Hola, hola! Welcome to Casa Cinco, a weekly newsletter curating connection.

Are you building or investing in human connection? See the bottom of this email and connect with Casa Cinco.

Members - stay on the lookout for an event at The Conduit happening mid-October 💃.

This week I’m back with our weekly cadence, which +50% of you voted for, and exploring what solutions for connection could look like. Happy reading!

Here’s to connecting,

Andy

MAKING CONNECTION ACCESSIBLE TO YOU

I’ve spoken extensively about the loneliness epidemic and, perhaps more importantly, the lack of human connection.

While I will certainly continue to explore the problem, I thought it would be a good time to toy around with potential solutions. After all, this is a weekly newsletter curating connection. Whether through anecdotes, interviews, or resources, my aim at Casa Cinco is to make connection accessible to you.

Some of these solutions already exist in some shape or form, while others are on the verge of coming to existence. All of these may sound crazy, stupid, or overall ‘impossible’. But remember - everything did at some point. Leave aside any preconceptions of how connection should emerge and indulge with me in a bit of entrepreneurial exploration.

With that, here are five examples of the types of companies I would hope to invest in or incubate one day with Casa Cinco:

1. 🏠Home away from home: Soho House meets serviced apartments.

   I will live in Florence for a few months later this year and I have no idea how I will meet people and build community. What I would have loved to find, but didn’t, was a hybrid model between a members’ club and serviced apartments. Cohabs gets close, but is sadly not in town. Is this too much to ask for?!

2. 👔Networking made easy: Facebook events meets corporate life.

   Few things are more inefficient than walking into a room full of generic finance bros and ‘networking’ with the first to make eye contact. Instead, what these events need is a digital solution that ‘engineers serendipity’. Know who is going in advance, reach out, ask for a meeting, or get suggestions on who could be interesting for you to meet. Efficiencies, people!

3. ✌️Friends of friends: Tinder meets mutual connections.

   Know why you get along with friends of friends? That mutual connection helps establish trust. Perhaps you’re moving to a new town where you know no one, but your friends do. How about being able to access that network quickly for romance, friendships, or the silliest of questions? I’m still waiting for introductions to people in Florence…

4. 👯Social meditation: Headspace meets Clubhouse.

   Signing up to the gym with a friend works because it holds both of you accountable. How about replicating this for things like meditation? I wouldn’t just open my app and meditate, but I’d invite my friends to join or hop on an ongoing session with others. Part of what I like to call, ‘socializing self-care’ 

5. ⌚Connection tracker: Whoop meets your Calendar.

   Complement ‘hard’ data from your wearable with ‘the feels’. How connected did you feel after meeting Sam yesterday? Systematically understand who and what makes you feel connected (or not)

Thoughts? Reactions? Smiles? Tears? I’d love to know what you think and feel.

Meanwhile, you can check out some fascinating start-ups I’ve come across recently for connecting with yourself, others, and the planet:

The inspiration for you is: what other solutions could we bring to life to help us all live more fully? If we were to re-build Facebook, TikTok, Soho House, Tinder, and WeWork knowing what we know today, how would we do it differently?

Reply to this email and let’s chat!

WEEKLY CURATION

PEOPLE

• 🧑From The NYT Magazine: Why is the Loneliness Epidemic so Hard to Cure? 

• 👯You live in a bubble of trust. Here’s how to inflate it

• 💌A bit out off-piste, but who cares: Life Without Goals

• 🍴Priya Parker's first quiz: Unlock your Hosting Superpower. Apparently, I’m the ‘Inclusive Host’

PRODUCTS & SERVICES

• 📕The Conduit Academy launches its AI for Social Good course. Anyone care to join?

• 🧹Library of Things: Shifting communities from buying to borrowing

PLACES

• 👔69% of employees are unsatisfied with their connections at work. Maybe it’s time we shift from corporate culture to corporate community?

• 😴McKinsey: Moving beyond burnout to holistic health. Yes, including social health!

CONNECT WITH CASA CINCO

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We’ll talk soon. Thank you for joining me at Casa Cinco.

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