‘Now is the right time’: Cork businesses get behind sensory-friendly shopping initiative

When Dean Murphy was growing up, his mum, Nuala, struggled with everyday things that many parents take for granted, like popping to the shops.

“I couldn’t go into shops,” says the Kilcully mum. “He would scream the place down before we could even get past the front door.

“I’d have to leave trollies full to the brim – I’d have to just lift him up and walk out. It was sensory overload. That’s what was happening.”

Dean, now 19, is neurodivergent. His family started attending the Rainbow Club in Cork - a charity that helps children and young people with autism and their families – when it opened in 2015, and found the support provided there invaluable.

“They helped us so much down the years,” says Nuala. “Especially when other services were gone.”

A key goal of the Rainbow Club, as CEO Karen O’Mahony tells me, is to allow young people with neurodivergence “to grow and develop with a lovely support system around them, and to be able to go out in the world and manage”.

One important way of achieving this is through the provision of inclusive and accepting spaces for children and their families, to avoid the distress that so affected Dean and thousands of children like him. This is where the new Sensory-Friendly Shopping initiative comes in.

This Cork Business Association initiative will see a number of retail spaces across the city provide a sensory-friendly atmosphere for customers during the first hour of trading each Sunday. Participating stores will, as much as possible, reduce sensory stimuli – for example, through turning down music, dimming lights, pausing shelf stacking or suspending scent samples - and make other reasonable adjustments, such as providing quiet spaces in-store, to make the retail experience as comfortable as possible for anyone who may find shopping overstimulating. This isn’t just young people with autism.

“You know, we’re looking at people with mental health problems, we’re looking at people who have disability through brain injury or other injury,” says Karen. 

“We have people who have had a stroke or who have dementia. So we’re not just looking at people who have autism or neurodivergence. We want everybody to be able to go into shops and be able to enjoy the experience.”

Karen is the mother of two boys with autism and was diagnosed herself two years ago. “For me,” she says, “shopping was always a challenge with the boys and even for me myself. And it’s what the small, simple things can do, looking at the person behind their disability. Catering for the small things like the music, or being conscious of the lighting, or just being conscious of the anxiety someone may have even just walking into a shop. It’s all those things.”

Promoting this awareness among participating stores is a vital part of the initiative, and evidence-based staff training has been developed and provided by Cork Business Association in conjunction with the Rainbow Club and Shine, the autism charity, whose General Manager Kieran McAuliffe says: “We are very proud to support this initiative and it is encouraging to see so many businesses getting behind it”.

Cliona Barnes, Director of Cork Business Association, welcomed the support of the two charities, saying they are “grateful for their input and direction in developing the training programme”.

The Sensory-Friendly Shopping initiative was originally launched back in 2019, but unfortunately, the following year’s pandemic prevented it from really getting off the ground.

“Now is the right time,” Cliona continues, “to refresh the training, reintroduce the initiative, and invite more businesses across the city centre to get involved.”

Speaking at the launch of the renewed initiative, Lord Mayor of Cork, Cllr Fergal Dennehy agreed, saying: “As the city centre continues to evolve and welcome new retailers, I hope many more stores will sign up and do their best to make Cork an inclusive city, allowing access for all.”

Retailers that have already signed up for the initiative include Marks & Spencer, Brown Thomas, Penneys, Vibes & Scribes, Here’s Health, Pinocchio’s, Sheena’s Boutique, Auntie Nellies, Bakestone and Eason, and Opera Lane stores H&M, Skechers, Specsavers, Next, and Bath and Body Works.

Cork Business Association hopes the relaunched initiative will encourage more retailers to sign up – and they can do so via the Association’s website. There is also a staff training video available on an online portal for new businesses wishing to participate and for existing retailers looking for a refresh.

The initiative is good for business, as Karen O’Mahony explains: “It provides footfall through stores. It brings people into the city.”

Inclusive businesses are also making customers for life, as Karen explains: “Neurodiverse families are very loyal. When they find a place that really gets them and their family and they feel supportive, they will continue to come back...

“What families want is to be happy in town, in these wonderful stores that are absolutely opening their arms and their doors and saying, look, we want to support you, we want to get to know you, we want you to be part of our world. I think that’s really, really important.”

The businesses involved are happy to contribute to a more inclusive Cork. Marks & Spencer was the first to trial a sensory hour in their city centre store several years ago, and they have seen the benefits for customers.

“For many people, this quieter period is the only time they feel comfortable coming in to shop. It has become very meaningful for those customers and their families, and it shows how small changes can make a big difference to people’s everyday lives,” said David Long, General Manager of M&S Cork.

Karen O’Mahony hopes that, going forward, more businesses will sign up to Sensory-Friendly Shopping.

She believes that the initiative “shows the willingness of businesses in the city to welcome people from all backgrounds and all differences in their stores. It’s the small things that make a difference in somebody’s life. It might only be an hour’s trip into town, but that could be the only time someone gets out of the house in that week.”

For families like Nuala Murphy’s, the Sensory-Friendly Shopping initiative provides a huge sense of relief. “For Dean”, she says, “he can read the signs, and you know, he understands. He can say, ‘oh, it’s going to be fine, I’m going to be fine’.”

Nuala would like to see the initiative rolled out beyond the first hour of trading on a Sunday, providing more flexibility for the target customers and ultimately increasing awareness for – and normalising – their needs.

“I’d love it to be for a full day, not just a section of the day”, she says. “The initiative is great, but there’s more to do”.

Karen O’Mahony would also like to see Sensory-Friendly Shopping expand – beyond both the city centre and one hour: “I think the big goal for us here would be that we can move beyond one hour of sensory-friendly shopping, and have those supports in place so that if I felt I wanted to go into to town on a Tuesday at three o’clock, I can, and I will get the same support that I could get on a Sunday at twelve. So it’s really increasing it after this. It’s getting this up and going, getting something that’s very safe and successful and then building and scaling it up after. I think that’s very, very important.”

For now, though, a sensory-friendly Sunday is a great start, and a great show of collaboration between business and society in Cork.

“It shows we’re all standing together to make Cork City inclusive... It’s a very big statement that we’re doing something as a city. We’re coming together collectively on an initiative that we’re all wanting the best out of. And it’s for the benefit of us all,” says Karen.

• For more information on the Sensory Friendly Shopping initiative, see http://corkbusiness.ie/sensory-friendly-shopping/