On Friday 8th August we took the Care Innovation Challenge to St Monica Trust’s The Chocolate Quarter Retirement Village for a day of innovation, pitching and mentoring with St Monica’s fantastic resident innovators.
For the first time in Care Innovation Challenge history, our five semi-finalists were invited to visit St Monica Trust’s The Chocolate Quarter Retirement Village for an incredible day of innovation, mentoring and pitching. With a tour of the state-of-the-art Chocolate Quarter Retirement Village and the unique opportunity to pitch to mentors, resident innovators and the senior team at St Monica Trust, our semi-finalists were able to perfect their pitches ahead of the Care Show in Birmingham on 8th and 9th October.
Our 5 semi-finalists: Team Making Space, Team Carpe Care, Dr Shelley James, David Grey and Molly Baldini were able to pitch their innovations in both B2B and B2C scenarios to prepare them for the final at the Birmingham Care Show. The morning kicked off with our semi-finalists pitching their innovations to St Monica Trust’s panel of resident innovators who are experts by lived experience – during the resident innovators were able to ask each semi-finalist questions about their innovation and give them honest feedback, a unique opportunity that our semi-finalists found “incredibly useful”.
The team were then taken on a tour of the bespoke retirement village located in Keynsham, Bristol. The Chocolate Quarter retirement village which was originally a chocolate factory offers homes that are elegant and allows residents to feel part of an active community. With a pool, stylish restaurant and even a cinema room, this unique retirement setting encourages residents to feel inspired and comfortable in their later years. St Monica Trust’s resident innovators give a lived experienced perspective to their initiative to become a ‘Centre for innovation’. They were able to offer some great advice to our semi-finalists and Dave and his wife Judy were among the panel of resident innovators.
Dave said “We were both very happy to be involved on the day and have also been testing the SleepWell sleep analysing pad developed by David Grey in our own home.
I have a techy background and am a regular user of smart technology, so it was fascinating to hear the different pitches from the innovators and share our thoughts with them.
Personally, there is a lot of satisfaction from helping develop technology that could not only benefit myself and Judy as we grow older, but also older people in general, both now and in the future.”
Our semi-finalists then had the chance to pitch to St Monica Trust’s senior team who were able to give the innovators feedback on their pitches from a business perspective. The St Monica Trust’s Head of Innovation Delivery, Sean Davey said: “It was a brilliant opportunity to bring passionate entrepreneurs and innovators along to The Chocolate Quarter to meet our equally inspiring resident innovators, and explore what we can create together.
“From a better night’s sleep to helping people with dementia clean their teeth, the Care Innovation semi-finalists are addressing real world problems. When we pair that with the life experience of our residents then we have the potential to create some really game-changing innovations.”
It was an unforgettable day of innovation, collaboration and insight from St Monica Trust’s senior team and their resident innovators which left our five semi-finalists inspired ahead of the Challenge final which will be taking place at the Care Show on 8th and 9th October.
We’d like to thank St Monica Trust for their collaboration and a wonderful, innovative day at The Chocolate Quarter Retirement Village and we’d love to see you at the Challenge final on 8th and 9th October where our semi-finalists will be presenting their solutions on stand C10 at the Care Show!