Our Mission

Black Country Elderberries Online was founded in direct response to a documented and growing crisis of loneliness, isolation and social exclusion among older adults living with disability and limited mobility.

Our Mission is to build genuine community for seniors living primarily indoors by delivering a rich, year-round programme of live sessions; with social events, guest speakers and async activities that meet people where they are.

 

Our Goal

Is to address a gap in provision for older adults 55+ living with disability, limited mobility, housebound, and living independently.

A group for whom most existing social activities are physically inaccessible, and for whom lonliness can be a daily reality rather than an occasional difficulty.

The BCEO - Black Country Elderberries Community was built by its founder to address this identified gap, and the programme is designed not to replicate existing provisions but to fill what is genuinely missing.

The Gap We Fill 

Black Country Elderberries Online specifically serves adults living with disability or limited mobility — a group identified by the evidence as facing disproportionately high rates of loneliness and the fewest accessible routes out of it.

 

The Health Impact of Loneliness

• Loneliness poses equivalent health risks to smoking 15 cigarettes a day — Holt-Lunstad, 2015

• Chronic loneliness is associated with a 26% increased risk of premature death — Holt-Lunstad, 2015

• Older adults reporting social isolation or loneliness show poorer cognitive function 4 years later — Cacioppo & Cacioppo, 2014

• Social isolation significantly increases the risk of developing dementia, heart disease and depression

• Disconnected communities are estimated to cost the UK economy £32 billion every year — Eden Project Communities

 

The Evidence Base

The statistics below are drawn from the most current UK government, NHS and charitable sector sources, and demonstrate the Scale of Loneliness Among Older Adults.

• Over 3.9 million people in Great Britain — 7% of adults — report feeling lonely often or always - ONS / Community Life Survey 2024/2

 

• 25% of adults report feeling lonely often, always or some of the time, approximately 14 million people - ONS Public Opinions & Social Trends, 2025

 

• Disabled adults are five times more likely to feel lonely often or always than non-disabled adults — 15% compared to 3% - Community Life Survey 2023/24, GOV.UK

 

• The number of over-50s experiencing loneliness is projected to reach 2 million by 2025/26 — a 49% increase in 10 years

 

• Half a million older people go at least five or six days a week without seeing or speaking to anyone at all - Age UK

 

• Two fifths of all older people — approximately 3.9 million — say the television is their main company - Age UK

 

• 9 in 10 older people who are often lonely are also unhappy or depressed, compared to 4 in 10 of those who are hardly ever lonely - Age UK, 2024