UN-AGE - THE START UP PROGRAM BRINGING TOGETHER YOUNG AND OLDER PEOPLE

(Thanks to everybody who made our Crowdfunder Campaign a Success)

What People Say About Un-Age

I've been running an Employability Club for 10 years and the Un-Age program has shown my community how to create their own business in partnership with young people - which is novel and fantastic.

Rick Crust - Organiser Employability Club South Hackney

Bringing together young and older people and giving them skills and agency to start new businesses is very empowering and something that is much needed in Hackney

Matt Clack - Hackney Council - Public Health Manager

Through Un-Age I have met my business partner Evelyn who is 57 and a great cook. With the help of the Un-Age team I've found my dream business partner and we have started our own business

Jason Nicolini - 19 years old catering student

Team and Mentors

Gini Simpson

(Co-Founder & Mentor)

is an intergenerational expert and producer who was previously Head of Learning and Participation at the Barbican, Senior Business Development Manager at Queen Mary University of London and Managing Director of Phakama, a youth led theatre organsation. She is also a qualified social worker. She is a co-founder of Un-Age bringing her expertise in setting up creative programs that include and empowerment across generations.

Jacob Wright

(Co-Founder & Mentor)

is a marketing expert with extensive start up experience. Having worked at multi award winning creative agencies like Mother and Droga5 he knows how to differentiate young businesses. He is also a behavioural psychologist and enthusiastic gardener. As a co-founder of Un-Age he is mentoring our entrepreneurs in effective marketing and branding.

Christian Ahlert

(Co-Founder & Mentor)

is a serial entrepreneur who has has been part of many start ups (some of which have failed and some have grown up, others are still growing). Through his innovation agency MiniBarLabs he has run start up accelerator and education programs which have helped many start up founders. He is a co-founder of Un-Age using his start up knowledge for young and old. He also thinks that we need to find new ways of doing business that support a wide variety of people in terms of background and age.

Rac

Rachel Ho (Mentor)

(mentor

Co-founder and Director of Craving Coffee. Specialises in back of house operations of food & beverage small business, including HR, finance, business development, events and promotion. Rachel also runs Tottenham Social which has since 2015 invited street food traders to their kitchen providing a place for these young businesses to gain additional experience and skill. Though this work Rachel has a lot of hands on experience in how young food businesses grow, what’s on trend and also what the pitfalls are.

Turku Zurlutuna (Mentor)

(Mentor

is a freelance Food & Beverage industry consultant, focussing on business strategy, sustainable operations and building memorable, unique brands. Working mostly with East London Chefs and businesses such as Old Spitalfields Market, Happy Endings Ice Creams and Nuno Mendes, she is an ardent believer in the power of food to bring communities and generations together

Un-Age Food Start Up

Program

The Un-Age Start Up Accelerator program has a call to to participate life. Participants need to be under 25 or over 55. The start up program focusses on setting up new food businesses. If you are dreaming of having your own food business, whether this is a food stall, pop up, catering service, food brand or a creative take on healthy eating, this program is for you. The program takes place in Hackney to starting in June 2018 - you will find brilliant mentors, a great environment and at the end you will pitch your concept to a group of experienced entrepreneurs and foodies. The top teams will win free launch opportunities and further business support . You can find more details here

Un-Age - Our Mission

Traditional businesses do not provide lifelong employment anymore, or the chance to grow your own life as you want it. Un-Age is a social enterprise bringing younger and older people together to create new businesses which support them.

We think everybody, no matter how old, or young should be enabled to run their own business. Teaching people entrepreneurship and business skills and helping them to launch new businesses is what we do.

Here a few numbers that show why this is important:

More than 50% of 16 to 25 year olds want to set up their own businesses (UnLTD)

By 2040 nearly 40% of the UK population will be at retirement age but already less than a third of employees are over 50 (FT)

57% of 50-59 year olds are being forced out of their jobs

Without diving more into statistics it is clear that we are living in an ageing society where younger people don’t often meet or work with older people, or set up a businesses together. And while the number of older people is growing rapidly employment opportunities fall drastically for the over 55 year olds. At the same time many more young people want to start their own business and this is why we created Un-Age.