Research on Multilocal Living
What have we done?
Our goal was to make the needs of multilocal residents visible and create service concepts based on these, which can be used to create new business in the Southern Savonia region. A comprehensive and visual report was created as a result of the research, and it describes the opportunities and challenges related to multilocal living, based on genuine customer understanding. As a continuation of the research we organized the Good Living in Southern Savonia webinar in April 2022 together with the client.
How did we do it?
At the beginning of the service design process, we familiarized ourselves with current studies and articles about multilocal residents. We deepened customer understanding with expert and customer interviews and an extensive market survey of the region's leisure time residents (N 425). Based on these, we identified needs, based on which we designed possible service concepts for further development.
See Yourself
“In our opinion, the content of the report was very good. The visuals of the report are also excellent. The project was carried out in just over two months in an agile and good atmosphere.”
Petri Kousa
head of unit, digital solutions and innovations, Suur-Savon Sähkö Oy
It is preferable to do remote work at a vacation home
Almost half of those who responded to the survey said that they do remote work from their vacation home. Moving in nature, being with family and enjoying silence were considered important values in relation to a secondary residence. In addition to these, the majority felt that it was very important to have a well equipped vacation home, and disconnecting from machines and devices is no longer considered as important in a vacation home as before.
More and more time is spent at the cottages in Etelä Savo, and the time spent is divided between work and free time. A survey made with the help of Mindhive's service design process reveals that in five years the change has been very big.
In general, these changes in values place an even greater importance on basic infrastructure, such as the electricity grid, internet connections and things related to movement, thinks Suur-Savon Sähkö's digital solutions and innovations unit manager Petri Kousa.
In the Mökkibarometri conducted in 2016, only seven percent of those for whom remote work is possible said that they work from their vacation home. Covid-19 clearly moved people to also work where they have fun, i.e. to a cottage, because in the MökkiBarometri conducted at the end of last year, the share of the same group had risen to 43 percent.
- The results of our survey were very similar, says Mindhive's service designer Anni Vigrén. 44 percent of all those who responded to the survey said that they work from their vacation home. A third of them said they work remote 1-2 days a week on average, and almost a fifth (17%) as much as four days a week. 38 percent of the respondents said they do remote work from home.
The change in values creates new business opportunities
Multilocal living refers to a situation where a person divides their everyday life and free time between different locations. The reason can be, for example, going to work, spending free time or living in turns in one location after a divorce. In Finland, the most typical multilocal living situation is going to summer cottages, i.e. spending time in a leisure apartment outside your home county.
According to a recent survey, the values Finns attach to cottage living have changed in five years. The importance of movement in nature and silence have remained, but the majority of people feel that the good equipment of the leisure apartment and the possibilities for doing remote work are very important.
The region must find its own unique ways of organizing life in the region from its own starting points and thus meet the needs of the leisure time residents. There is hardly an easy and fast way to find, but there are even more opportunities to see. They are a set of operating models that don't exist yet, but they can exist if we boldly start developing them, Venäläinen sums up.
– The answers certainly reflect the changes brought by the corona era, also in terms of values. More time has been spent in cottages than before, and the level of equipment and space have grown in importance. Appreciation of nature and silence make leisure residents spend more time here. Also, safety in the sparsely populated area was certainly emphasized during the corona era, sums up Mindhive CEO Ville Venäläinen.
– In general, these changes in values place an even greater importance on basic infrastructure, such as the electricity network, internet connections and things related to movement, thinks Petri Kousa, head of Suur-Savon Sähkö's digital solutions and innovations unit.
For him, the changes in values can also be seen on many levels in what kind of services leisure residents expect.
– In addition to the functionality of the basic infrastructure, village shops are expected to have an even better selection, and they need a cafe or restaurant as well as charging infrastructure for electric cars. Public transport is not considered sufficient and finding services is perceived as difficult. If these needs can be met, according to the report, more and more people could spend longer periods in a second home and thus leave more and more euros in the region.
– The region must find its own unique ways of organizing life in the region from its own starting points and thus meet the needs of the leisure time residents. There is hardly an easy and fast way to find, but there are even more opportunities to see. They are a set of operating models that don't exist yet, but they can exist if we boldly start developing them, Venäläinen sums up.
Read the report on multilocal living (in Finnish)
Hyvää elämää Etelä-Savossa - ytyä monipaikkaiseen asumiseen -webinaari 11.4.2022 | In Finnish