Accessibility Isn’t Optional—It’s Good Business
Nov 27, 2024
When we think about accessibility, it’s often in terms of legal requirements or accommodations for people with disabilities. While these are important, accessibility is much more than that—it’s a strategic advantage that improves experiences for all users and opens doors to new markets. Businesses that embrace accessibility not only build more inclusive products but also position themselves for growth and longevity.
Take OXO, for example. Their founder, inspired by his wife’s arthritis, designed kitchen tools with large, comfortable grips. This focus on usability revolutionized their industry and turned OXO into a household name. Apple, similarly, has embedded accessibility into their products from day one, with features like VoiceOver and dynamic font scaling that make their devices easier to use for everyone, not just those with disabilities.
As populations age and EU accessibility regulations tighten, businesses that fail to adapt risk losing customers to competitors who prioritize inclusion. But there’s good news: accessibility isn’t just a compliance checkbox—it’s a value-add that creates better products and builds customer loyalty.
What do we mean with accessibility?
When we talk about accessibility, we’re not just talking about users with disabilities. We’re talking about designing for the full spectrum of human experience. This isn’t some niche concern; it’s about recognizing that all of us, at some point in our lives, encounter barriers that better design could overcome.
Think about how aging impacts vision and mobility. Or how a noisy café makes subtitles on a video suddenly invaluable. Or how a broken wrist turns the ability to tab through a website into a small miracle of usability. Accessibility is about removing those barriers, not for a small group of people, but for all of us.
There’s an undeniable elegance in accessibility. It’s in the OXO peeler’s ergonomic design, created so someone with arthritis could cook with ease—and in the process, revolutionized kitchen tools. It’s in Apple’s VoiceOver feature, which ensures blind users can navigate an iPhone with ease. These innovations weren’t born from compliance mandates. They were born from empathy.
Businesses can’t afford to ignore accessibility
There’s a misconception that accessibility is a cost—a burden to be absorbed or an afterthought to be patched in. But for businesses that understand its potential, accessibility is a competitive edge.
Accessibility makes products better. It widens your audience. And as we learned while creating the Accessibility Toolkit at Fraktio, it fosters a kind of creative thinking that improves everything it touches. Consider this: by 2030, over a fifth of the EU’s population will be over 65. If your digital products don’t accommodate vision that blurs, hearing that fades, or motor skills that slow, you’re shutting out one of the fastest-growing demographics.
This isn’t just about aging populations. It’s about everyone. Accessibility doesn’t just comply with laws—it elevates brands. It can make an ordinary product exceptional, allowing not only those with physical disabilities to better use their services, but also everyday people who might be in a hurry on a scooter trying to race to their next appointment. It creates loyalty by saying to users: we see you, we value you, and we designed this for you.
The Accessibility Toolkit: a collaborative resource
In 2022, while working at Fraktio, my colleague Sami Rouhiainen and I embarked on a mission: to create a practical tool that would bring accessibility into the heart of design workflows. The result was the Accessibility Toolkit, a freely available resource on the Figma Community. It was born not just out of a professional obligation to do better but out of a genuine belief that accessibility is both a moral imperative and a powerful driver of innovation.
The toolkit has found its way into the hands of countless designers and developers, but as I reflect on its creation and ongoing impact, one thing remains clear: the conversation around accessibility has never been more urgent. As populations age, as regulations tighten, and as technology weaves its way deeper into our lives, accessibility is no longer a side note—it’s the main event.
The heart of the toolkit is collaboration. Too often, accessibility is siloed—either seen as the responsibility of designers or handed off to developers as a technical challenge. The truth is, accessibility requires shared ownership. When designers, developers, and business leaders work together, accessibility transforms from an obligation into an opportunity.
The toolkit offers templates to get started, exercises to foster dialogue, and resources to guide teams in identifying barriers and improving experiences. It’s not a silver bullet, but it’s a starting point. A way to move accessibility from the margins to the center of your process.
How to get started
Empathizing with your users and improving your product doesn’t have to feel like an overwhelming task. This toolkit is designed to bring your team together, spark meaningful conversations, and uncover actionable insights—all without needing a full-day workshop.
Here’s how you can get started:
Set aside an hour: Find a time that works for your team, grab some coffee, and gather around (virtually or in person) for a focused session.
Dive in together: Start exploring the toolkit as a team. A great place to begin is the accessibility audit—it’s a quick, eye-opening exercise that helps you see your product from your users' perspective.
Reflect and decide: Use the last few minutes to discuss what you’ve learned. What stood out? What needs attention? Agree on one or two small steps to move forward.
Make it a habit: These sessions don’t just help your product—they build a stronger team culture. Make this a recurring moment (weekly or monthly) to step back, align as a team, and keep your focus on what matters most: your users.
By committing just an hour at a time, you’ll see the compounding value of continuous improvement, all while fostering deeper empathy and collaboration in your team.
An opportunity to improve
Designing with accessibility in mind forces you to confront the assumptions baked into your work. It asks you to see the world from someone else’s perspective—and that act of empathy leads to better design for everyone.
As EU regulations evolve, as consumer expectations shift, and as the need for inclusive design grows, the businesses that thrive will be those that see accessibility not as a cost, but as an investment. An investment in people.
If you’re reading this as a designer, a developer, or a business leader, I challenge you to see accessibility differently. Not as a box to check, but as a lens through which to see the world. Start small. Use tools like our Accessibility Toolkit to begin conversations within your teams. Audit your products. Think about how your designs serve not just the users you expect, but the ones you didn’t anticipate.
Accessibility is the future of design—not just because it has to be, but because it makes everything we build better. And isn’t that what design is all about?