Partner Article

Kate Welch, CEO at Acumen, on Social Enterprise and the public sector

Social enterprises aim to tackle social issues by using a sustainable business model. Many are run by individuals or groups that have a real passion for the issue they are tackling but struggle with the business approach. Traditionally this hasn’t mattered too much because social issues such as youth unemployment, high levels of re-offending or child poverty have been the responsibility of the public sector and funded accordingly. Voluntary groups and charities have received grants from Local Authorities or government agencies and carried out their work without worries about cash flow or profitability. Times are changing and the old model is broken. There is far less money to go around and new ways of working are needed. The majority of social enterprises currently earn most of their income from the public sector and will have to change their approach.

It’s a great challenge to find ways of generating income that are not reliant on public sector but many have done it. One Water is a social enterprise that sells bottled water to fund water projects in Africa. Simple, but effective, as they have generated over £6 million for their projects. A Way Out in Stockton make sandwiches and sell them to office staff nearby to support their work with young people and at the same time give the young people skills and experiences to help them gain employment.

We are launching a new social enterprise, Reap & Sow, a joint venture with Rebecca Howard of Cynergy and Sensevents, which will transform the culture in prison workshops and for organisations working with offenders in the community. Reap & Sow designs, develops and manufactures garden and outdoor living products for sale to the public. Offenders gain the experience of working in a real business environment, learning skills that will help them gain employment once they have served their sentence and lessen the chance that they will re-offend. As a social enterprise it is not reliant on public money at all as the revenue model is that of a manufacturing and retail business. It has all the challenges of a private sector business with the added issues of working with offenders and in prison and probation settings but it has the potential to achieve transformational change.

We want people to buy from social enterprises because they produce the best quality goods and services whilst addressing issues in society that have been problems for a long time. If One Water can be the bottled water of choice for Virgin and other major companies whilst at the same time putting all of its substantial profits into addressing African water shortages what better model for doing business can there be?

I challenge you all to see if you can find a better way of doing business! Build social enterprises into your supply chain, help voluntary groups to become more business-like or consider starting a social enterprise yourself. The North East has its own issues of child poverty, long term unemployment, children excluded from schools – why not be part of the solution?

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Kate Welch .