accounts for 31% globally. In China the sheer number of people living alone is equivalent to two thirds of the entire population of the US.
Image: Gift Habeshaw
There are many reported negative outcomes of living alone, with a mortality indicator equivalent to smoking or obesity. The WHO declared loneliness a ‘global public health
concern’ in 2023, and so finding ways to navigate singlelivers toward a connected and fulfilling life takes on a vital importance and requires imaginative thinking and innovation.
In fact, there’s a big difference between ‘alone’ and ‘lonely’ and an increasing number of people are now seeking ‘me time’, with solo travel and solo dining exploding in popularity since the pandemic, perhaps illustrating a growing confidence in being alone, riding on self-care and self-love trends.
In some cases products and services have caughtup with these shifts but there are many instances where ‘family sized’ is irrelevant to the consumer’s lived experience and where the inflexible nature of product scale, take most washing machines for example, are in danger of alienating both of the fastest growing household types discussed here.
Image: Janaya Dasiuk
We believe the household of the future will demand solutions that are flexible enough to respond to multiple needs all at once, adapt to part-time use and that every item given space by a consumer will need to earn it’s place by working twice as hard as it does now.
The stereotypical Western family unit living in a house or apartment is outdated to say the least and the newly emerged complexities and nuances which have replaced it require sensitive and creative solutions. These are the kind of challenges we relish, juggling myriad entanglements of consumer needs, and path finding innovative solutions for our clients.
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