May 1, 2025 • 34 mins
Want to inspire your 50+ clients to stay active, connected, and confident? In this episode, I talk with Road Scholar’s PR Director, Kelsey Knoedler Perri, about how fitness and travel work hand-in-hand to promote healthy aging.
We explore survey data from Road Scholar’s “Age Adventurously” campaign and how fitness pros can use these insights to motivate clients, boost retention, and create content that resonates.
🎯 Great for: gym owners, trainers, wellness professionals
Topics include:
- How travel encourages fitness in older adults
- The social power of group adventures
- Using storytelling and Facebook communities to connect
- Why adventure doesn’t have to mean extreme
💥 Special highlight: Learn more about Age Adventurously Day on June 8th — a movement redefining what it means to age boldly.
🔗 Learn more: https://www.ageadventurously.org
🌐 Road Scholar: https://www.roadscholar.org
Connect with Jay Croft here:
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/primefitcontent
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/croftjay/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jaycroft
For more tips reaching the over-50 fitness market, subscribe to The Optimal Aging Podcast or visit www.primefitcontent.com.
Email: jay@primefitcontent.com
Thanks for listening!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
The survey that we did for on adventure and travel
and happiness and health reallyinspired us to create this day,
so Road Scholar is celebratingour 50th anniversary this year.
We've been around since 1975and we wanted to celebrate our
birthday in a special way, whichis June 8th.
It's the first day 50 years agothat we had our first programs.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Hi everybody.
Our first programscommunications, content and
making powerful connections.
We're talking about three of myfavorite subjects today fitness
, travel and adventure.
They go together for millionsof people over 50.
There's plenty of wiggle roomin the definition of each to
(00:59):
apply to just about anybody.
Now I write a lot about thedesire to travel being a key
motivator for people over 50wanting to get fit or stay fit,
and it turns out we can apply alot of the same messaging and
marketing ideas to encouragingtravel, fitness and other kinds
of adventure.
This all comes togetherbeautifully in a non-profit
(01:21):
organization called Road Scholar, in a non-profit organization
called Road Scholar planning its50th anniversary this summer,
with a focus on agingadventurously.
The group conducted a survey ofits participants and found that
the top three components ofaging adventurously are staying
fit and healthy, traveling andcontinuing to learn and grow.
(01:41):
Today's optional aging guest isfrom Road Scholar and I'm
delighted to share ourconversation because I love
fitness, travel and adventureand I love talking about how we
can encourage more mature adultsto get excited about them, to
stay excited about them.
Kelsey Perry is the PR directorfor Road Scholar and our chat
will be illuminating and, Ithink, a lot of fun to anyone
(02:04):
trying to work with older adultsin fitness, health, well-being,
probably just about anything.
Stick with it to the end tolearn about the group's special
day coming up in June and whatthe hottest spots in over 50
travel are these days.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
So we did a survey recently of both our
participants, which is, ourtravelers who travel with us
each year and also people whohave not traveled with us.
We wanted to be able to kind ofcompare both communities, but
we surveyed all people over 50,from 50s to 90s, to make sure we
had a good range.
We wanted to make somedeterminations about the
(02:40):
interaction between travel,adventure and health and
wellness in older adulthoodspecifically.
So we asked a lot of questionsabout the interplay between
those different things and whatwe found is that those who
considered themselvesadventurous also rated
themselves higher on both ahealth scale and a happiness
(03:02):
scale.
So there's definitely arelationship between the idea of
being adventurous and howhealthy and how happy you are.
But we also found that folksfelt less adventurous as they
aged, which was interesting, andto me, with that, the story
that I'm a storyteller, so I'malways looking at what story
does the data tell me, and sothe story that I'm interpreting
(03:25):
from this data is that I seeadventure like a muscle, so
tying into fitness here you haveto keep flexing it.
It's something that it's easierat any age really to kind of get
comfortable in our day-to-dayroutine and become less
comfortable going outside of ourcomfort zone essentially, and
the more you flex that muscleand the more you push yourself
outside of your comfort zoneessentially, and the more you
flex that muscle and the moreyou push yourself outside of
(03:47):
your comfort zone, the easier itbecomes.
I think a lot of us saw thisduring COVID.
We all became a little bit moreof a homebody during COVID and
both the adventure muscle andthe social muscles we had to
start flexing those again,coming out of the pandemic and
getting outside of our comfortzone.
And so I think that adventureis something that really keeps
you mentally both physically andmentally spry and agile and it
(04:10):
keeps you alert and learning inolder adulthood and it can
really result in a sense ofempowerment.
It's related to your pride andyour self-confidence that help
you remain more independent inyour later years, and I think
that's just really what howadventure plays into the health
and happiness in older adulthoodis, because it has so much to
(04:31):
do with confidence.
If you flex that muscle, themore you'll want to do it and
then you'll also then get theresults of being more
adventurous, which keeps yourmind fresh, keeps you learning
and then also benefits yourmental health and your physical
health.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
Right.
You know, as I was telling youa minute ago before we hit the
record button, that travel isone of the primary motivators
for older people to want toeither get fit or stay fit.
So they go to gyms and that'sone of the main reasons that
they give for wanting to startlifting weights and doing yoga
and developing their cardio ortheir cardio endurance, these
(05:08):
kinds of things, so they cantravel.
They've worked at a desk job,they've raised their kids and
now they want to go do thesewonderful things that they've
always dreamt of.
So being fit is really helpfulto do that.
Just walking through an airportwith luggage is difficult, you
know, if you're not in goodcondition.
You asked folks what it meansto age adventurously and the
(05:29):
number one answer was, in fact,staying healthy, staying
physically active and healthy.
That is amazing to me.
How do you define agingadventurously and how does that
connect with what we're talkingabout?
Speaker 1 (05:42):
Yeah.
So, like you said, that was thenumber one answer to that
question was, when we asked themwhat it means to age
adventurously, they said stayingphysically and actively healthy
.
82% said yes to that.
Number two was traveling andexploring new places, close
behind at 81%.
And then the third wascontinuing to learn and grow,
which I think was around 70 or71%.
(06:03):
So I think obviously where thiscomes from is a lot of people,
when you hear the word adventure, you think of adventure.
You think of like whitewaterrafting and like mountain biking
and things like that.
So I think that's part ofwhat's happening here is that's
how people think of that word,the connotation that they have
with the word adventurous.
But I think that you know it'sobviously important to stay in
(06:24):
shape to benefit you physicallyand mentally and help you live
longer and be healthier in thoselater years, but it also gives
you access to more options forbeing adventurous, like
something like river rafting orziplining that you wouldn't be
able to do.
But I also think that at RoadScholar we think of adventure.
We like to try to challengethat and broaden the idea of
(06:45):
adventure, because it'sdifferent for everybody and
everyone has different physicalabilities and the reality is
that adventure is going tochange.
It's going to look different asyou age.
Everybody ultimately will havemobility challenges as they age.
It hits them at a differentpoint and we should try to stay
physically fit so that we canhave those physical options as
(07:05):
long as possible.
But there are still lots ofways to be adventurous, even if
those physical hiking and bikingand things are maybe outside of
our of our reach.
So we try to really encouragepeople to think of adventure
differently, in terms of really,it just means trying something
new or doing something a littlebit outside of your comfort zone
.
So that might mean somethinglike taking a language class,
(07:30):
learning a new language.
It might mean just like tryinga new restaurant, like an ethnic
restaurant in your neighborhood, or doing something that just
stretches you a little bit.
And I think, as we talked about, you stretch that muscle.
Maybe the first thing you do ifyou're a little bit of like, if
you don't think of yourself asa super adventurous person,
maybe the first thing you do ifyou're a little bit of like, if
you don't think of yourself as asuper adventurous person, maybe
the first thing is like let mego out and try this new
restaurant in my neighborhood.
Once you do that, you gain theconfidence, and then you can
(07:53):
start to stretch it and stretchit even more, and maybe some of
those things that you hadn'tthought of being capable of
doing before become more andmore possible for you.
Speaker 2 (08:06):
Absolutely.
I'm glad that you explainedthat, because when I think of
adventure, I think yeah, I thinkwhitewater rafting, but you
could also think of it as, asyou said, exploring a new
neighborhood in your city ortrying a new restaurant, or
going to the gym for the firsttime since college, anything
like that really Joining a bookclub, joining some kind of
community, accessing your, yoursocial opportunities.
Speaker 1 (08:25):
That's another thing that's so important in older
adulthood and it might be alittle bit, like I said, when
you're not stretching thatsocial muscle might be a little
intimidating.
But the more you just kind oftiptoe out and you push yourself
, little little, then a littlemore, and a little more, then
something like traveling toeurope may become more
accessible for you as well.
And maybe some people that'stheir starting point is
(08:45):
traveling to Europe and maybethey want to build up to go into
Antarctica or whatever thatmight be.
But everybody's starting itfrom a different place and we
want to meet them where they are.
Speaker 2 (08:54):
Tell me more about the results from your survey
that were so interesting.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
Yeah, I think those were the biggest things as far
as the interplay betweenadventure travel.
But also, I mean, what we werehoping to find and we did is
that our participants thattravel with us, compared to
those who don't travel with us,they're more adventurous,
they're happier, they'rehealthier, which is, you know, a
great thing to see, and it wassomething we were hoping to see.
(09:19):
But the data does also backthat up.
So we definitely saw that notonly does adventure keep you
happier and healthier, but sodoes travel, and that when you
travel with Road Scholar, you'rehappier, you're a happier
person when you travel with RoadScholar, so that's a good thing
.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
Well, let's talk about that Traveling with Road
Scholar, compared to, maybe, howyou want to travel when you're
25, 45, now you're 65, or 85,whatever.
45, now you're 65, you want it,or 85, whatever.
How do our desires for travelevolve with age?
And, you know, perhaps one ofthem might be going with a group
(09:53):
.
Instead of just striking out onyour own and just going
wherever the wind takes you, youwant to go with a group.
There's some good reasons forthat.
What else can you think ofthat's different?
Because I'm thinking aboutmyself at 25, listening to this
podcast, would say I'll never dothat when I get old.
I'm going to go out.
I'm just going to get on mymotorcycle and my backpack.
I'm going to go out and do myown thing.
(10:15):
Well, you know, maybe not rightto go out and do my own thing.
Well, you know, maybe not right.
There's a lot of good things tobe said for group travel.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
So tell me about that Definitely.
Well, in the same way thatadventure changes as we age, so
might travel.
It's going to look differentfor us later in life than it did
in our 20s and 30s.
Like you said, we see somepeople start to travel in older
adulthood because they'reretiring and they have more time
and they may have more money.
But we also see people who havebeen traveling for their whole
lives independently and theystart to think about and
(10:43):
consider group travel, andthere's a lot of people who are
hesitant about it.
Even me, like before I worked ingroup travel, I've always been
the person who loved to put myspreadsheet together and plan my
travels and go solo or go withmy husband and be able to
explore on our own, and I neverthought group travel would be
for me either, but then Istarted working in it.
I've worked for a couple ofdifferent companies now and I
(11:05):
love it and I think there's aplace for both independent
travel and group travel, nomatter what age.
But I think there are a lot ofspecific benefits for older
adults, so I can talk more aboutthose, yeah please do.
Yeah.
So I think that what we see inour travelers is they love that
all the details are taken careof for them.
Some people do, like I said,love to do the research and love
(11:27):
to have their spreadsheets andeverything like that, but when
you travel with Road Scholar,all of those logistics are taken
care of.
A lot of people hate thosethings and so all of that is
taken care of.
You don't have to bother withthe planning.
You have the confidence,knowing that there are experts
who are making these decisionsfor you and planning all the
logistics.
So you don't have to worryabout train times and booking
(11:48):
tickets between one place andthe next and you know hotel
arrangements and all of thatstuff is taken care of for you.
So that's one thing thatbecomes something that can be a
bigger burden in older adulthood, especially as technology
changes and the way that we makethese plans change, it can
become more intimidating.
So we don't want those burdensto become a barrier for travel
(12:10):
for people as they get older.
And another thing is that as weage, we become more vulnerable
travelers.
Maybe our reactions aren't asquick, we have more trouble
carrying things, so you'reworried about your luggage and
you're not as aware of yoursurroundings.
There's a lot of reasons whytravel might become a little
less safe as we age, and so ourparticipants really like to go
(12:32):
with the group because they knowthat there's that comfort in
traveling in numbers, but alsoyou have the group leader who's
looking out for you, making sureyou are where you need to be at
all times and everything likethat.
So there's definitely a comfortlevel and just the safety
aspect of it as we age.
And then the last thing I wantto mention is the social aspect,
because when you're travelingindependently, it can be easy to
(12:54):
go on a trip and not talk toanybody the whole time if you're
really going solo.
But what our travelers reallylove is interacting with the
other participants on theprogram, sharing the experiences
with them, learning from theirlife experiences.
You know all of them have livedlong lives and have amazing
lived experiences, so they lovelearning from each other as much
(13:15):
as they love learning from theinstructors, and loneliness and
social isolation has beendeclared love learning from the
instructors and loneliness andsocial isolation has been
declared an epidemic in the USand beyond, and we know that
social interactions in olderadulthood benefit our health our
physical health, our mentalhealth everything, and so any
opportunity that we can havelater in life to create new
(13:37):
social connections and fosterthose is always a good thing for
our mental health.
So Rhodes in life to create newsocial connections and foster
those is always a good thing forour mental health.
So Road Scholar can create newconnections for us.
We have a lot of solo travelersespecially who meet other
travelers on our trips and theybecome friends, they stay in
touch, they travel together inthe future.
So that's a big element of whatour programs offer too.
Speaker 2 (13:57):
So you have people who go by themselves, but to
join your group.
Speaker 1 (14:01):
Exactly, I guess in my head I was thinking it would
be a group of friends, or no,all of our trips it's just, you
know it's group travel where youtypically it's couples or solo
travelers or a couple of friendsenroll in the program and then
they're with a bunch ofstrangers that become friends
throughout the week.
We do do private group trips aswell.
So if you want to get a groupof your own together and go on a
(14:23):
private date, that's an option,but typically that's a very
small percentage of what weoffer.
Mostly you're coming eitherwith a partner or you're coming
solo.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
Okay, a lot of what you're saying about traveling is
what we talk about with fitnesstoo.
It's good for you socially,it's good for you mentally.
You can join in things.
It builds up your confidence.
The more you do it, the moreyou want to do it and feel good,
not just in performing theexercises at the gym, but in
doing the things in your dailylife lifting up the groceries,
(14:54):
playing with the grandchildren,enjoying your sports, whatever
it might be.
You have that confidence right.
So there's a lot ofsimilarities here.
So tell me about your marketingand your outreach and maybe
what you're finding that'sreally effective in speaking to
today's over 50 traveler.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
I will say our participants are over 50, but
the average age is 72.
So that really truly is anaverage, because we have people
in their 50s and we have peoplein their 90s.
So 72 has been the average foryears, even before I worked here
.
It's weird, it doesn't evenlike oscillate between 71 and 70
.
It's like always 72.
It's kind of bizarre, but youknow, we have two thirds baby
(15:35):
boomers at this point and sothat's really who we are serving
for the most part.
But we're at this unique pointwhere we're now serving three
generations at once, which is,you know, certainly those
generations are all verydifferent from each other and
all people over 50 are not justlike old people who all have the
same characteristics anddesires and physical abilities.
Those are three completelydifferent generations, and even
(15:55):
the boomers you can kind ofbreak down into two.
So yeah, those are threecompletely different generations
, and even the boomers you cankind of break down into two.
So yeah, but in general, youknow, I worked at road scholar
for almost 10 years now and soI've been writing for and
speaking to and marketing toolder adults for a long time now
and I've learned so much aboutthat demographic I've also, I
have to say I'm so grateful forthe way that it has changed the
way that I see aging, that I Isee my own aging.
(16:18):
It's helped me be a less ageistperson and I've learned a lot
about ageism and just.
I'm inspired by our participantsevery day.
My favorite part of my job iswhen I get to speak with them
and do interviews and hear abouttheir adventures and they're
just, they're so inspiring.
I've built friendships.
One of my participants thatI've I met her just through, you
(16:39):
know, doing an interview for PR, and she just handmade a
pillowcase for my son that shesent me.
So I've built these connections, these social connections with
cross-generational, which issomething that we just don't see
.
There's not enoughopportunities in life anymore to
create cross-generationalrelationships with people who
are not in your family, and I'mso grateful for that gift that
(17:02):
Rhodes Scholar has brought to me.
But back to marketing somethings that I've learned about.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
Can I pause you there ?
That is marketing and the waythat I practice it.
What you just described, you'retalking about stories and, for
lack of a I hope this isn't acrass way to put it You'll know
what I mean, but peoplelistening might think I'm being
rude.
Material, because people atthis age in life are so rich
with material and you get toknow them and you help them do
(17:30):
things that are important tothem and they open up to you and
you get in positions like yoursand mine.
We then get to share thesestories with others who are then
touched by them and motivatedby them to do them as well.
That is a part of the marketingpicture to me.
Anyway.
I'm.
Speaker 1 (17:48):
maybe I'm too no that's absolutely my theory and
approach on marketing andcommunications.
I have an MFA in creativewriting, so for me it's all
about storytelling.
That's what I love about it andthat's my approach showing
examples of what ourparticipants are doing, and it
really just creates aspiration,inspirational content that can
(18:11):
empower other people who arereading it or consuming the
content who might be hesitant.
You know we're talking a lot inthis conversation about how so
much of this is about confidenceand so if they see somebody
else who's doing these thingsand they hear these stories,
they think, oh well, she's doingthat.
I guess it's not out of thequestion for me.
And so it's so much aboutstorytelling but representation.
(18:32):
You know you talk aboutrepresentation a lot in
marketing in terms of otherthings like racial demographics
and gender, but there's alsorepresentation in terms of age,
and I think that's one of thedemographics that a lot of.
Obviously, we serve only olderadults, so we're thinking about
that all the time, but there's alot of brands and companies out
there who are not representingolder adults in their marketing
(18:55):
enough.
It's definitely you hearstudies all the time especially
older women being completelyignored by marketers, even
though they hold so much of thepurse strings in our society
these days.
Speaker 2 (19:05):
It makes no sense, it's just mind-boggling.
But everyone wants the youthmarket and in some industries
that's probably really smart.
But in fitness it's verylimiting, and perhaps it is in
travel as well.
I don't know.
I don't know much about thetravel industry, but tell me
more about the marketing.
I interrupted you and Iapologize for that, but you
(19:27):
really touched me because that'show I relate to all of this as
well.
Speaker 1 (19:30):
Yeah, and tying into fitness and representation too
is like I think of you know,whenever I'm doing like a, I
like to work out at home and Ilike workout videos, yoga and
stuff like that.
But when I watch these and it'slike everyone in the video is
like completely fit and I justthink well and young of course,
but even just from a fitnesslevel, I'm like I'm intimidated
(19:52):
and watching even if it's anentry level yoga it's like I
feel like, well, this isn'treally for me, because these
people have no problem with itand this is challenging for me.
So then I end up watching thisand just feeling like even worse
about myself if it'schallenging for me, and then I
don't even want to do the videoanymore.
So a lot of it is about thevisual representation of showing
(20:12):
somebody who is in thatdemographic doing something
adventurous, doing somethingphysically active, so that other
people can see that and think,okay, maybe I'm not there yet,
but like if they're doing it, Ican do that too.
That's a big part of it, Ithink.
Speaker 2 (20:27):
Hey, are you a fitness professional trying to
grow your business with peopleover 50?
If you are, then you need toknow how to communicate with
them, how to market to them andhow to get them to trust you
with their fitness, well-beingand money.
We're talking about millions ofpeople who are a little older
than the typical market that thefitness industry usually
pursues.
They have more money, more timeand better motivation to make
(20:51):
the best long-term fitnessconsumers you'll find anywhere.
If you're not focusing on them,you should be.
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designed specifically to helpyou engage people in this group
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Check it out atprimefitcontentcom.
(21:14):
That's prime like prime of yourlife, fitcontentcom.
Back to the show.
Tell me about just generally,maybe a bigger picture view.
Are you actively going out andfinding people and trying to
convince them to come along withyou, or do you find people are
coming to you and I ask thatbecause a lot of the gyms I work
with struggle to find enoughleads of people to talk to and
(21:39):
get in their sales funnel andconvert to customers, that kind
of thing.
What's your process?
How do you find your?
Your is customers, the term youuse.
Do you say members?
Speaker 1 (21:49):
We say participants.
Speaker 2 (21:50):
Participants that's the word we use.
How do you find them and getthem into your program?
Speaker 1 (21:54):
I mean we do, we do everything and and also a lot of
people come to us I mean wordof mouth and friend referrals is
the biggest and most powerfulform of marketing and that's
something that is the leastcontrollable.
So the best way you can controlthat is just by offering an
experience that people love somuch that they are motivated to
go out and tell their friends.
(22:15):
So, as much as you can go aboveand beyond for your customer,
for your participant, so that itwill empower them to go out and
tell their friends, that's themost powerful but again, like
the least controllable of formsof marketing, I think, yes, we
do go out and sort of like youknow, we send a lot of print
material.
Still, because of ourdemographic, we send brochures
(22:36):
and catalogs.
A lot of our older participantsstill like to have something in
their physical hands to lookthrough and browse.
So we do a lot of printmarketing to new audiences.
We buy lists, we do things likethat.
As far as we also do a lot ofsocial media, but for social
media, for us it's mostlyFacebook, because that's where
our participants are.
(22:56):
What's been really successfulfor us is our Facebook groups,
which is not something that alot of companies do as like a
marketing or communicationstrategy.
But our Facebook page, it feelsmore promotional.
But the Facebook groups that wehave we have about four or five
of them it's a community, it'sall about community.
So, although we are the oneswho created the groups and we've
(23:17):
invited people to join them,they do most of the conversation
.
They ask questions, they sharepictures from their trips, they
give testimonials.
It's so much more authentic.
It's kind of a way, as I said,like to create that friend
referral channel and that wordof mouth channel by letting them
talk about it to each other andit comes off as so much more
authentic and it's so much morepowerful than anything that we
(23:38):
could say.
So we post content in there toget conversations going.
It's more like conversationstarters, but it's not any kind
of like salesy type perspectivethat we come at it with.
So and we're lucky in that weare, I mean, we serve like a
hundred thousand travelers ayear.
So we weren't starting fromcreating these Facebook groups
from nothing, like we had a lotof people to invite and so that
(24:00):
community already existed.
You know one of them is calledthe Women of Road Scholar.
I think having a community ofwomen is really powerful because
women feel more comfortablewith other women and talking,
giving advice, asking for advice, talking about concerns, like
we have a lot of widows thattravel with us.
That will post.
You know, I became widowed andI'm nervous to go on my own.
(24:20):
Does anybody have any advice?
So, again, when you're talkingabout confidence and you're
talking about fitness andthere's maybe a lot of women who
are particularly nervous andhave less confidence, so maybe
having some kind of community,whether it's online or events or
something like that, where youreally focus on women, I think
would be a really powerful thingto do.
It's been powerful for us.
(24:42):
And the other thing is one ofour Facebook groups is just
called Retired Teachers TravelClub.
It doesn't even have RoadScholar in the name, because a
lot of retired teachers travelwith us because of our focus on
learning, so that communitypeople come there because of an
affinity to being a retiredteacher and so, although Road
Scholar is involved in it and alot of people talk about Road
Scholar and travel through RoadScholar, it's not so focused on
(25:05):
us.
So that's even one step removedfrom being like salesy.
But there's a lot of ways tocreate community through social
media.
In-person events, I meanbecause we're a national
organization.
Yes, we do trade shows andstuff, but I think, in terms of
you're talking about like a gymowner getting involved in your
community and creating likelocal events, could be something
(25:26):
that would be really powerfultoo.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:28):
I'm glad you mentioned the Facebook groups
and I'm really glad youmentioned that you were an
established organization withmany thousands of followers by
then, because it's hard you knowto do when you're.
I tried it.
I have a business page for mybusiness, prime Fit content, and
then I have a group, prime FitPros, and I tried for the first
(25:49):
year or so to get it up tobecome self-sustaining and it
just was too much.
A lot of work, too small.
Yeah, I've got maybe 1,000,2,000 people in there.
I'm not sure of people in there.
I'm not sure.
And you have to have so manypeople to have enough who are
going to participate in it thatmuch that it does drive itself.
(26:11):
But it is a good thing to tryand I know some of my gym owners
do it.
It's really a good way toencourage their people to
communicate with each other.
That's fantastic.
What's happening right now withtravel?
Are there any sort of trendyplaces among our demographic
that people want to go to?
And I'm glad you corrected meabout the over 50, because I say
over 50 because that's just aline in the sand that I drew for
(26:35):
fitness consumers, but a lot ofthe people I'm talking with and
writing for are 60s, 70s, 80sas well, so it's 50 and well
above, yeah, 50 as well, becausethat's when you have to.
Speaker 1 (26:46):
You have to pretty much be 50 to travel with us.
That's kind of the startingpoint.
So we say over 50 as well in alot of our marketing and
communications, but that's notthe average, you know.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
I just wanted to like be clear about that I'm glad
you are, because I, when I talkto people about this a lot,
they'll say, oh yeah, 50.
And they'll talk about50-year-olds Then they forget
about 75-year-olds.
And that's a different stage oflife and some people at 75 are
elite athletes and verycomfortable walking into a new
gym and getting their workout,and many are not, and same with
(27:15):
50-year-olds.
And so there's, like you said,there's all this diversity in
this age group.
It's way too big andcomplicated to call a niche, I
think.
But I like that reminder thatwe're not just talking about
50-year-olds because hey, 50,you're still capable of a lot of
things that you might not becapable of at 80, but you still
want to go and do things andparticipate in life.
Speaker 1 (27:36):
There's both the physical ability that changes,
but also, like you said, justlife stage.
I mean someone who's 50 mightstill have teenagers at home.
Yeah, they may be parenting.
They're probably workingfull-time and then when you
start to become empty nestersand retire and you have maybe
more time, more financialcapital, and you have more time
to go to the gym, you have moretime to focus on yourself, and
(27:57):
so those things changeenormously in those years too.
Speaker 2 (28:02):
Okay.
So what's hot right now?
Where are people going?
Speaker 1 (28:04):
What's hot, where are people going?
I would say the Azores issomething that's really popular,
which is a island off Portugal.
We've heard it described as theHawaii of Europe.
My colleague who is ourvideographer she's a full-time
videographer on staff.
She's been to tons of places,both independently and with Road
Scholar and she said it's oneof her favorite ever.
She just she described it as acombination between um, new
(28:27):
zealand, hawaii and scotland I'mready, let's go beautiful.
it's a great outdoor destinationand also it's one of those
places where people it'sstarting to become popular, but
she described it when they werethere like they were the only
people in all the places thatthey were.
So it's still a little bitundiscovered and and I think
those are the places that I'llprobably talk about here the
(28:47):
most is places where it's likethey're starting to get hot.
We're starting to see moreinterest among our participants,
but they still feel a littlebit undiscovered because that's
kind of the.
I feel like that's like theline that you want to kind of
toggle right.
So I would say the Azores we'vehad a lot of interest in Malta
recently, so we've been addingsome more programs there.
That's a place where, if you'vekind of already done Europe
(29:10):
maybe you've done some Italy,you've done some France, you've
done kind of the big ones it's aplace that you know you're like
maybe I've never thought aboutgoing to Malta, so that's
another place that's a littlebit more undiscovered and less
trafficked are you finding anyinterest in fitness travel?
Speaker 2 (29:25):
or maybe spa, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (29:28):
Spas, right, I mean, I don't mean getting massages, I
mean wellness retreats yes thatkind of something like that
well in general, the our walkingand hiking programs are one of
our most popular collections.
Um.
The national parks in the usare always super, super popular,
whether you're doing somethingphysically active like hiking,
or if it's more of like a slowerpaced birding type adventure,
(29:48):
but walking and hiking is alwaysthe biggest for us.
We do have cycling programs aswell.
We have pickleball programs,which is obviously something
becoming hotter and hotter, andI just love that trend because
it's been completely driven byolder adults.
You don't see a lot of trendsthat are like originated by
older adults and I just and noweveryone's doing it, but it was
really driven by people over 50,which is really cool.
(30:10):
So we have pickleball programs,we have golf programs, tennis
programs.
Let me think what else we havelike multi-sport, where you're
doing more like whitewaterrafting, canoeing, that kind of
thing as well.
But yeah, we've definitely seenmore interest in that.
It's something that we'realways adding more destinations
and more places to do that.
There's a lot of places where,like the azores will, where
(30:32):
we'll have a hiking version,we'll have one program that's
hiking and then we have onethat's like more focused on
volcanoes and vineyards.
So we kind of offer a lot ofdestinations at different
activity levels.
That's something that's reallyimportant for serving older
adults.
For us is having a huge rangeof activity levels so we can
serve as many people as possible.
So a lot of destinations willhave more and less active
(30:55):
programs.
Speaker 2 (30:56):
Yeah, oh, it sounds great, let's get.
I want to wrap up by gettingback to adventure and I want you
to tell the folks about theevent you have coming up or the
day you have coming up.
That gets us back to adventure,and please tell folks where
they can learn more about it andmore about the organization.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
Yeah.
So the survey that we did foron adventure and travel and
happiness and health reallyinspired us to create this day.
So Road Scholar is celebratingour 50th anniversary this year.
We've been around since 1975and we wanted to celebrate our
birthday in a special way, whichis June 8th.
It's the first day 50 years agothat we had our first programs.
(31:33):
But we didn't really want it tobe just revolved around Road
Scholar.
We wanted to go back to ourroots in a way, to create a
movement again.
When Broad Scholar was foundedin 1975 as Elder Hostel, it
really was a movement because itwas a time when retirement and
social security were new things,sort of.
They were still sort of new.
And so there was this wholetime in someone's life where
(31:56):
previous generations wereexpected to just sit in a
rocking chair on their frontporch and watch their
grandchildren play, and therewas this whole new generation of
older adults who didn't seethemselves that way and they
were looking for things to do inretirement and older adulthood.
So that's where Elder Hostelwas founded as a way to give
learning opportunities to peoplein retirement, and it really
(32:18):
was a movement.
And so, anyway, we now, 50years later, wanted to create a
movement again aroundcelebrating the joys of aging
and trying to help reframe theway that people see aging and
thinking of it as just anothertime and an excuse to be
adventurous and to stretch thoseadventure muscles.
So we declared June 8th AgeAdventurously Day and we are
(32:42):
putting out a challenge to ourcommunity and beyond for
everybody to plan on June 8th,do something adventurous,
whatever that means to them Ifit's, like I said, trying a new
restaurant in your neighborhood,or if it's booking a trip to
Antarctica, it's getting atattoo, whatever adventure means
to you.
Plan to do somethingadventurous on June 8th and
we're going to try to make it anannual event where it can
(33:03):
snowball and become really amovement.
So we are doing a contest wherepeople can share what they're
doing on June 8th to win aRhodes Scholar voucher.
So we're a part of that, butwe're trying to get everybody
involved in just doing somethingoutside of their comfort zone
on that day to celebrate thejoys of aging and to flex those
adventure muscles.
Speaker 2 (33:22):
I love it.
It dovetails beautifully withmy message at Prime Fit Content
and on this show and I just loveit.
It's so positive, such apositive thing to do for people
and to get them thinking aboutthis in a good way to counter
some of that negativity that westill have associated with aging
.
It's just.
Speaker 1 (33:41):
And even our own aging.
I mean, we have internalizedaging, and that's something that
we all have to change about,about society and about
ourselves on an individual basis.
Speaker 2 (33:50):
so absolutely so.
Um, what's the website wherepeople should go to?
Yes, ageadventurouslyorgageadventurouslyorg will tell me
all about it beautiful,beautiful.
Well, I just love thisorganization and I'm so glad
that we got to know each other alittle bit, and thank you so
(34:10):
much for your time, kelsey.
Speaker 1 (34:12):
Thank you, it's been really fun.
Speaker 2 (34:14):
All right Thanks.
Thank you for listening to theOptimal Aging Podcast.
I'm your host, jay Croft ofPrime Fit Content.
I hope you enjoyed it and Ihope you'll subscribe, review
and tell a friend.
All of that helps me grow myaudience.
I hope you'll share anycomments you have with me,
including suggestions aboutpeople I should interview and
topics I should cover.
(34:34):
You can learn more about mynewsletter and content business
at primefitcontentcom and writeme at jay at primefitcontentcom.
Again, thanks for listening.
Join me next time.
The survey that we did for on adventure and travel
and happiness and health reallyinspired us to create this day,
so Road Scholar is celebratingour 50th anniversary this year.
We've been around since 1975and we wanted to celebrate our
birthday in a special way, whichis June 8th.
It's the first day 50 years agothat we had our first programs.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Hi everybody.
Our first programscommunications, content and
making powerful connections.
We're talking about three of myfavorite subjects today fitness
, travel and adventure.
They go together for millionsof people over 50.
There's plenty of wiggle roomin the definition of each to
(00:59):
apply to just about anybody.
Now I write a lot about thedesire to travel being a key
motivator for people over 50wanting to get fit or stay fit,
and it turns out we can apply alot of the same messaging and
marketing ideas to encouragingtravel, fitness and other kinds
of adventure.
This all comes togetherbeautifully in a non-profit
(01:21):
organization called Road Scholar, in a non-profit organization
called Road Scholar planning its50th anniversary this summer,
with a focus on agingadventurously.
The group conducted a survey ofits participants and found that
the top three components ofaging adventurously are staying
fit and healthy, traveling andcontinuing to learn and grow.
(01:41):
Today's optional aging guest isfrom Road Scholar and I'm
delighted to share ourconversation because I love
fitness, travel and adventureand I love talking about how we
can encourage more mature adultsto get excited about them, to
stay excited about them.
Kelsey Perry is the PR directorfor Road Scholar and our chat
will be illuminating and, Ithink, a lot of fun to anyone
(02:04):
trying to work with older adultsin fitness, health, well-being,
probably just about anything.
Stick with it to the end tolearn about the group's special
day coming up in June and whatthe hottest spots in over 50
travel are these days.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
So we did a survey recently of both our
participants, which is, ourtravelers who travel with us
each year and also people whohave not traveled with us.
We wanted to be able to kind ofcompare both communities, but
we surveyed all people over 50,from 50s to 90s, to make sure we
had a good range.
We wanted to make somedeterminations about the
(02:40):
interaction between travel,adventure and health and
wellness in older adulthoodspecifically.
So we asked a lot of questionsabout the interplay between
those different things and whatwe found is that those who
considered themselvesadventurous also rated
themselves higher on both ahealth scale and a happiness
(03:02):
scale.
So there's definitely arelationship between the idea of
being adventurous and howhealthy and how happy you are.
But we also found that folksfelt less adventurous as they
aged, which was interesting, andto me, with that, the story
that I'm a storyteller, so I'malways looking at what story
does the data tell me, and sothe story that I'm interpreting
(03:25):
from this data is that I seeadventure like a muscle, so
tying into fitness here you haveto keep flexing it.
It's something that it's easierat any age really to kind of get
comfortable in our day-to-dayroutine and become less
comfortable going outside of ourcomfort zone essentially, and
the more you flex that muscleand the more you push yourself
outside of your comfort zoneessentially, and the more you
flex that muscle and the moreyou push yourself outside of
(03:47):
your comfort zone, the easier itbecomes.
I think a lot of us saw thisduring COVID.
We all became a little bit moreof a homebody during COVID and
both the adventure muscle andthe social muscles we had to
start flexing those again,coming out of the pandemic and
getting outside of our comfortzone.
And so I think that adventureis something that really keeps
you mentally both physically andmentally spry and agile and it
(04:10):
keeps you alert and learning inolder adulthood and it can
really result in a sense ofempowerment.
It's related to your pride andyour self-confidence that help
you remain more independent inyour later years, and I think
that's just really what howadventure plays into the health
and happiness in older adulthoodis, because it has so much to
(04:31):
do with confidence.
If you flex that muscle, themore you'll want to do it and
then you'll also then get theresults of being more
adventurous, which keeps yourmind fresh, keeps you learning
and then also benefits yourmental health and your physical
health.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
Right.
You know, as I was telling youa minute ago before we hit the
record button, that travel isone of the primary motivators
for older people to want toeither get fit or stay fit.
So they go to gyms and that'sone of the main reasons that
they give for wanting to startlifting weights and doing yoga
and developing their cardio ortheir cardio endurance, these
(05:08):
kinds of things, so they cantravel.
They've worked at a desk job,they've raised their kids and
now they want to go do thesewonderful things that they've
always dreamt of.
So being fit is really helpfulto do that.
Just walking through an airportwith luggage is difficult, you
know, if you're not in goodcondition.
You asked folks what it meansto age adventurously and the
(05:29):
number one answer was, in fact,staying healthy, staying
physically active and healthy.
That is amazing to me.
How do you define agingadventurously and how does that
connect with what we're talkingabout?
Speaker 1 (05:42):
Yeah.
So, like you said, that was thenumber one answer to that
question was, when we asked themwhat it means to age
adventurously, they said stayingphysically and actively healthy
.
82% said yes to that.
Number two was traveling andexploring new places, close
behind at 81%.
And then the third wascontinuing to learn and grow,
which I think was around 70 or71%.
(06:03):
So I think obviously where thiscomes from is a lot of people,
when you hear the word adventure, you think of adventure.
You think of like whitewaterrafting and like mountain biking
and things like that.
So I think that's part ofwhat's happening here is that's
how people think of that word,the connotation that they have
with the word adventurous.
But I think that you know it'sobviously important to stay in
(06:24):
shape to benefit you physicallyand mentally and help you live
longer and be healthier in thoselater years, but it also gives
you access to more options forbeing adventurous, like
something like river rafting orziplining that you wouldn't be
able to do.
But I also think that at RoadScholar we think of adventure.
We like to try to challengethat and broaden the idea of
(06:45):
adventure, because it'sdifferent for everybody and
everyone has different physicalabilities and the reality is
that adventure is going tochange.
It's going to look different asyou age.
Everybody ultimately will havemobility challenges as they age.
It hits them at a differentpoint and we should try to stay
physically fit so that we canhave those physical options as
(07:05):
long as possible.
But there are still lots ofways to be adventurous, even if
those physical hiking and bikingand things are maybe outside of
our of our reach.
So we try to really encouragepeople to think of adventure
differently, in terms of really,it just means trying something
new or doing something a littlebit outside of your comfort zone
.
So that might mean somethinglike taking a language class,
(07:30):
learning a new language.
It might mean just like tryinga new restaurant, like an ethnic
restaurant in your neighborhood, or doing something that just
stretches you a little bit.
And I think, as we talked about, you stretch that muscle.
Maybe the first thing you do ifyou're a little bit of like, if
you don't think of yourself asa super adventurous person,
maybe the first thing you do ifyou're a little bit of like, if
you don't think of yourself as asuper adventurous person, maybe
the first thing is like let mego out and try this new
restaurant in my neighborhood.
Once you do that, you gain theconfidence, and then you can
(07:53):
start to stretch it and stretchit even more, and maybe some of
those things that you hadn'tthought of being capable of
doing before become more andmore possible for you.
Speaker 2 (08:06):
Absolutely.
I'm glad that you explainedthat, because when I think of
adventure, I think yeah, I thinkwhitewater rafting, but you
could also think of it as, asyou said, exploring a new
neighborhood in your city ortrying a new restaurant, or
going to the gym for the firsttime since college, anything
like that really Joining a bookclub, joining some kind of
community, accessing your, yoursocial opportunities.
Speaker 1 (08:25):
That's another thing that's so important in older
adulthood and it might be alittle bit, like I said, when
you're not stretching thatsocial muscle might be a little
intimidating.
But the more you just kind oftiptoe out and you push yourself
, little little, then a littlemore, and a little more, then
something like traveling toeurope may become more
accessible for you as well.
And maybe some people that'stheir starting point is
(08:45):
traveling to Europe and maybethey want to build up to go into
Antarctica or whatever thatmight be.
But everybody's starting itfrom a different place and we
want to meet them where they are.
Speaker 2 (08:54):
Tell me more about the results from your survey
that were so interesting.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
Yeah, I think those were the biggest things as far
as the interplay betweenadventure travel.
But also, I mean, what we werehoping to find and we did is
that our participants thattravel with us, compared to
those who don't travel with us,they're more adventurous,
they're happier, they'rehealthier, which is, you know, a
great thing to see, and it wassomething we were hoping to see.
(09:19):
But the data does also backthat up.
So we definitely saw that notonly does adventure keep you
happier and healthier, but sodoes travel, and that when you
travel with Road Scholar, you'rehappier, you're a happier
person when you travel with RoadScholar, so that's a good thing
.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
Well, let's talk about that Traveling with Road
Scholar, compared to, maybe, howyou want to travel when you're
25, 45, now you're 65, or 85,whatever.
45, now you're 65, you want it,or 85, whatever.
How do our desires for travelevolve with age?
And, you know, perhaps one ofthem might be going with a group
(09:53):
.
Instead of just striking out onyour own and just going
wherever the wind takes you, youwant to go with a group.
There's some good reasons forthat.
What else can you think ofthat's different?
Because I'm thinking aboutmyself at 25, listening to this
podcast, would say I'll never dothat when I get old.
I'm going to go out.
I'm just going to get on mymotorcycle and my backpack.
I'm going to go out and do myown thing.
(10:15):
Well, you know, maybe not rightto go out and do my own thing.
Well, you know, maybe not right.
There's a lot of good things tobe said for group travel.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
So tell me about that Definitely.
Well, in the same way thatadventure changes as we age, so
might travel.
It's going to look differentfor us later in life than it did
in our 20s and 30s.
Like you said, we see somepeople start to travel in older
adulthood because they'reretiring and they have more time
and they may have more money.
But we also see people who havebeen traveling for their whole
lives independently and theystart to think about and
(10:43):
consider group travel, andthere's a lot of people who are
hesitant about it.
Even me, like before I worked ingroup travel, I've always been
the person who loved to put myspreadsheet together and plan my
travels and go solo or go withmy husband and be able to
explore on our own, and I neverthought group travel would be
for me either, but then Istarted working in it.
I've worked for a couple ofdifferent companies now and I
(11:05):
love it and I think there's aplace for both independent
travel and group travel, nomatter what age.
But I think there are a lot ofspecific benefits for older
adults, so I can talk more aboutthose, yeah please do.
Yeah.
So I think that what we see inour travelers is they love that
all the details are taken careof for them.
Some people do, like I said,love to do the research and love
(11:27):
to have their spreadsheets andeverything like that, but when
you travel with Road Scholar,all of those logistics are taken
care of.
A lot of people hate thosethings and so all of that is
taken care of.
You don't have to bother withthe planning.
You have the confidence,knowing that there are experts
who are making these decisionsfor you and planning all the
logistics.
So you don't have to worryabout train times and booking
(11:48):
tickets between one place andthe next and you know hotel
arrangements and all of thatstuff is taken care of for you.
So that's one thing thatbecomes something that can be a
bigger burden in older adulthood, especially as technology
changes and the way that we makethese plans change, it can
become more intimidating.
So we don't want those burdensto become a barrier for travel
(12:10):
for people as they get older.
And another thing is that as weage, we become more vulnerable
travelers.
Maybe our reactions aren't asquick, we have more trouble
carrying things, so you'reworried about your luggage and
you're not as aware of yoursurroundings.
There's a lot of reasons whytravel might become a little
less safe as we age, and so ourparticipants really like to go
(12:32):
with the group because they knowthat there's that comfort in
traveling in numbers, but alsoyou have the group leader who's
looking out for you, making sureyou are where you need to be at
all times and everything likethat.
So there's definitely a comfortlevel and just the safety
aspect of it as we age.
And then the last thing I wantto mention is the social aspect,
because when you're travelingindependently, it can be easy to
(12:54):
go on a trip and not talk toanybody the whole time if you're
really going solo.
But what our travelers reallylove is interacting with the
other participants on theprogram, sharing the experiences
with them, learning from theirlife experiences.
You know all of them have livedlong lives and have amazing
lived experiences, so they lovelearning from each other as much
(13:15):
as they love learning from theinstructors, and loneliness and
social isolation has beendeclared love learning from the
instructors and loneliness andsocial isolation has been
declared an epidemic in the USand beyond, and we know that
social interactions in olderadulthood benefit our health our
physical health, our mentalhealth everything, and so any
opportunity that we can havelater in life to create new
(13:37):
social connections and fosterthose is always a good thing for
our mental health.
So Rhodes in life to create newsocial connections and foster
those is always a good thing forour mental health.
So Road Scholar can create newconnections for us.
We have a lot of solo travelersespecially who meet other
travelers on our trips and theybecome friends, they stay in
touch, they travel together inthe future.
So that's a big element of whatour programs offer too.
Speaker 2 (13:57):
So you have people who go by themselves, but to
join your group.
Speaker 1 (14:01):
Exactly, I guess in my head I was thinking it would
be a group of friends, or no,all of our trips it's just, you
know it's group travel where youtypically it's couples or solo
travelers or a couple of friendsenroll in the program and then
they're with a bunch ofstrangers that become friends
throughout the week.
We do do private group trips aswell.
So if you want to get a groupof your own together and go on a
(14:23):
private date, that's an option,but typically that's a very
small percentage of what weoffer.
Mostly you're coming eitherwith a partner or you're coming
solo.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
Okay, a lot of what you're saying about traveling is
what we talk about with fitnesstoo.
It's good for you socially,it's good for you mentally.
You can join in things.
It builds up your confidence.
The more you do it, the moreyou want to do it and feel good,
not just in performing theexercises at the gym, but in
doing the things in your dailylife lifting up the groceries,
(14:54):
playing with the grandchildren,enjoying your sports, whatever
it might be.
You have that confidence right.
So there's a lot ofsimilarities here.
So tell me about your marketingand your outreach and maybe
what you're finding that'sreally effective in speaking to
today's over 50 traveler.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
I will say our participants are over 50, but
the average age is 72.
So that really truly is anaverage, because we have people
in their 50s and we have peoplein their 90s.
So 72 has been the average foryears, even before I worked here
.
It's weird, it doesn't evenlike oscillate between 71 and 70
.
It's like always 72.
It's kind of bizarre, but youknow, we have two thirds baby
(15:35):
boomers at this point and sothat's really who we are serving
for the most part.
But we're at this unique pointwhere we're now serving three
generations at once, which is,you know, certainly those
generations are all verydifferent from each other and
all people over 50 are not justlike old people who all have the
same characteristics anddesires and physical abilities.
Those are three completelydifferent generations, and even
(15:55):
the boomers you can kind ofbreak down into two.
So yeah, those are threecompletely different generations
, and even the boomers you cankind of break down into two.
So yeah, but in general, youknow, I worked at road scholar
for almost 10 years now and soI've been writing for and
speaking to and marketing toolder adults for a long time now
and I've learned so much aboutthat demographic I've also, I
have to say I'm so grateful forthe way that it has changed the
way that I see aging, that I Isee my own aging.
(16:18):
It's helped me be a less ageistperson and I've learned a lot
about ageism and just.
I'm inspired by our participantsevery day.
My favorite part of my job iswhen I get to speak with them
and do interviews and hear abouttheir adventures and they're
just, they're so inspiring.
I've built friendships.
One of my participants thatI've I met her just through, you
(16:39):
know, doing an interview for PR, and she just handmade a
pillowcase for my son that shesent me.
So I've built these connections, these social connections with
cross-generational, which issomething that we just don't see
.
There's not enoughopportunities in life anymore to
create cross-generationalrelationships with people who
are not in your family, and I'mso grateful for that gift that
(17:02):
Rhodes Scholar has brought to me.
But back to marketing somethings that I've learned about.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
Can I pause you there ?
That is marketing and the waythat I practice it.
What you just described, you'retalking about stories and, for
lack of a I hope this isn't acrass way to put it You'll know
what I mean, but peoplelistening might think I'm being
rude.
Material, because people atthis age in life are so rich
with material and you get toknow them and you help them do
(17:30):
things that are important tothem and they open up to you and
you get in positions like yoursand mine.
We then get to share thesestories with others who are then
touched by them and motivatedby them to do them as well.
That is a part of the marketingpicture to me.
Anyway.
I'm.
Speaker 1 (17:48):
maybe I'm too no that's absolutely my theory and
approach on marketing andcommunications.
I have an MFA in creativewriting, so for me it's all
about storytelling.
That's what I love about it andthat's my approach showing
examples of what ourparticipants are doing, and it
really just creates aspiration,inspirational content that can
(18:11):
empower other people who arereading it or consuming the
content who might be hesitant.
You know we're talking a lot inthis conversation about how so
much of this is about confidenceand so if they see somebody
else who's doing these thingsand they hear these stories,
they think, oh well, she's doingthat.
I guess it's not out of thequestion for me.
And so it's so much aboutstorytelling but representation.
(18:32):
You know you talk aboutrepresentation a lot in
marketing in terms of otherthings like racial demographics
and gender, but there's alsorepresentation in terms of age,
and I think that's one of thedemographics that a lot of.
Obviously, we serve only olderadults, so we're thinking about
that all the time, but there's alot of brands and companies out
there who are not representingolder adults in their marketing
(18:55):
enough.
It's definitely you hearstudies all the time especially
older women being completelyignored by marketers, even
though they hold so much of thepurse strings in our society
these days.
Speaker 2 (19:05):
It makes no sense, it's just mind-boggling.
But everyone wants the youthmarket and in some industries
that's probably really smart.
But in fitness it's verylimiting, and perhaps it is in
travel as well.
I don't know.
I don't know much about thetravel industry, but tell me
more about the marketing.
I interrupted you and Iapologize for that, but you
(19:27):
really touched me because that'show I relate to all of this as
well.
Speaker 1 (19:30):
Yeah, and tying into fitness and representation too
is like I think of you know,whenever I'm doing like a, I
like to work out at home and Ilike workout videos, yoga and
stuff like that.
But when I watch these and it'slike everyone in the video is
like completely fit and I justthink well and young of course,
but even just from a fitnesslevel, I'm like I'm intimidated
(19:52):
and watching even if it's anentry level yoga it's like I
feel like, well, this isn'treally for me, because these
people have no problem with itand this is challenging for me.
So then I end up watching thisand just feeling like even worse
about myself if it'schallenging for me, and then I
don't even want to do the videoanymore.
So a lot of it is about thevisual representation of showing
(20:12):
somebody who is in thatdemographic doing something
adventurous, doing somethingphysically active, so that other
people can see that and think,okay, maybe I'm not there yet,
but like if they're doing it, Ican do that too.
That's a big part of it, Ithink.
Speaker 2 (20:27):
Hey, are you a fitness professional trying to
grow your business with peopleover 50?
If you are, then you need toknow how to communicate with
them, how to market to them andhow to get them to trust you
with their fitness, well-beingand money.
We're talking about millions ofpeople who are a little older
than the typical market that thefitness industry usually
pursues.
They have more money, more timeand better motivation to make
(20:51):
the best long-term fitnessconsumers you'll find anywhere.
If you're not focusing on them,you should be.
Prime Fit Content is the onlycontent marketing company
designed specifically to helpyou engage people in this group
and to help you distinguishyourself from competitors in
your community.
It's effective, affordable andsuper easy to use.
Check it out atprimefitcontentcom.
(21:14):
That's prime like prime of yourlife, fitcontentcom.
Back to the show.
Tell me about just generally,maybe a bigger picture view.
Are you actively going out andfinding people and trying to
convince them to come along withyou, or do you find people are
coming to you and I ask thatbecause a lot of the gyms I work
with struggle to find enoughleads of people to talk to and
(21:39):
get in their sales funnel andconvert to customers, that kind
of thing.
What's your process?
How do you find your?
Your is customers, the term youuse.
Do you say members?
Speaker 1 (21:49):
We say participants.
Speaker 2 (21:50):
Participants that's the word we use.
How do you find them and getthem into your program?
Speaker 1 (21:54):
I mean we do, we do everything and and also a lot of
people come to us I mean wordof mouth and friend referrals is
the biggest and most powerfulform of marketing and that's
something that is the leastcontrollable.
So the best way you can controlthat is just by offering an
experience that people love somuch that they are motivated to
go out and tell their friends.
(22:15):
So, as much as you can go aboveand beyond for your customer,
for your participant, so that itwill empower them to go out and
tell their friends, that's themost powerful but again, like
the least controllable of formsof marketing, I think, yes, we
do go out and sort of like youknow, we send a lot of print
material.
Still, because of ourdemographic, we send brochures
(22:36):
and catalogs.
A lot of our older participantsstill like to have something in
their physical hands to lookthrough and browse.
So we do a lot of printmarketing to new audiences.
We buy lists, we do things likethat.
As far as we also do a lot ofsocial media, but for social
media, for us it's mostlyFacebook, because that's where
our participants are.
(22:56):
What's been really successfulfor us is our Facebook groups,
which is not something that alot of companies do as like a
marketing or communicationstrategy.
But our Facebook page, it feelsmore promotional.
But the Facebook groups that wehave we have about four or five
of them it's a community, it'sall about community.
So, although we are the oneswho created the groups and we've
(23:17):
invited people to join them,they do most of the conversation
.
They ask questions, they sharepictures from their trips, they
give testimonials.
It's so much more authentic.
It's kind of a way, as I said,like to create that friend
referral channel and that wordof mouth channel by letting them
talk about it to each other andit comes off as so much more
authentic and it's so much morepowerful than anything that we
(23:38):
could say.
So we post content in there toget conversations going.
It's more like conversationstarters, but it's not any kind
of like salesy type perspectivethat we come at it with.
So and we're lucky in that weare, I mean, we serve like a
hundred thousand travelers ayear.
So we weren't starting fromcreating these Facebook groups
from nothing, like we had a lotof people to invite and so that
(24:00):
community already existed.
You know one of them is calledthe Women of Road Scholar.
I think having a community ofwomen is really powerful because
women feel more comfortablewith other women and talking,
giving advice, asking for advice, talking about concerns, like
we have a lot of widows thattravel with us.
That will post.
You know, I became widowed andI'm nervous to go on my own.
(24:20):
Does anybody have any advice?
So, again, when you're talkingabout confidence and you're
talking about fitness andthere's maybe a lot of women who
are particularly nervous andhave less confidence, so maybe
having some kind of community,whether it's online or events or
something like that, where youreally focus on women, I think
would be a really powerful thingto do.
It's been powerful for us.
(24:42):
And the other thing is one ofour Facebook groups is just
called Retired Teachers TravelClub.
It doesn't even have RoadScholar in the name, because a
lot of retired teachers travelwith us because of our focus on
learning, so that communitypeople come there because of an
affinity to being a retiredteacher and so, although Road
Scholar is involved in it and alot of people talk about Road
Scholar and travel through RoadScholar, it's not so focused on
(25:05):
us.
So that's even one step removedfrom being like salesy.
But there's a lot of ways tocreate community through social
media.
In-person events, I meanbecause we're a national
organization.
Yes, we do trade shows andstuff, but I think, in terms of
you're talking about like a gymowner getting involved in your
community and creating likelocal events, could be something
(25:26):
that would be really powerfultoo.
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:28):
I'm glad you mentioned the Facebook groups
and I'm really glad youmentioned that you were an
established organization withmany thousands of followers by
then, because it's hard you knowto do when you're.
I tried it.
I have a business page for mybusiness, prime Fit content, and
then I have a group, prime FitPros, and I tried for the first
(25:49):
year or so to get it up tobecome self-sustaining and it
just was too much.
A lot of work, too small.
Yeah, I've got maybe 1,000,2,000 people in there.
I'm not sure of people in there.
I'm not sure.
And you have to have so manypeople to have enough who are
going to participate in it thatmuch that it does drive itself.
(26:11):
But it is a good thing to tryand I know some of my gym owners
do it.
It's really a good way toencourage their people to
communicate with each other.
That's fantastic.
What's happening right now withtravel?
Are there any sort of trendyplaces among our demographic
that people want to go to?
And I'm glad you corrected meabout the over 50, because I say
over 50 because that's just aline in the sand that I drew for
(26:35):
fitness consumers, but a lot ofthe people I'm talking with and
writing for are 60s, 70s, 80sas well, so it's 50 and well
above, yeah, 50 as well, becausethat's when you have to.
Speaker 1 (26:46):
You have to pretty much be 50 to travel with us.
That's kind of the startingpoint.
So we say over 50 as well in alot of our marketing and
communications, but that's notthe average, you know.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
I just wanted to like be clear about that I'm glad
you are, because I, when I talkto people about this a lot,
they'll say, oh yeah, 50.
And they'll talk about50-year-olds Then they forget
about 75-year-olds.
And that's a different stage oflife and some people at 75 are
elite athletes and verycomfortable walking into a new
gym and getting their workout,and many are not, and same with
(27:15):
50-year-olds.
And so there's, like you said,there's all this diversity in
this age group.
It's way too big andcomplicated to call a niche, I
think.
But I like that reminder thatwe're not just talking about
50-year-olds because hey, 50,you're still capable of a lot of
things that you might not becapable of at 80, but you still
want to go and do things andparticipate in life.
Speaker 1 (27:36):
There's both the physical ability that changes,
but also, like you said, justlife stage.
I mean someone who's 50 mightstill have teenagers at home.
Yeah, they may be parenting.
They're probably workingfull-time and then when you
start to become empty nestersand retire and you have maybe
more time, more financialcapital, and you have more time
to go to the gym, you have moretime to focus on yourself, and
(27:57):
so those things changeenormously in those years too.
Speaker 2 (28:02):
Okay.
So what's hot right now?
Where are people going?
Speaker 1 (28:04):
What's hot, where are people going?
I would say the Azores issomething that's really popular,
which is a island off Portugal.
We've heard it described as theHawaii of Europe.
My colleague who is ourvideographer she's a full-time
videographer on staff.
She's been to tons of places,both independently and with Road
Scholar and she said it's oneof her favorite ever.
She just she described it as acombination between um, new
(28:27):
zealand, hawaii and scotland I'mready, let's go beautiful.
it's a great outdoor destinationand also it's one of those
places where people it'sstarting to become popular, but
she described it when they werethere like they were the only
people in all the places thatthey were.
So it's still a little bitundiscovered and and I think
those are the places that I'llprobably talk about here the
(28:47):
most is places where it's likethey're starting to get hot.
We're starting to see moreinterest among our participants,
but they still feel a littlebit undiscovered because that's
kind of the.
I feel like that's like theline that you want to kind of
toggle right.
So I would say the Azores we'vehad a lot of interest in Malta
recently, so we've been addingsome more programs there.
That's a place where, if you'vekind of already done Europe
(29:10):
maybe you've done some Italy,you've done some France, you've
done kind of the big ones it's aplace that you know you're like
maybe I've never thought aboutgoing to Malta, so that's
another place that's a littlebit more undiscovered and less
trafficked are you finding anyinterest in fitness travel?
Speaker 2 (29:25):
or maybe spa, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (29:28):
Spas, right, I mean, I don't mean getting massages, I
mean wellness retreats yes thatkind of something like that
well in general, the our walkingand hiking programs are one of
our most popular collections.
Um.
The national parks in the usare always super, super popular,
whether you're doing somethingphysically active like hiking,
or if it's more of like a slowerpaced birding type adventure,
(29:48):
but walking and hiking is alwaysthe biggest for us.
We do have cycling programs aswell.
We have pickleball programs,which is obviously something
becoming hotter and hotter, andI just love that trend because
it's been completely driven byolder adults.
You don't see a lot of trendsthat are like originated by
older adults and I just and noweveryone's doing it, but it was
really driven by people over 50,which is really cool.
(30:10):
So we have pickleball programs,we have golf programs, tennis
programs.
Let me think what else we havelike multi-sport, where you're
doing more like whitewaterrafting, canoeing, that kind of
thing as well.
But yeah, we've definitely seenmore interest in that.
It's something that we'realways adding more destinations
and more places to do that.
There's a lot of places where,like the azores will, where
(30:32):
we'll have a hiking version,we'll have one program that's
hiking and then we have onethat's like more focused on
volcanoes and vineyards.
So we kind of offer a lot ofdestinations at different
activity levels.
That's something that's reallyimportant for serving older
adults.
For us is having a huge rangeof activity levels so we can
serve as many people as possible.
So a lot of destinations willhave more and less active
(30:55):
programs.
Speaker 2 (30:56):
Yeah, oh, it sounds great, let's get.
I want to wrap up by gettingback to adventure and I want you
to tell the folks about theevent you have coming up or the
day you have coming up.
That gets us back to adventure,and please tell folks where
they can learn more about it andmore about the organization.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
Yeah.
So the survey that we did foron adventure and travel and
happiness and health reallyinspired us to create this day.
So Road Scholar is celebratingour 50th anniversary this year.
We've been around since 1975and we wanted to celebrate our
birthday in a special way, whichis June 8th.
It's the first day 50 years agothat we had our first programs.
(31:33):
But we didn't really want it tobe just revolved around Road
Scholar.
We wanted to go back to ourroots in a way, to create a
movement again.
When Broad Scholar was foundedin 1975 as Elder Hostel, it
really was a movement because itwas a time when retirement and
social security were new things,sort of.
They were still sort of new.
And so there was this wholetime in someone's life where
(31:56):
previous generations wereexpected to just sit in a
rocking chair on their frontporch and watch their
grandchildren play, and therewas this whole new generation of
older adults who didn't seethemselves that way and they
were looking for things to do inretirement and older adulthood.
So that's where Elder Hostelwas founded as a way to give
learning opportunities to peoplein retirement, and it really
(32:18):
was a movement.
And so, anyway, we now, 50years later, wanted to create a
movement again aroundcelebrating the joys of aging
and trying to help reframe theway that people see aging and
thinking of it as just anothertime and an excuse to be
adventurous and to stretch thoseadventure muscles.
So we declared June 8th AgeAdventurously Day and we are
(32:42):
putting out a challenge to ourcommunity and beyond for
everybody to plan on June 8th,do something adventurous,
whatever that means to them Ifit's, like I said, trying a new
restaurant in your neighborhood,or if it's booking a trip to
Antarctica, it's getting atattoo, whatever adventure means
to you.
Plan to do somethingadventurous on June 8th and
we're going to try to make it anannual event where it can
(33:03):
snowball and become really amovement.
So we are doing a contest wherepeople can share what they're
doing on June 8th to win aRhodes Scholar voucher.
So we're a part of that, butwe're trying to get everybody
involved in just doing somethingoutside of their comfort zone
on that day to celebrate thejoys of aging and to flex those
adventure muscles.
Speaker 2 (33:22):
I love it.
It dovetails beautifully withmy message at Prime Fit Content
and on this show and I just loveit.
It's so positive, such apositive thing to do for people
and to get them thinking aboutthis in a good way to counter
some of that negativity that westill have associated with aging
.
It's just.
Speaker 1 (33:41):
And even our own aging.
I mean, we have internalizedaging, and that's something that
we all have to change about,about society and about
ourselves on an individual basis.
Speaker 2 (33:50):
so absolutely so.
Um, what's the website wherepeople should go to?
Yes, ageadventurouslyorgageadventurouslyorg will tell me
all about it beautiful,beautiful.
Well, I just love thisorganization and I'm so glad
that we got to know each other alittle bit, and thank you so
(34:10):
much for your time, kelsey.
Speaker 1 (34:12):
Thank you, it's been really fun.
Speaker 2 (34:14):
All right Thanks.
Thank you for listening to theOptimal Aging Podcast.
I'm your host, jay Croft ofPrime Fit Content.
I hope you enjoyed it and Ihope you'll subscribe, review
and tell a friend.
All of that helps me grow myaudience.
I hope you'll share anycomments you have with me,
including suggestions aboutpeople I should interview and
topics I should cover.
(34:34):
You can learn more about mynewsletter and content business
at primefitcontentcom and writeme at jay at primefitcontentcom.
Again, thanks for listening.
Join me next time.
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