5 Ceos Respond To ‘disruptive Mindshift’ Of Senior Living Consumers

Connecting with the senior living customer of today is no easy feat, as operators face a customer base, led by the Baby Boomer generation, that is more tech-savvy and demanding of individualized wellness and lifestyle offerings.

“They want choice and they have come with a disruptive mind-shift,” Lifespace Communities CEO Jesse Jantzen said during a CEO panel at Senior Living 100 on Monday in Jacksonville, Florida. “That’s really making us double down on experience.”

Dallas, Texas-based Lifespace operates 16 communities in seven states.

Making strategic technology investments is also key to attracting the next generation to senior living, Atria Senior Living CEO Holly Belter-Chesser said during the panel.

“The new consumer is more tech-savvy and they want to learn about what we do in different ways,” Belter-Chesser said during the panel.

Louisville, Kentucky-based Atria is one of the largest senior living providers in the country, operating over 200 communities in 28 states.

This comes as senior living communities have been linked to increased longevity amid customers demanding more robust wellness and lifestyle offerings. Some senior living operators have even started considering targeting Generation X adults, who often serve as a point of contact between the industry and older adult parents.

“If you can simplify things around longevity and quality and security, that’s a big piece of it,” said Brandon Ribar, CEO of Sonida Senior Living (NYSE: SNDA).

Dallas-based Sonida operates 94 communities in 20 states.

Put simply, Juniper Communities CEO Lynne Katzmann said, the senior living customer of today is “very different” in terms of their behaviors and desires.

“The consumer is very different than we think of them,” Katzmann said. “It’s the people we work with, it’s the people we communicate and socialize with.”

Shifting consumer habits shape demand boom

Due to demographic shifts, it’s no secret the baby boomer generation is one of the most highly sought after age groups targeted by senior living. That demand is already playing out as senior living operators focus on driving net operating income growth, shifting out of recovery mode from the days of 2020.

The country’s second-largest senior living operator is already capturing this boomer-driven demand “very consistently,” Belter-Chesser said during the panel.

But seeing record demand and capitalizing on it are two different things, she cautioned, noting that the operator is preparing for a future in which senior living sales aren’t solely reliant on the tour process.

That’s been driven, Belter-Chesser said, by changing consumer habits in searching for senior living, with communications coming across internet-based chat services or texts to traditional phone calls.

“We have to be able to nimbly move between those because everyone wants to communicate in a different way on the same lead and we’ve got to be prepared to do that,” Belter-Chesser said during the panel.

Katzmann also noted the importance of operators not only marketing to boomers, highlighting the importance of thinking about Gen X as the “buyers” of senior living for their aging parents.

In recent years, one way senior living operators have succeeded in bringing in new customers was through establishing robust wellness and care offerings. Juniper successfully launched a home health and private physician practice to drive new revenue, and Katzmann said operators must think about membership models going forward.

“There are people who are so independent and so set on choice that they want to buy what they want, when they need it,” Katzmann said. “Think memberships and a la carte prices.”

Moving forward, Katzmann said, the industry must also position wellness programs in line with care delivery, with the understanding that wellness programming be focused on “prevention-oriented services” that address social determinants of health.

“In simple terms, we say wellness is about food, fitness and fun,” Katzmann said.

With customer expectations changing, Jantzen said it’s incumbent upon operators to create wellness offerings that create an experience for residents in a personalized and impactful way.

“We view care as table stakes but the differentiator is holistic wellness,” Jantzen added.

Amid this changing customer profile, Ascension Living CEO Erin Shadbolt said uncertainty created by current political rhetoric around immigration could create future workforce issues.

“I think the unknown is causing a lot of angst, and we’re seeing that a little bit even with trends of the workforce,” Shadbolt said. “It’s a big unknown right now for us and I’m pretty worried about it.”

Optimizing portfolios and operating models to meet future demand

As new senior living development remains muted due to financing and construction costs, senior living operators have in recent years taken smaller bites on growth using capital projects and leveraging repositionings or renovations.

Atria had to take “an introspective look” at its portfolio of 230 communities to determine which communities needed plans to “redevelop and refresh,” Belter-Chesser said. This led to Atria repositioning units, changing unit mixes and adjusting common spaces along with resident rooms to meet current consumer expectations.

Within its Holiday by Atria independent living communities, Atria has been able to “rinse and repeat” renovations quickly while the company has other communities that were converted hotels or school buildings, which required “a really different approach,” Belter-Chesser said.

For example, Atria added 49 memory care units to a property that now has “high, double-digit returns,” she noted. Another recent example for Atria is a high-rise building on Long Island, New York, that added two floors for memory care.

“There’s some really good opportunities within your own portfolio to make sure that you’re pointing your asset competitively towards the consumer, and so that I can compete against somebody who has been able to get a building out of the ground next door,” Belter-Chesser said during the panel.

Operators also have a chance to bring tech integration to support operations. For example, Lifespace went from 14 different human resource systems to one platform now accessible “in the palms of the hands of our team members,” Jantzen said. This led Lifespace reporting improvements in operational efficiency, staff engagement and retention while also increasing resident engagement and the company’s Net Promoter Score, he added.

After growing the company’s portfolio by 30% in 2024, Sonida in 2025 will continue to integrate its newest acquisitions into the fold. That comes after learning that first impressions between community staff and corporate leadership was “the most important thing you can do” in integrating a new community, Ribar said.

On the issue of retention, Atria is implementing a “hire to retire” career path plan for new roles, for workers to learn the skills associated with different positions, Belter-Chesser said.

She also emphasized that it’s important for senior living providers to “tell our story” to employees as well as customers. It’s a point that Katzmann also made, in relation to expanding partnerships, as well.

“We need to find the right partners in the community or nationally to work with us. It’s important for our brand. It’s important to get our story out of the old way we talked about,” Katzmann added.

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