A strategist’s case for accessibility & inclusive design
- May 7
- 4 min read
The strategies I’ve found most interesting, across years of consumer and retail work, were built around a single, specific friction. The narrower the brief, the sharper the work got. A clear friction is a gift to a strategist. It tells you what to start, stop, continue, and what success looks like.
Removing frictions, is also the work of accessibility. The very purpose of its existence. This piece pulls together the strategist’s view: three misconceptions that hold the conversation back, and a sketch of where accessibility actually belongs in a business.
The three misconceptions about accessibility and inclusive design-
1. Accessibility is all about ramps, elevators, and reserved parking
That is indeed step one. The built environment is where the conversation started, but the concept has broadened, and the dictionary definition is wider than the architecture: “the quality of being easy to reach, use, understand.”
Easy is the operative word.
In other words, accessibility is a way of building things so they remove friction. Applied at business scale, this lens covers the workplace, the products, the services, the websites, the apps, the internal tools, the communications. Anywhere a person engages with a company, the question is: how easy is this to reach, use, understand?
Most companies are working on perhaps one of these (usually the website, because of regulation). The opportunity is treating accessibility as a horizontal capability, not a vertical project.
2. Accessible design is boring
That has not been true for a long time, and 2026 has made it impossible to argue. The Met Gala this year took meaningful strides on accessibility, both in its built environment and on the carpet itself. Fashion across models with all abilities. The looks were bold, creative, and anything but muted.
Accessible design shows up across brands like Apple, Microsoft, Nike, Adidas, Tommy, etc. and safe to say they are innovative and universal. Designing from constraint sharpens design. It does not flatten it. Designing for the most constrained user often produces the cleanest and sharpest answer for everyone, not the dullest.
3. Accessibility is expensive
Only when retrofitted. A 2019 PwC report for the Centre for Inclusive Design found that retrofit costs can reach significantly higher than the cost of building accessibly from the start. The earlier accessibility enters the work, the lower the cost curve. Better to get on it early than late.
The European Accessibility Act, enforceable from June 2025, is the regulatory pressure most European businesses are responding to right now. The companies treating this purely as compliance are paying twice: once for the retrofit, and again in opportunity cost.
Accessible design starts with the hardest use case and creates a user journey that is usable and friction-free, elevating the end-user experience. Good experiences delivered repeatedly and at scale earn customer loyalty, and ultimately love. These are precious metrics today, and what most strategies are trying to get to.
There is data backing this up. Accenture’s 2023 disability inclusion study found that companies leading on disability inclusion criteria generated 1.6x more revenue, 2.6x more net income, and 2x more economic profit than peers in the same benchmark survey. Forrester research, frequently cited in the industry, suggests every dollar invested in accessibility and inclusive design returns roughly nine in revenue.
So yes, accessibility may carry a start-up cost. Used smartly, it is a long-term value play.
Where accessibility actually belongs in a business
The short answer: not in one place. It runs across five layers. Internal first, external second.
Internal
1. Organisational environment. Culture, spaces, tools, ways of working. The lowest hanging fruit, and the one most companies underestimate. Accenture’s 2023 work found that companies leading on disability inclusion generated 1.6x more revenue and 2.6x more net income than peers.
2. Product design. Where the most innovation upside sits. Designing for the hardest use case tends to produce products that work better for everyone. Nike’s hands-free shoe started as a brief about athletes getting ready faster, and ended up serving adaptive athletes, students, and parents with full hands. Sold out at launch.
External
3. Marketplace channels. Digital, physical, third-party. Where regulatory pressure is highest. The European Accessibility Act, enforceable from June 2025, has reset the timeline.
4. Consumer experience. Every touchpoint, end to end. The Valuable 500 found 71% of disabled consumers have abandoned a website due to barriers, costing UK businesses an estimated £17 billion annually.
5. Community development. The longest-arc layer, and the hardest to fake. Sponsorships, representation, co-design with lived experience. This layer rewards the four before it.
The bigger pattern
Accessibility is becoming a leading indicator of where consumer behaviour is heading. Captions, voice commands, simplified packaging, intuitive interfaces, all started as accessibility features. All became defaults. The pattern is consistent enough now that it is no longer a coincidence.
For leaders thinking about the next growth or loyalty lever, the candidates are familiar: data, AI, sustainability, brand. Accessibility belongs on the same list. It is the one most companies are leaving on the table.
If I were an enterprise leader thinking about where the next lever sits, this is one I would have on the radar. Even at step one.
Sources
Inclusive Design Report and The Benefit of Designing for Everyone, PwC for the Centre for Inclusive Design (commissioned with Adobe and Microsoft), 2019
The Disability Inclusion Imperative, Accenture and Disability:IN, 2023
Nothing About Us Without Us: Inclusive Representation White Paper, The Valuable 500, January 2024
Click-Away Pound Report, 2019
European Accessibility Act, enforceable from June 2025
Forrester Research on accessibility ROI, 2018
Industry data on captions and Gen Z viewing behaviour
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