Final Blog: Repack

Blog 8: Repack Summary

In the fall of 2018, Proctor Academy’s Social Entrepreneurship class worked on business plans for a hypothetical Social Enterprise during the second half of the term. Each business had the goal of being scalable, sustainable/ profitable, and to meet a double or triple bottom line. Business propositions ranged from employing the homeless to bring in food scraps, to collecting plastic bottles from oceans and making them into pots designed to grow vegetable plants. Most of the plans involved food in some capacity, whether or not one of the goals was to help world hunger. Our group was the only one to stray from a food-related business. The best way to help people rise above their current socioeconomic state is to educate them, so that was a driving force behind our plan.

Our mission statement was to employ youth in correction centers to reuse textiles that would otherwise go to landfills to create functional and quality backpacks. A portion of profits would be allocated toward bringing in tutors and teachers to elevate the youth’s level of high school education in order to make them eligible for college. For a product, we were originally considering tapestries. Almost every high school student has at least one in their room, so we knew there would be a market. However, because of our inventory, the tapestries would be very thick and look like quilts, so they may not look very aesthetically appealing (we would collect our materials through old donated clothing). As it turns out, the students we surveyed weren’t big fans of the idea of a tapestry made of denim from old jeans. We decided to pivot, and focus instead on backpacks. This makes a lot of sense, since backpacks are easily tied to education.

We identified two problems pretty early on. Our first was the amount of waste existing in the world. There are over 3,000 landfills in the US alone, and we are running out of space (EPA Federal Register). On top of that, China is no longer accepting our trash, so the USA needs to start reducing waste. According to the EPA, clothing alone makes up 6% (10.5 million tons per year!) of all landfill waste, so clothing is a good place to start, especially considering that 95% of discarded clothing is reusable. The following link contains a video of a landfill and shows the amount of waste that one of them has. https://youtu.be/mA608GJ-EzM

Our second problem was the current education systems in prisons, particularly in youth detention centers. An article by The Atlantic says “science classes are taught without beakers, Bunsen burners, microscopes, and anything that’s sharp or can be used as a weapon. Homework is rarely, if ever, assigned.” Furthermore, according to an article by Time, “75% of incarcerated young people end up back in the system within a few years” (Time Magazine). http://time.com/4543401/youth-prison-reform/. These two statistics seem to be correlated. Youth who were placed in Detention centers receive low levels of education and are underprepared for college. With few options, many of them tend to end up back in the prison system, whether after a few years, or a longer span of time.

Repack hopes to help both of these problems. First, all fabric materials would be sourced from donated clothing, therefore reducing waste and the massive amounts of clothing in landfills.

Our second problem proved to be a little more difficult. Adults in prisons can be paid very low wages for work, but youth can’t. They still often work, but it is called “community service” by the system. We were originally hoping to place money into a college fund for the “employees,” but this was a bit irrational. We felt that the money placed in a fund may conflict with the “no payment” rule, and it was a difficult to find an equation to supply an appropriate amount of funding to each worker while making an actual difference in terms of money available for college. More importantly, the youth in the centers have a tendency to have low levels of education, making them ineligible for college anyway, in many cases. We decided to instead allocate profits into bringing tutors and other teachers into the detention centers, and to improve the academic conditions so that they would be more prepared and motivated for that level of education. In addition to receiving a higher level of education, the youth would be taught potential career skills in textiles that they most likely would not normally receive.

To start out, we would begin by collecting clothing primarily from bins that would be purchased and placed in locations such as town dumps. We would begin by selling 10 backpacks per week on websites such as Etsy and Amazon. After a year of this, we would begin our work in the detention centers and create a website, and incorporate advertising. The more products sold, the more consumers would hear about our enterprise. We would have a printable shipping label, allowing people to easily send in clothing without having to drive anywhere—one of the reasons clothing gets thrown away rather than being donated. Another reason is that thrift stores often don’t accept clothing with rips, tears, and stains. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/what-does-goodwill-do-with-your-clothes_n_57e06b96e4b0071a6e092352 According to this article, some clothes donated to goodwill are deemed unsellable, and end up in the trash. We would accept everything, as the clothing would be cut up anyway. This places us above our main competition of thrift stores in two ways, convenience and usability. Other competitive alternatives on the retail side are other backpack brands. However, despite the crowded market, roughly 140 million backpacks are sold in the USA per year, according to the Travel Goods Association. In fact, backpacks make up a 7.8 billion dollar industry.

Revenue Model Located Above

To prove that making a backpack from old clothing was viable, our group went to a thrift store (unfortunately we couldn’t get donated clothes) and picked out a few items. We spent some time after classes cutting up the material, making a simple design, and sewing the pieces together with a cheap sewing machine. Our company would use more advanced, industrial grade sewing machines, but this experiment proved that our business could function even with the most basic tools.

Repack evolved from the the most basic ideas we had into a well thought out business model for phases one and two, with basic plans for phases three and four. We would hope to expand into more countries, employing sweatshop workers with higher wages and better working conditions. More importantly, we would add a design feature to our website where not only could a customer design their own backpack with the available inventory, but also send in their own clothing to be crafted into a more personalized product.

At innovation night, we received great positive reinforcement from a former social entrepreneur, and if we were to dive deeper into our enterprise, we would be in a good place to start.

 

Works Cited

EPA. “Advancing Sustainable Materials Management: 2014 Fact Sheet.” Saturday
    Evening Post, Nov. 2016, http://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2016-11/
    documents/2014_smmfactsheet_508.pdf. Accessed 14 Nov. 2018.

EPA Federal Register. “Landfills Proposed Rules.” Zero Waste America, 30 Aug.
    1988, http://www.zerowasteamerica.org/LandfillsFedRegEPA.htm. Accessed 14 Nov.
    2018.

Farquee, Mishi. “Youth Prisons Don‘t Work. Here‘s What Does.” Time, 26 Oct.
    2016, time.com/4543401/youth-prison-reform/. Accessed 14 Nov. 2018.
McCluskey, Molly. “The Education Crisis in Youth Detention Centers.” The
    Atlantic, http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/12/
    juvenile-solitary-confinement/548933/. Accessed 14 Nov. 2018.

Travel Goods Association. “How Many Backpack Are Sold in the United States per
    Year?” Quora, http://www.quora.com/
    How-many-backpacks-are-sold-every-year-in-the-United-States. Accessed 14
    Nov. 2018.

 

Image source links

https://www.cagedbirdmagazine.com/single-post/2017/03/28/50-Companies-Supporting-Modern-American-Slavery

https://sites.duke.edu/education303final/education-experiences-of-incarcerated-youth/

 

Other images were personally taken or from Proctor Academy Flickr

Forgotten Fruit

My company purpose is to provide healthy and nutritious food for food insecure families and to reduce food waste.

Food insecurity is a huge issue in the US and it’s effects are devastating. It is particularly troublesome for children and according to Feeding America, 13.1 million children lived in food insecure households in 2015. Children who live in food insecure households are more likely to require hospitalization because their bodies and immune systems are weakened by the lack of healthy and nutrition food available. They are also at a much higher risk of developing chronic health conditions such as asthma or anemia. Pregnant woman who are food insecure are more likely to experience birth complications and low birth weight. These health issues are very concerning but the problems that come from food insecurity don’t stop there. Children who are from food insecure households have numerous behavioral problems and have a difficult time in school. They are more prone to fighting, aggression, bullying, anxiety, mood swings, tardiness, and truancy. Food insecure children in their first two years of life also have delayed development, poor attachment, and learning difficulties. These issues can be easily addressed with proper nutrition for pregnant women and children.

While there are millions of families throughout the country suffering from food insecurity, we are throwing out 1.3 billion tons of food every year. Collectively we throw out approximately one third of all the food we produce and more than forty percent of that is wasted before it gets to grocery store or restaurants. Although some produce is thrown out because it is rotten or otherwise damaged, most produce that is being discarded simply doesn’t meet beauty standards. Ninety seven percent of that waste goes into landfills and breaks down anaerobically and produces methane gas which is twenty one times more potent than CO2 as a greenhouse gas. This food waste is hurting the environment, hurting families, and hurting farmers. Farms rarely donate produce because they have to pay for transportation and only sometimes get tax breaks. Farmers are forced to throw out a huge portion of what they grow, greenhouse gas emissions are incredibly high, and families are missing out on nutritious food. If we stopped our food waste we could feed every person in the entire world.

 

My solution is to make a low cost produce box to provide to low income families in the Greater San Francisco Bay Area. This box would be made up of ‘ugly’ produce from farms in the California Central Valley. The California Central Valley grows over two hundred and fifty different crops every year, worth about seventeen billion dollars. It has the benefit of microclimates that provide an opportunity for a tremendous range of produce, weather that is conducive to year round growing, and is less than one hundred and fifty miles from the San Francisco Bay Area. While it may seem impossible to provide fruits and vegetables for such low prices it is actually very feasible. Most farms are having to throw out massive amounts of produce and would happily donate as long as they would not have to pay for transportation. Even if we did pay for the produce the cost would be insignificant. Below is an example of ‘ugly’ produce.

Currently families deal with food insecurity in a variety of ways including food banks and fast food. Food banks are a very important and effective way to help families in need however food banks provide food that is high in sodium and fat. Programs such as Feeding America helps 1 in 7 Americans and I do not want to replace them, I want to work alongside them. By combining the food and support that they can provide and the produce and convenience that I am proposing we can find a way to create a healthy balanced diet. Food banks began appearing in the 1980’s during an economic downturn and were only supposed to be a temporary solution to what has turned into an increasingly large problem. Despite many signs of these food banks being successful, many of these food banks are actually harming the health of the users. The foods that are donated are high in sodium and rarely fresh and aren’t all that useful and when money is donated it goes to buying food that doesn’t spoil easily.Having fruits and vegetables is an essential part of a healthy diet and my produce box would be providing fresh fruits and vegetables for people suffering from food insecurity. 

The other competitive alternative for me is fast food.  Fast food is the cheapest food available and, as the name implies, the fastest food available. People turn to fast food because it is their only option for a variety of reason but mainly it is economic. Fast food has contributed to the rise in obesity particularly in America. According to Feeding America, 84% of households served by the Feeding America network report purchasing the cheapest food available, even if it wasn’t the healthiest option to provide enough food for the household. Most people are aware of the problem and cannot solve it in their current situation. My goal is to provide fresh produce for families that would be less expensive than fast food. 

I am starting in the Greater San Francisco Bay Area because of its proximity to the California Central Valley. Approximately one in eight Californians are food insecure which means there are 5.4 million people living in food insecurity in California. In the Bay Area alone there are between one hundred thousand and two hundred and twenty five thousand people at risk for food insecurity. The districts that I would be targeting are West Oakland, the Tenderloin, the Haight, and Alameda Point. Food insecurity is a real problem in the Bay Area because the cost of living is so high that even at a relatively well paying job, people can still be at risk for food insecurity.

I would be selling each fifteen to twenty pound box of produce for five dollars. Below is a chart that represents the business costs, profits, and total revenue for two hundred customers, four hundred costumers, and one thousand customers.

 

While scaling my enterprise I also intend to add in a twenty dollar box of produce for higher income families looking to do good. This box would be exactly the same size and contain the same types of produce but at a slightly higher cost. This is still much cheaper than any other CSA or grocery store. Below is a chart that shows the costs and revenue for the twenty dollar box.

Using these charts as a guide it is easy to see how much potential this business has. It can also be expanded to include Southern California which has huge concentrations of poverty.

 

As the fall term comes to an end, unfortunately, so does this class. I don’t think that I can quite explain how much this class has inspired and impacted me but I’m going to try. I came into this class thinking that I liked business and maybe this could be interesting and now that I’m leaving it I have a new perspective on my future and how much one person can make a difference. Without getting too political I think the next four years are going to be difficult and I will be more active about the causes I believe in and standing up for my own rights and the rights of others. This class has really instilled a sense of personal power in myself and I now know that I can make a difference.

Happy Hands: Final Blog

The Start to Happy Hands

At the very start of the term in social entrepreneurship, we had many discussions on how we can break the cycle of poverty by using private sector environmental, social and economic approaches.

Articulating Our Targeted Problem

Over the summer my cousin told me that there is a direct correlation between poverty and disease.  Doing research, Crowley, my partner, and I found that 2.5 billion people do not have access to clean water. This resonated with us and we knew we would be working on trying to address one of the numerous problems that are a result of the lack of clean water. The next fact we read was that eighty percent of diseases in Sub-Saharan Africa are spread through poor hand sanitation.  The two facts directly correlate with each other. Clean water is essential for good sanitation, and one third of the population does not have access to it. People in Sub-Saharan Africa are forced to clean their hands with contaminated water. Even if individuals use soap when they clean their hands with dirty water, germs are still left on the surface of their hands, potentially leaving more bacteria. We wondered, how can people wash their hands without using water?

After a brainstorming session, we came up with hand sanitizer, our waterless solution to attack poor hand sanitation.  Our hand sanitizer, Happy Hands, needs to be manufactured in the places in need so that we do not have to import materials across the ocean. This will also add cash flow into the local economies. Everything in our hand sanitizer needs to be locally sourced. We found aloe, which we know exists in many products that moisturize skin. Alcohol needs to be one of the ingredients, the next thing we found was corn, which can be made into ethyl alcohol. Our product aims to take away the need to use contaminated water  to wash the surface of people’s hands, while killing germs and moisturizing them.

Happy Hands

By the end of the term, through the help of our “advisors” Gregor Makechnie, and Ian Hamlet, Crowley and I made a successful socially focussed business.

Our Purpose

Happy Hands, is one hundred percent organic and an extremely effective hand sanitizer. We will sell Happy Hands in the US, which will subsidize distribution in developing countries. We are aiming to reduce diseases spread through poor hand sanitation while also providing income for farmers and the local people.

Happy Hands uses alcohol and aloe. The corn distilled alcohol is in Happy Hands to kill germs left on our beneficiaries hands, while the aloe moisturizes them.

The Creation of Happy Hands

Crowley and I emailed our school’s organic chemistry teacher about trying to make hand sanitizer using only aloe and corn distilled alcohol. We had several meetings discussing the reality of what we were trying to accomplish, and after two weeks of planning we made our hand sanitizer. Since it is illegal to distill alcohol from corn in the US, we used isopropyl alcohol(rubbing alcohol) instead. Our product that we will sell in the US will have isopropyl alcohol while the product produced in developing countries will contain corn based alcohol.

Cultural Realities and Creating Income

After talking to Fabrice, who works with Burundi Friends International, and Andrew Briggs, the CEO of Freedom in Creation, Crowley and I had a better cultural understanding of what life is like in Sub-Saharan Africa. Fabrice told us that only twenty percent of the population in Burundi, Africa has access to running water, which still is not always satisfactory. The other eighty percent of the population sources their water for drinking and sanitation from rivers lakes, and mud holes. Andrew Briggs sent us a picture as an example of the water that that have access to and how bad the sanitary conditions are.

Our second goal in our business purpose is to provide income for farmers and individuals. During our conversation with Fabrice we got into the average income for people living in Burundi averages around $580 dollars a year. After running the numbers and finding the average price for aloe and corn in Sub-Saharan Africa we decided that we would pay one dollar per aloe leaf and twenty-five cents for every pound of corn. Aloe and corn grow in plenty in areas in need, so people do not need to be farmers in order to provide us with materials and receive an income. If the average person can bring four leaves per week to our dispensary, we can increase that person’s income by $200 dollars. Happy Hands will have a large impact because the price of living is so low.

Educating the public will be a challenge we will need to address. From talking to Fabrize, Crowley and I learned that sanitation is an issue that many people struggle with and are aware that a change needs to be made. But, in some rural areas, natives may think that washing their hands with the water they find is ok to use because they are using soap. These people do not know the dangers associated with how they are washing their hands.

Competitive Alternatives

US hand sanitizers

Recently we discovered that many hand sanitizers in the US were labeled to be harmful  due to the addition of certain chemicals. The glistening hand sanitizers that consumers reach for at home, school, and work will effectively kill germs, which is their statement on the front of every bottle, but what isn’t shown on the label, is the potential risk of  antibiotic resistance, hormone disruption , and a weakened immune system. All of the risks that come with some hand sanitizers are due to the chemicals that are added.

Happy Hands is an eco-friendly and human friendly hand sanitizer. It does not contain any of the toxins or chemicals that the FDA labeled as dangerous. Happy Hands effectively kills germs and bacteria without the added side effects.

Other Alternatives and Behavioral Changes

At the moment, people living in  Sub-Saharan Africa are washing their hands with polluted water and soap. Even with the use of soap, germs are still left on the surface of their hands. There are other organizations trying to solve these issues. These are nonprofits that rely on donations to provide resources. As well,  non profits do not inject money back into the economy by empowering the local workforce.

Partners

We believe that partnering and working with existing organizations and social entrepreneurship’s in Sub-Saharan Africa will be extremely beneficial to Happy Hands. There are over 80 different organizations already in Sub-Saharan Africa working on the water crisis, sanitation, and education that we can partner with to get Happy Hands on the ground. Working with Freedom in Creation is a great resource for Happy Hands because they can help us educate the locals why good hand sanitation is so important. With their help and the support from other organizations we can educate people on how Happy Hands can improve their lives. Partnering will make a behavioral change with our beneficiaries much easier.

Existing Organizations In Sub-Saharan Africa

Another reason why partnering with companies already in Sub-Saharan Africa is ideal is because they have the same goal as we do. If we can partner with organizations like The World Health Organization, we could sell  Happy Hands at a reduced price. They can then provide our product with people who can not purchase it from our dispensaries.

Development Road Map

Happy Hands has a globally large scale and market place. Around one third of the population suffers from the lack of improved sanitation because of the water crisis. Through working with Partners, we can set a goal to try and improve sanitation all around the world.

Pricing, Revenue, and US Market Size

After working out the financials for the cost to manufacture each 8 0z bottle and the amount the we can make we found that we have very profitable numbers.  It costs $1.58 to make an 8 oz bottle of Happy Hands. For every dollar we invest in manufacturing Happy Hands, we will earn  $7.50 in revenue.

After doing research about our competitors in the US, the biggest being Purel, we found that on average each company sells their hand sanitizer for $.023 per mL. It costs Happy Hands $.0067 to make one mL of our sanitizer, if we match our price per mL to the average price per mL, we will make $4.29 for every 8 oz bottle sold assuming a retail price at $5.81. Last year alone, $29,862,306 was spent on hand sanitizer. Based on this we created this table.

Table of Revenue in Relation to Percent of Sales in the US

Innovation Night

Innovation night went really well for Happy Hands. Having a physical product to display and let the community test out was incredibly beneficial. It was really fun having people come up and try Happy Hands and tell them how much they liked it. Both Crowley and I feel we did well during the presentation section of the night. We received great feedback about our business plan from Stephen Thompson, Senior Manager, and Strategic Recruiting and Academic Relations at Amazon. One of the critiques he gave us was how we were going to decide to advertise Happy Hands. During our presentation we mentioned “Purel”, he expressed his concern for competing against the biggest hand sanitizer company in the world. This is one aspect that Crowley and I did not talk about as much. Based on his feedback, we believe we can market Happy Hands as the all natural “contribute to a social cause” alternative to the “big corporate” product.  

We are planning on marketing Happy Hands in the US to the green-eco friendly community. We are targeting to carve out a small percent of the US market to help subsidize our production in developing countries. By labeling Happy Hands with “Organic”, “Eco-Friendly”, and “To Help People In Need”, we believe we will be able to obtain a the amount of revenue we need to start production overseas. Stephen Thompson really liked our plan. When we told him our business model he said “BAM, you guys nailed it.” Some of the other feedback we got had to do with the smell and other aspects of the physical product.

Recently , we presented Happy Hands  at the Proctor Academy Staff meeting which has created additional interest. We are going to start small, Crowley and I plan on presenting in front of our schools assembly in the upcoming weeks and we will start selling at our school. For the class, I don’t think I would’ve done anything differently, I think Crowley and I worked very well together, meeting outside of class at least twice a week to work on our business plan. Overall, I really enjoyed this class. I thought the format of using the readings from our textbook to guide us with creating a socially focused business was challenging and helped me learn some essential skills for upcoming years of my life.

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Fresh Tokes Last blog

My name is Michenader, my partners Charlie and Owen and I created Fresh Toke. Which is a product that will help smokers quit. This product is accessible and affordable to buy.

Problem

When my partners and I were trying to find a problem to solve, we came up with smoking studies that have proven that smoking leads to certain physical health diseases such as Cancer, heart disease, stroke, lung diseases, and diabetes. Smoking can also lead to mental health disorders such as depression, high stress, and schizophrenia.

Current Solutions

Many companies and brands have tried and attempted to solve these issues of smoking. Those solutions are currently e-cigarettes, pouches, gums, therapy, and medications as well. Expensive therapy is not accessible to everyone who is dealing with smoking addiction. it’s too expensive, but our product, Fresh Tokes, is free from nicotine, is inexpensive, and it’s accessible to people who are in need to help them stop their addiction. We cannot fix every person’s physical health, the damage may be already done, but what we can do is help a consumer’s mental health to the best of our ability and help them fight the addiction. That’s what we are trying to do.

Why Now?

Recent studies have shown that 11.4% of middle school and high school students are using tobacco. For adults, it is 18.7%. Our company believes that we have found a solution that will be cost-effective and that will decrease the use of nicotine tobacco for adults and underage smokers.

Market Size

The potential Market size for Fresh Tokes is the amount of people who smoke because roughly 1.3 billion people smoke. If we sell to the product’s potential market size, our company will bring in roughly $1.5 billion but realistically we would be bringing in $187.2 million 

Product

The product that we created is a small cylinder-shaped object that is compactly filled with cotton. The customer uses the product as if it were a real cigarette, with the same steps as a cigarette but the only different thing is that you do not light it. All the customer is doing is breathing air. Its value is that it gives the same sensation of touch. The product is sold in packs of 3 per day, one is original, one is for the day, and the other is for the night. Day packets contain beads that have caffeine and night products contain beads that have melatonin for sleep. You can purchase refillable beads for the product. The product will last up to a year depending on how much the customer uses it regularly. With a regular consumer base, customers will need to rebuy the beads and the product itself creating sustainable income.

Business Model

This business model shows what you can get for a monthly, yearly, in five years. It also shows potentially how much revenue we can make in these three brackets.

Monthly $5 – Original  $10 – pack of 3 including night and day  Beads wear off in one week 1 pack night beads (flavored or unflavored) (includes 4 beads) $2 1 pack day beads (flavored or unflavored) (includes 4 beads) $2 One customer for one month = $14 Potential monthly earning = $18.2 billion Realistic earning (2% of market) $15.6 million

Yearly $5 – Original $10 – pack of 3 including night and day  Beads wear off in one week 1 pack night beads (flavored or unflavored) (4 beads) $24 1 pack day beads (flavored or unflavored) (4 beads) $24 One customer for one year  = $168 Potential monthly earning = $75.4 billion Realistic earning (2% of the market) $187.2 million

5 years $25- Original $50-pack of 3 including night and day  Beads wear off in one week 1 pack night beads (flavored or unflavored) (4 beads) $300 1 pack day beads (flavored or unflavored) (4 beads) $300 One customer for one year  = $840 Potential monthly earning = 1.1 trillion  Realistic earning (2% of market) $936 million

Final blog –Zack (extra-credit)

Achetta Bars summary
By: Ben, Hap, and Yuzhang

Achetta Bars ames to provide environmentally sustainable protein bars with a higher level of nutrition to people in need around the world.

People in need may include individuals in developed countries who want to eat healthier snacks or protein bars, as well as those who lack food supplies and nutrition in third-world countries.

Hello, everyone! I am Zack, the co-founder of Achetta Bars, along with Ben and Hap. I handle market research and manage the marketing and sales for the sticker business.

Problems

The problems we are trying to solve are malnutrition and environmental issues. In 2022, more than 828 million people were malnourished, and 25,000 people died from hunger each day. That is one person every 5 seconds.

Furthermore, the production of beef, pork, and chicken accounts for environmental issues, as they collectively contribute to around 12% of all total greenhouse gas emissions.

Pain Point of the Beneficiary

1. People in the developing world lack access to nutritious food, while people in the developed world need a better source of protein and nutrients.

2. Our product can provide beneficiaries with a superior, high-level source of protein and other nutrients. Additionally, our product is more environmentally friendly and sustainable.

3. We are seeking our target audience who have not yet incorporated insects into their diet to encourage them to do so.

4. Eventually, this can be very challenging, as it is hard for some people to mentally accept and be prepared to eat insects, which are often assumed to be gross and untasty. To address this challenge, we plan to adapt our product by utilizing different insect varieties based on regional preferences. By aligning our product with insects that are already familiar and consumed in specific regions, we aim to offer a more culturally acceptable and palatable option. This way, consumers will be enjoying the same insect they are accustomed to eating, albeit in a different form and flavor.

Why now?

You might be asking, why now? Why do we need this solution now? This is because of the increased demand for a more productive, environmentally sustainable source of nutrients and protein due to the rising population and people experiencing hunger.

Solutions

We are helping to solve those problems by providing environmentally sustainable protein bars made from crickets. Crickets have high nutritional benefits as they contain macro- and micro-mineral elements such as calcium, potassium, magnesium, phosphorus, sodium, iron, zinc, manganese, and copper. Additionally, crickets are rich in the required amounts of vitamins such as B-group vitamins and vitamins A, C, D, E, and K, all of which are necessary for humans.

Cricket is also more environmentally friendly than any other common source of protein.

Cricket needs way less water and feed to grow than regular animals like cows, pigs, and chickens.

It also create less greenhouse gases and need less space to grow compared to other animal.

Competition

To different ourselves from other protein bar:

1. We offer all natural protein bar based on cricket which have a higher value of protein and nutrients than other type of protein bar.
2. Cricket protein are more environmentally sustainable and more cost-effective than most other protein source out there.

From other cricket protein bar:

We have a social mission that EXO doesn’t have. We are trying to help people who are currently malnourished in developing countries by using a buy-one-give-one free model. That is, for every bar sold in developed country, one bar is given free to the developing countries.

Product

•  The product will be around 3 ounces which is lighter bigger than most other protein bars, so we can pack more nutrients in a bar to set it above competitors. 
• 26-30 grams of protein per 3 ounce bar
• Have packaging with adds to help reduce costs

Business model

As I mentioned before, we will have a buy one give one model for our product. We will have adds on our packing so that it can help us to reduce some of the costs which will hopefully be around 30-40% if our revenu. The other 70-60% will come from grocery stores, online orders, retailers. Cost to make will cost us around 0.5 to 2 dollar depending on the add coverage. And we are selling it for 3 dollar.

We are going to start with US and China first, and then work our way to other country.

Innovation Night

JC gave us really good feedback. We are running out of time for our presentation, and he said that we don’t have to talk as much; we have really good visuals, and we should let the pictures speak for themselves. That’s what I did with this blog post; I used fewer words in it.

Also Georgia asked a really good question: ” where are we getting our cricket from?”

So, we plan to initially buy crickets or cricket powder from a supplier. Once we scale up, we can begin to farm our own crickets. Additionally, we intend to collaborate with organizations to deliver our protein bars to third-world countries.

Personal Note

hank you so much, Gregor. This has been an amazing term, and I really enjoyed it.

Final Blog Post- Our Social Entreprise

Purpose

Welcome to the Creative Collective: Creating community to better fashion industry standards.

The Creative Collective serves to change the way the fashion industry works by improving working conditions and access to fair trade goods, through an incubator and website store.

The Board of Directors for the Creative Collective are:

Whitney Hollenbeck

From Burlington, Vermont, age 18

CEO of the Creative Collective

Passionate about labor laws and human rights.

Connor Roy 

Wellesley, Massachusetts, age 18

CFO of the Creative Collective

Cool guy with mustache

Olivia Kewenvoyouma

From Gilbert, Arizona, age 17

CMO of the Creative Collective

Striving to make safer working conditions for exploited workers.

Problem

To begin, 370 million people work in less than ideal conditions, but more specifically in Cambodia: 45% of children who work ages 5-14, work in sweatshops: there are 860,000 garment factory workers: and lastly the living wage $309 and the minimum wage is $78.

Right now, workers have no certainty of job security and no access to labor laws and major conglomerates driven by profits, like Shein, are ruining lives. For years beneficiaries have been protesting to address this crisis but not much traction was gained. Our Social Enterprise aids with fair treatment and job security, additionally it will increase the amount of educated kids 

Currently, we have no direct competitors that have all the capabilities we have.

Solution

Our solution is to improve labor conditions for exploited labor workers by creating fashion incubators in developing countries that create safe places to work. We will have all supplies needed to create their product, which will then be sold on our website available world wide. The creators, who are also our beneficiaries, will then take 90% of the profits, while the Creative Collective keeps 10% of the profits.

Our website home page below :

The Shift

What will need to change: Our beneficiaries will need to

1. Quit their existing job 
2. Create their own clothes
3. Keep 90% of profit  

Behavior changes:

1. Take a risk and leave their jobs
2. Have their children put in school
3. Be independent  

How difficult will it be to effect these behavior changes?     

It won’t be easy, changing behavior is hard, but with education into our mission and proof. Nobody would pass up the offer to make what they deserve for their craft.

Our Beneficiary

 

Win, a garment worker from Cambodia, lives in Phnom Penh on 80 dollars a month. She makes than 3 dollars a day; additionally, 90% of garment workers are female. Win specifically has been working in a factory since fifteen-years-old and she dreams of a time where she is valued for her work.  

Competition

The competitive alternative is Phnom Penh’s Factory a collective space to inspire creators and show their work. This can’t compare to the Creative collective because they don’t generate money for their beneficiaries. 

Historically forced labor and unsafe working conditions have existed forever, people who cannot stand up for themselves because of little means. 

Across the world the media has increased publication of the issues in developing countries surrounding forced labor, and unsafe working conditions for little way. This is making it easiest to create innovative hubs.  

Developmental Roadmap

Pricing

We will utilize abandoned warehouses.

-Our beneficiary/ a Creative Collective Designer uses a booth inside our warehouse

Our booth/ our materials = Free..

-until they start making profits of the garments they sell, then they will pay $- to rent the booth+materials

Then we take  10% of their profits… 

-creating an increase revenue stream for us

Once they start becoming more independent… 

-they start utilizing our supplies less and less. 

Business Model for Month 1:

​​Business Model for Month 12:

Business Model Growth

Increasing monthly revenue stream due to exposure which then will benefit the beneficiary giving them a larger monthly income

This will exponentially grow year by year.

Additional Customer Profiles

Conclusion

Our goal is to address unfair working conditions and exploited workers through the Creative Collective. This enables us to run a triple bottom line enterprise benefiting the lives of the workers and their families while supplying fair trade clothing to people of the world.

Thank You

-The Creative Collective

Final Blog extra credit

Our company More Protein aims to provide environmentally sustainable protein bars with a higher level of protein to people in need around the world. 

Our team is Hap, Zack, and Ben 

Our main beneficiary is our people with a lack of nutrition. We are catering to multiple markets. I will categorize our market as so: market one is someone in a developed country that has bad or wants to improve their nutrition and also wants to be environmentally conscious and wants to buy a product that helps the environment as well as their own health. Market two is someone in a developing country who is struggling to survive because of a lack of nutrition (in this case the bars are free).

The benefit in case two doest that they have many options as food is generally hard to come by, most of these people will leave and become refugees or become part of the 828 million people that go hungry yearly. In the case of our first market in a developed country we would sell in the US which has around 44 million people suffering from malnutrition each year. 

Our protein bars in this market would provide more nutrition for the people lacking in that and also would allow them to donate a bar while feeding themselves, with our buy one donate one business model.

Cricket protein is one of the most sustainable protein sources and compared to beef it has 30% more protein it also takes around 1,800 gallons of water to produce one pound of meat while it only takes 1 gallon for every pound of cricket protein. 

As our population grows there is a higher demand for protein and sustainable protein. We are on the edge of climate disaster and one of the main causes of this is the way we farm for our food. This increase in demand for unsustainable farming practices needs to be combated with our more sustainable cricket model. 

Our mission is to be a more sustainable company and provide high-quality protein to people in need. We achieved this using local insect farms providing more sustainable and healthy protein using cricket flowers. We are starting in countries that need food or more nutrition and we hope to expand to other countries. In conclusion, this is a highly sustainable solution for many problems, it is also a very scalable business model and has the potential to add more revenue streams like the idea we were given at innovation night to give farms to 3rd world country’s and then buy back the farmed crickets. Our idea has many social aspects and would be a viable business model.

work cited
https://www.happydaybrands.com/pages/buy-one-give-one
https://exoprotein.com/collections/all-products
https://mightycricket.com/product/chocolate-cricket-protein-powder/
https://mightycricket.com/sustainability/cricket-protein-vs-beef/
https://www.istockphoto.com/photos/cricket-insect

Analysis of Beneficiary Experience — Zack Cong

What do your beneficiaries need to be able to do? 

Our beneficiaries who haven’t tried eating insects, specifically crickets, will need to overcome any apprehension about consuming crickets. The goal is for them to comfortably enjoy the protein bars we provide, which incorporate crickets as a sustainable source of protein.

https://www.istockphoto.com/photos/cricket-insect

To address this challenge, we plan to adapt our product by utilizing different insect varieties based on regional preferences. By aligning our product with insects that are already familiar and consumed in specific regions, we aim to offer a more culturally acceptable and palatable option. This way, consumers will be enjoying the same insect they are accustomed to eating, albeit in a different form and flavor.

Typical family dinner for me

In Yunnan, China, it’s common for people to regularly consume a specific type of bug known as “Silkworm Pupa,” which resembles an oval shape. Therefore, it would be more appropriate for us to consider shifting our focus from crickets to silkworm pupa as an insect type for consumption. Silkworm pupa has a history of widespread consumption in our region, making it a more relevant choice for our culinary preferences compared to crickets, which may not be as widely consumed here.

How does that compare with the experience of the competitive alternative?  

The alternative solution for our beneficiaries is to buy other protein bars that are less nutritious and less environmentally friendly.

More broadly, how is your offering different than the competitive alternatives?

To different ourselves from other protein bar:

1. We offer all natural protein bar based on cricket which have a higher value of protein and nutrients than other type of protein bar.

2. Cricket protein are more environmentally sustainable and more cost-effective than most other protein source out there.

https://mightycricket.com/sustainability/cricket-protein-vs-beef/

https://mightycricket.com/product/chocolate-cricket-protein-powder/

(For more detailed information, please refer back to this blog post.

https://wordpress.com/post/pasocialentrepreneurship.wordpress.com/9425

From other cricket protein bar:

https://exoprotein.com/collections/all-products

1. We have a social mission that EXO doesn’t have. We are trying to help people who are currently malnourished in developing countries by using a buy-one-give-one free model.

https://www.happydaybrands.com/pages/buy-one-give-one

citations:
https://www.happydaybrands.com/pages/buy-one-give-one
https://exoprotein.com/collections/all-products
https://mightycricket.com/product/chocolate-cricket-protein-powder/
https://mightycricket.com/sustainability/cricket-protein-vs-beef/
https://www.istockphoto.com/photos/cricket-insect

Final blog — Georgia (extra-credit)

Techwat+ summary-

Our companies mission is to offer clean water with nutritional additives to consumers in developing countries through a buy one give one system. Through our water filtration system we hope to eliminate many of the decease and death associated with unsafe drinking water. We will do this by advertising and selling our product to consumers in developed countries, specially the United States outdoor activity market. With the profit made within this sector we hope to then use that money to provide products for those in undeveloped countries who are unable to buy techwat for themselves.

The problems we are trying to tackle are malnutrition and inability to access safe/clean drinking water. Globally 1 in 4 people around the world suffer from the consequences of drinking unsafe water. These consequences include diseases like Cholera, diarrhoea, dysentery, hepatitis A, typhoid and polio which mostly effect people in undeveloped countries and regions, with sub-sarhian African being the most effected.

The other component of the issue we wish to resolved in malnutrition effecting around 735 million people globally.

Our sulution to these issues is to create a water filtration bag, like many already on the market, that includes a pocket to insert nutrianal supplements. this filtration bag will filter out all the contaminants within the water leaving just the clean water to drink. Once the water is clarified it thens run through an insert that has supplements like vitamins and proteins. Which provides additional nutritional support for those who many not reserve enough in daily life.

Our product is valuable on the market right now due to the outdoor industry being at its peak. With the industry being worth $862 billion there is clearly money to be made in this market. Such a large industry assures us that we can profit for ourselves and also provide product for those who need it. With unsafe water being one of the lead causes of death within the world we need to act on this issue now. Looking at both outdoor industry growth and number of deaths due to unsafe water we believe we can use one to help the other.

We have two markets we aim to direct our product too. The outdoor industry (initially within the United States) and water stressed regions (initially sub-Saharan Africa.) The outdoor industry, which is worth 862 billion dollars globally, is where our revenue stream is coming from. We will market out filtration bag to backpackers and people who go out into the woods for long periods of time who need a way to clean their water. Then there are the people who cannot afford our product, the beneficiaries in underdeveloped countries we aim to help with our product.

There is a lot of competition on the market already. Including lifestraw, membrane solutions, and puribag. What really separates us from our competitor is out nutrient supplement pouches. Our focus on not only providing clean water for those who need it but nutritional benefits is what makes our product more appealing. We aim to target the people who purchase our bags with ethos, making them feel like they are making a difference and doing good for others, which they are.

For our business model we will provide two size filtration bags initially. A 3 liter bag for around $45, and a 10 liter bag for around $130. Along with the bags themselves we will sell a monthly subscription box with our supplement pods. This will allow us to have a guaranteed revue stream to fall back to since a filtration bag will last consumers a long time. With our products we hope to make made 10,000 sales in one year. Which would set up to the goal of making $800k-$1M total, leading to the donation of 20,000 water filters the following year.

For distribution of our products to people in underdeveloped countries we would form partnerships with pre-exesting non-profits who already support clean water acts in these nations. We will supply originations like red-cross, charity water, and UN water with our filters for them to give out to those who need them. This makes our job easier since we do not need to be finding the people in need.

echWat+ aims to provide healthy water for those who do not have access to it.Our mission is an exponential increase in health across underdeveloped countries.

 

Achetta Bars

Purpose

As Achetta Bars, we aim to provide the most environmentally sustainable protein bars with a higher level of nutritional value to people who suffer from malnutrition.

Founders

Hap

Previous experience: Sticker Business Manager

Ben Sant-Johnson

Previous experience: CO founder, CEO, Bake sales expert, Sticker business artist

Zack Cong

Precious experience: Sticker marketing chief

Social Problem

People in the developing world struggle to get enough food to eat on a daily basis. Over 828 people in the world struggle for proper nutrition every day; this is the amount of people in America multiplied 2 and a half times. There is a significant amount of people in the world whose lives we can improve by simply providing nutrition.

Solution

Our solution to this problem is by using a buy one give one system. For every bar that is bought, we will donate a bar to someone in need of nutrition. We will do this by selling a high-quality nutrition bar in developed countries that provides vitamins minerals and a high amount of protein. We will offer the most viable nutritional supplement that won’t need to be refrigerated or cooked by the recipient making it an easy nutritional option.
What makes our different than other nutritional bars is that our product will offer more than just Protein. Crickets contain high amounts of minerals and vitamins necessary for proper nutrition. These bars aren’t just a supplement they are a valid part of a meal.

Why Now?

In the past there have been very few other companies that have embraced the buy one give one strategy that has provided nutrition bars let alone cricket-based nutrition bars. However, as the human population grows so does the number of people in need of proper nutrition. This means that the number of people we could help is massive. The number of people we could benefit is vast.

Market Size

On the developing country side of things, the size of our market is vast, 24% of Americans exercise regularly meaning eighty million people could benefit from our Nutrition bars. This is a large amount of people whose performance could be improved by a nutritional bar.

Competition

We have lots of competitors inside of the nutrition bar world and even in the cricket bar world; however, the thing that sets us apart is the fact that we are doing a buy one give one system. After doing lots of research I have been unable to find a business that is a direct competitor to our business model.

Business Model

Our business is sustainable because the market size is massive and our possible social impact is nearly limitless for possibilities. As you can see below Our business is very scalable and the amount of people that we could sell to and impact is massive.

Final Blog post

Hello, my name is Owen. My partners Charlie, Michenader, and I created Fresh Toke. Fresh Toke is a product that will help smokers quit in an accessible and affordable way.

Problem

When pondering modern problems that haven’t had a golden solution, smoking was one of the first things that came to mind. Studies have proven that conditions like Cancer, Heart and lung disease, and strokes are a direct result of nicotine abuse. Avid usage can also lead to high stress, and impulsivity, and can even cause mental disorders such as Schizophrenia and depression.

Current solutions

Many companies and brands have attempted to solve this issue. Currently, solutions such as e-cigarettes, pouches, gums, Therapy, and medication are among the most popular. However, there are multiple problems with these “Solutions”. Products such as e-cigarettes and pouches may be contributing to the very problem they claim to destroy. For example, one JUUL pod contains 20 cigarettes worth of nicotine. This product claimed to be an avenue to quit smoking, but as you can see it has had the opposite effect. On the contrary, our product is a smoke and nicotine-free solution that is inexpensive and accessible.

Why now?

In recent studies, it is shown that 11.4% percent of middle and high school students report using tobacco products. And about 18.7% of adults report smoking as well. 53% of those adults have also reported an interest in quitting. But only a fraction actually do. We believe that if the solutions were more accessible and less costly than fraction would increase jearasticaly

Market size

Our potential market size, or amount of people who smoke, is amount is roughly 1.3 billion people. Assuming that we sell to the vast majority or all of our potential market, we would bring in roughly 1.5 billion dollars

Product

Our product is a small cylinder-shaped object that is packed with cotton. The user would put the product in their mouth and inhale. although you are just breathing 02, the airflow will simulate that of a cigarette and give you a similar instant sensation. Our product will be sold by itself or in packs of 3, one original, one for night, and one for day. the night and day products will contain beads that contain melatonin or caffeine for the respective time of day. This product can last up to or more than a year depending on care. The customer will need to re-up on both beads and the product itself creating sustainable income.

Monthly $5 – Original  $10 – pack of 3 including night and day  Beads wear off in one week 1 pack night beads (flavored or unflavored) (4 beads) $2 1 pack day beads (flavored or unflavored) (4beads) $2 One customer for one month = $14 Potential monthly earning = $18.2 billion Realistic earning (2% of market) $15.6 million

Yearly $5 – Original $10 – pack of 3 including night and day  Beads wear off in one week 1 pack night beads (flavored or unflavored) (4 beads) $24 1 pack day beads (flavored or unflavored) (4beads) $24 One customer for one year  = $168 Potential monthly earning = $75.4 billion Realistic earning (2% of market) $187.2 million

5 years $25- Original $50-pack of 3 including night and day  Beads wear off in one week 1 pack night beads (flavored or unflavored) (4 beads) $300 1 pack day beads (flavored or unflavored) (4beads) $300 One customer for one year  = $840 Potential monthly earning = 1.1 trillion  Realistic earning (2% of market) $936 million

Final Blog Post

Music is part of everyone’s daily life, from listening to music to your drive to work or school to listening to music while you work out or while doing work. People listen to music daily. Most music streaming brands are just streaming popular artists while Global Beats target small musicians in developing countries.

Music helps people lower anxiety levels and who doesn’t want to help out people when listening to good music. Global beats allows people to listen to good quality music while helping out some by giving them a job and money.

Global beats has multiple portable recording studios that will travel to developing countries to give the artists a chance to record and publish their music in our app. Global Beats wants to help the musicians make a name for themselves and to help them start to make a living doing what they love.

Our main competitors are Spotify, Apple Music, and SoundCloud. Currently they are the most popular and highest streamed apps.

For pricing, we were looking at having a one time purchase of 4.99 dollars in the app store, then a optional ad free subscription of 9.99 dollars a month. Another source of income for us is ads. An expense we are going to have is the portable recording studio which would cost us around 7,000 dollars.

We also plan to expand to more countries to help more low income musicians. We plan to partner up with popular artists to share our name and to get to people to use our app. We want to keep our app for helping out low income musicians and not turn into one of the larger streaming apps that only share popular artists or top hits.

During an Innovation night, we presented to a group of individuals that were “investors”. Once we finished presenting, the audience was allowed to ask question or respond with guidance and we received better ways to improve this business idea. We have taken those ideas in hope to make our app a big hit.

Analysis of Beneficiary Experience

The Creative Collective serves to change the way the fashion industry works by improving working conditions and access to fair trade goods through an incubator and website.  

When I’m sewing seams, I always think that these jeans must be very expensive, they cost at least $40 to $50 per pair, and I’m wondering how those people afford those expensive jeans while my salary is so small. I sometimes wonder how I could ever afford them. 

Garment Worker from Cambodia interviewed by Julia Wallace.  

The beneficiary experience is the most important thing; they are the reason behind creating our social enterprise.

Focuses	Advantages of The Creative Collective	Advantages of already existing companies
Job stability	Hired for a reason, pay increases with profit, they maintain at least a 10% profit. gets maternity leave if needed, medical leave.	There is no company that does what we do while also promising stable jobs with fair pay.
safe conditions	Designed for them, clean, has all materials, we do not hire children, they work a safe amount of hours each weak.	Clean, nice space, but only for showing the design or products, not to make them
fair pay	Above national average, increases with products sold, no cap, we are not profit-focused. they will always be earning money including from the start.	Forced labor companies hide true labor conditions. Images show clean factories, but these are fronts for the actually horrible conditions they force people to work in. We have no comparable data to a similar business as us.
small fee	10% of profits are taken, leaving 90% for them, way above the average forced labor, or sweatshop worker.	no comparable data
creative license	can create what ever they want, they can choose how much of each product they want to sell and for how much, they consult with our marketing team for pricing.	no comparable data

Beneficiary Experience Table

EDUCATION

The beneficiary relies on us to help change their working conditions; they do not know safe, reliable salaries. We need to teach them how to make a difference in their lives. Through safe conditions, stable and increasing pay, they will be household providers, reducing the number of children working to help support their families. We are addressing two issues when we educate them. Child labor should not exist, and they deserve more. They should be making a fair living wage. This is why we clearly illustrate how they make 90% of the profits from the clothes they sell. With a growing income as they expand and sell more each year, this income will allow them to educate their children, increasing success through the families.

The shocking fact is that around 45% of children ages 4-15 work to support their families in Cambodia; our social enterprise will subsequently address and improve this. We do not have any direct competition; some businesses address creative ideas, but with no formal profit, we are charging into an untapped market that is not only going to be profitable but a necessity for improving their lives. They need to take the leap of faith and leave their jobs that don’t value them; after the first few people join the creative collective, more will follow because they will see how beneficial it is.

We are superior to any offering; when looking at Cambodia’s garment sectors, you have fast fashion: bad labor laws, no freedom, child labor, and corruption. Slightly up from there are factories that are the middle ground, clean enough, appear safe, but still have meager pay that is almost not manageable to live off of. The final category is entrepreneur hubs, which show off people’s creative work or give them a place to work; this costs tremendous amounts of money to rent each month and isn’t designed for those given little opportunities.

Competitors that have a little bit of a similar idea

In this, the video is marketed towards the people who already have high incomes and just want to be more creative and expand their ideas; this completely ignores the real problems and is a cover for the truth of Cambodia’s labor. It falsely portrays this country that badly needs labor laws, fair pay, and safe working conditions. The creative collective is the solution to give people the rights they deserve and the income to change their lives.