Social Enterprises: A Motivational Insight into Seven Organisations

By Sabrina Fackler

What are social enterprises? Why are they different to conventional enterprises, and what's the difference to an NGO? Why work in a social enterprise? This book contains interviews with seven experts from Latin America and Spain, explaining the world of social entrepreneurship and why it's definitely worth thinking about.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sabrina Fackler
• Release date: Jun 12, 2022
• ISBN: 9781005664398

Sabrina Fackler

Born in 1998, grown up in Germany, studied Celtic Studies in Wales and currently working on an MA in Intercultural Communication. Horse-crazy since before I could walk, big into martial arts, languages, mythology and folklore.1998er Jahrgang, in Deutschland aufgewachsen, habe Keltologie in Wales studiert und arbeite momentan an einem MA in Interkulturelle Kommunikation. Pferdeverrückt seit ich denken kann, fasziniert von Kampfkunst, Sprachen, Mythologie und Folklore.

Book preview

Social Enterprises

A motivational insight into seven organizations

By Sabrina Fackler

Copyright 2022 Sabrina Fackler

Smashwords Edition

This ebook is for personal use only. Each reader is to obtain their own copy. Thank you for appreciating the hard work the author put into this work.

The copyright to all pictures lies with the photographer and the respective organisation.

Cover: Melina Myrenne

Editor: Veronika Todorova & Beth Corcoran

Translation from Spanish: Sabrina Fackler

For my gran

Who had absolutely no idea where I was going with this

Rest in peace.

Index

Preface

Introduction

Chapter 1 – Café Compadre

Chapter 2 – Inka Moss

Chapter 3 – Evea Ecofashion

Chapter 4 – Lázarro

Chapter 5 – Tierra Grata

Chapter 6 – Mukira

Chapter 7 – Ollin

Conclusion

About the Interviewees

Acknowledgements

Links and Addresses

Preface

Social entrepreneurship - what is that? When this question came up last fall, October 2021, I was at a loss at first. Of course I had heard the term before, it makes sense - but explain it? Phew... better ask Google (or, in my case, Ecosia) before embarrassing yourself in front of the entire team.

Now, a good six months later, it seems like an eternity in the past. After all, I have followed too many of the core principles that social entrepreneurship internalizes for a long time without ever consciously articulating them. Sustainable business, responsibility and humanity as important as profit rather than being just an afterthought…

And yet I sometimes wonder how my life would have been different if I had been introduced to the principle of social entrepreneurship when I was in school. Would I have chosen a different career?

This book was born out of this thought. It aims to provide an insight into the world of social entrepreneurship, portraying success stories and asking questions directly to experts who know more about the topic than I ever will. It might invite you to think about your own career, and maybe it will even motivate you to take a closer look at the topic, to do an internship in one of the companies presented or to apply for a job. Perhaps someone will even find the courage to realize their own idea? In that case, there is a list of further addresses in the appendix that you can contact if you are interested.

On that note, enjoy the book!

Introduction

So what exactly is social entrepreneurship? What is the difference between a social enterprise and a traditional one, or between a social enterprise and an NGO? What are Corporate Social Responsibility, Greenwashing and Whitewashing, and why do the terms often appear in this context?

Here we first need to take a look at the legal position of social enterprises. There is no globally accepted, clear definition of social entrepreneurship, although most definitions of the term social enterprise are very similar. They are an operator in the social economy whose main objective is to have a social impact rather than make a profit for their owners or shareholders and which operates by providing goods and services for the market in an entrepreneurial and innovative fashion (note: very important, since this is where we differ from the NGO later!). It also uses its profits primarily to achieve social objectives. Last but not least, the organization must be managed in a transparent and responsible manner, involving above all employees, consumers and stakeholders affected by commercial activities (European Commission 2022: Social Enterprises).

So far, social enterprises have no legal status in most countries, since the term is not legally defined. This means that from a legal point of view, a social entrepreneur must consider what type of company form they want to choose when founding – Incorporation, Limited Liability Company, sole proprietorship and so on.

Spain, on the other hand, has introduced the concept of social enterprise into law since 2011, although this varies greatly from region to region thanks to the decentralized administration. There is no generalized social enterprise, which makes it very hard to draw up statistics.

If we assume that the three points of the EU (social impact, primary use of profit to achieve social goals, involvement of employees, consumers and concerned stakeholders) distinguish our social enterprise from a traditional enterprise whose main goals are profit for owners and stakeholders and growth are – then what is an NGO?

NGO stands for Non-Governmental Organization and refers to all organizations independent of the government that seek to reduce suffering through their activities. Here one of the goals – social impact – overlaps with our social enterprises, but lacks the entrepreneurial component. NGOs very often operate on donations or other sources of income, which clearly distinguishes them from companies - both social and traditional: even if the focus is not on profit, a social enterprise still makes a profit. Well-known examples of this would be Greenpeace as an environmental organization and Amnesty International in the area of human rights. Two NGOs from Mexico will be portrayed later to better illustrate the difference.

Then, for the sake of completeness, we