Young people are a notoriously difficult audience to engage with, but the benefits of doing so are overwhelming across health and social care and society as a whole. So, the challenge many of us face is how do you go about future-proofing the under 25s - a group that lives for today with little consequence for tomorrow?

Our experience from working with young people across the country tells us that the answer lies in delving underneath the bed, into the cupboards and through the ear buds to find out what really matters to them; to uncover the real reasons why they behave the way they do and to hardwire our services directly into their world. We know, for example, that as many as one in five young people are still smoking and over 80% of adults started smoking before they were 20 years old.

Here are our top three tips for setting up stop smoking service for young people - ‘on their turf and in their style’:

• Engage with young people in places they already visit. By creating a network of venues such as colleges, universities, training centres and youth offender locations, services are fully integrated into everyday lives
• Take a holistic approach – interventions need to uncover and manage the wider motivations for smoking such as lifestyle, confidence and social pressure
• Think digital – this savvy group don’t read ‘information-based’ websites; they interact, share and learn from others. An at scale behavioural ‘nudge’ like our Puffell platform is essential

One of our key insights from working with young people is that they are often not heavy smokers and can be influenced before they fall further into addiction. Their quit journey will also influence others around them - their families, friends or partner - thereby reducing the strain on services while also making communities healthier.

ICE is an experienced healthy lifestyle provider, operating a holistic service that resonates with the needs and wants of our audiences to produce measurable outcomes. We are also adept at working in a consultancy service capacity.

If you would like to create a bespoke stop smoking or lifestyle improvement service for young people or would like us to co-create designs with your service providers, talk to Graeme Morgan on 0797 357 8337 or at graeme.morgan@icecreates.com