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Standing Side by Side with the Arts

Standing Side by Side with the Arts

Written by John Samuel

We launched Ablr in October 2020, but our company’s origin goes back to 2018, when we were operating as LCI Tech. We were in the beginning of our accessibility testing journey when we were looking for folks who would take a chance on an unproven team. Then, the Arts community showed us some love!

Charles Phaneuf, who was the Executive Director of the Raleigh Little Theatre and an old high school friend, was already creating sensory friendly shows and wanted people to be able to access information about this on their website, so he allowed us to evaluate their site. From there, we were introduced to Jamie Katz Court, who was at Pinecone at the time and was already doing amazing things to create accessible live experiences for people with disabilities, and Jamie also saw the need for accessible websites.

Today we have expanded our reach beyond just the Arts, and are collaborating with folks across retail, education, and even Fortune 500 companies!

However, despite the success we have experienced over the past couple of years, we are truly thankful to the Arts community! That’s why we were so excited to participate in the 2022 Leadership Exchange in Arts and Disabilities (LEAD) Conference in early August! Everyone from the Kennedy Center, who puts on this event, to the Raleigh host committee, including S.A. Corrin and Julie Brakenbury, created a sense of belonging for our team and it’s something I know we will never forget.

Our team also had the privilege of conducting twenty website assessments for organizations who attended the conference, which was an amazing experience! The best part of this exercise is that we got to be part of these twenty organizations’ accessibility journeys. This is something we know all too well, and like the Arts were there for us 4 years ago, we will pay it forward by standing by their side now!

If you are interested in having an accessibility assessment completed, and receive an Ablr Scorecard, please reach out to Sarah Clark!