Check our the ideas for promotion, templates for everything from press releases to a letter to your MP or elected members to give your enterprise a boost, support Social Saturday in 2016. Celebrate the work of your community with invited guests. Makes great copy!
You can always support the team at Social Saturday and add interest to your own energetic promotion by emailing news of your events or occasions to socialsaturday@socialenterprise.org.uk
Give your enterprise a boost, support Social Saturday in 2016.
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The Key Fundhave a range of on-line resources available for the budding social entrepreneur, or social enterprise that is leaning towards developing its business in 2016.
You can find some simple and effective Key Fund toolkits below. Whether needing to survey and assess your income needs as an individual, or a family unit, or to calculate various loan interests.
You can also find a template for creating your Social Enterprise Business Plan. This will guide you methodically and clearly through the steps you need to plan your governance, your policies and your operational delivery – all focused on social enterprise creation and sustainability.
The Key Fund main web pages also have a more comprehensive and detailed set of resources available on the Fund Start-up Advice web centre (Courtesy of Start-up Donut). This offers you more insight and detailed resources for creating a new social business and has links to a variety of services and information that new groups or companies will find useful.
So, wherever you are on your social business journey in 2016, from first idea to seeking social investment, you can contact The Key Fund Team here.
A happy and enterprising 2016!
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Sheffield Social Enterprise Network (SSEN) is to commission business development expertise to sustain and develop the network beyond the end of the Lottery grant which expires on 31 March 2016.
‘SSEN requires a consultant to help the network become a sustainable entity beyond the end of the current Awards for All grant which ends on 31.03.2016. This piece of work is fundamental to develop SSEN’s strategy for the medium and long-term’. Source: SSEN Nov. 2015.
The main areas of work include:
Work with SSEN management committee and its members to understand its circumstances, problems and opportunities.
Develop a tender/funding resource (key information that SSEN can use to input directly into funding/tender bids).
Scope the external environment for business opportunities
Register SSEN with key contract opportunity websites, mailing lists and newsletters.
Identify and evaluate potential income-generating services and projects that SSEN could develop (short term and long term).
Write funding and tender bids with the support of management committee members.
The deadline for receipt of tenders is 12pm on Tuesday 10 November2015.
This Saturday, 10th October 2015, is Social Saturday– spend your cash with a social enterprise and get some real ‘community multiplier effect‘ for your money!
‘In the UK alone, there are 70,000 social enterprises, contributing £18.5 billion to the UK economy and employing almost a million people. This exciting movement is growing fast all around the world and we’re seeing a boom in start-ups being launched that combine doing business with doing good’. Source: Social Enterprise UK
At the Key Fund, research that shows that this confusion persists about what social enterprise is. Although two thirds of us support the idea of social enterprise, only a fifth (21 per cent) knew what social enterprises were.
‘Simply, it’s about buying or using services from businesses that make a positive difference in our community or on the environment. Social enterprises reinvest their profits into furthering their social mission. They have to have good business models to be financially sustainable, so they don’t rely on grants or charity’. Source: The Key Fund
Key Fund is itself a social enterprise. Matt Smith of the Key Fund, quoted in a recent article in The Guardian, speaking about the misconceptions about Social Enterprise in the UK stated ‘…what’s interesting is this misconception that social enterprise relies on grants or donations. We escaped a culture reliant on grants many years ago, and the main impetus of social enterprise is to ignite local economies, create jobs, and be profitable or at least sustainable in delivering their ethical aim.”
If you are a UK based social enterprise, and bursting with good ideas, then this year’s Ignite Challenge could be just for you.
Do you have ideas that can be deployed, to enable the imaginative and efficient use of energy resources, which will contingently change people’s lives…then the Ignite Challenge 2015 is a ‘must look at’ for you?
‘We are looking for the brightest business ideas that use energy to make a difference in people’s lives’.
You can secure, if successful, between 50,000 Pounds to 2 million Pounds in order to make your idea a reality. The finalists will be asked to pitch their idea to a panel of energy industry and social enterprise experts during June 2015.
Elvaston Castle and Country Park, in Derbyshire, has been working to establish through consultation, with a wide variety of communities of interest and partners, a clear ‘vision document’ for the Castle.
This has been achieved and now the Castle is looking to appoint a Chair of a new advisory Development Board, to prepare the estate for the next phase of its sustainable future.
Working with The National Trust, Derbyshire County Council have delivered a profile and terms of reference for the new Chair and the Development Board.
This Community Interest Company (CIC) has been established to play its own partnership role in developing and broadcasting news and information to the Elvaston community and its hinterland.
(Roger Moors of SEEM, has through his work with the community and DCC, as well as the Elvaston team, been instrumental in the creation of this new inclusive community presence, designed to inform everyone about the new future for the Elvaston Estate).
You can discover more about ‘The Future of Elvaston’ on the web site www.futureelvaston.co.uk here.
Ethical business with a social dimension…
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SEEM (Supporting Social Business) will be in London for the UK’s biggest social investment conference at the end of November 2014 and as partners to this event we’ve secured a special discount rate for our members and readers of ‘MiningTheSEEM’
With less than four weeks to go to the Good Deal Conference taking place on the 24th and 25th of November, we’re looking forward to seeing what’s new in the world of Social Finance. Our partners Matter&Co are once again organising the UK’s biggest gathering of social entrepreneurs, civil society leaders, corporates and social investors.
Keynote speakers include Jacqueline Novogratz, Vince Cable, Safia Minney and Liam Black. For more information on programme and venue details please visit www.good-dealsuk.com.
As a partner to the event we are delighted to offer all of our members a 25% discount ticket to the conference using the promo code SEEM14.
We’re reliably informed that over half the tickets have already been sold, so if you can’t wait give a member of the Good Deals team a call 020 8533 8892.
Nottingham based Food Freedom, a new social business created by Nicky Gray and supported by Roger Moors of SEEM managed to secure national coverage this week on BBC Radio 4.
Developed as a consultancy and training company to advise and inform food businesses about allergies, Nicky spoke about the impending legislation that all restaurants, indeed all food outlets will be subject to come mid December this year. ‘You and Yours’, one of the stations prime time programmes featured Nicky and a number of restauranteurs talking about the need to comply with the new laws or face prosecution.
Nicky who has a wealth of knowledge in this arena decided to establish her business last year to both safeguard people who suffer with food allergies and intolerances but also to assist food outlets, many of whom are unaware of the new law and their obligations. Food Freedom was one of a number of businesses supported by SEEM under the Cabinet Office Social Incubator North programme. Roger said…
‘I’m delighted that Nicky has managed to get this level of publicity and awareness on national radio. The impact of her work is enormous and I’m really pleased that the support and finance we provided has enabled her to grow and develop her business so successfully in such a short period of time’.
To the Galleries of Justice in Nottingham this morning, 17th July 2014, for a massive double espresso shot of Social Finance. Two hours of concise advice, proven experience and excitement for a sector under change.
Hosted by our own Roger Moors of SEEM, the assembled audience convened for coffee and muffins at 7.45am, more about the venue at the bottom of this article, all looking forward to a series of key speakers on expanding, developing and capitalising on our growing sector, courtesy of Big Society Capital.
Councillor Nick McDonald – Nottingham City Council:
Cllr. McDonald was delighted to announce to the gathered social finance bankers and intermediaries that the City now had a newNottingham Social Impact Fund. This new source of funding for the enterprising small business comprises a pot of £1 million pounds, which, argued Cllr. McDonald, coupled to a revised City Procurement Policy, would heavily lean the city towards a paradigm shift in its industrial base, as well as building on existing entrepreneurial energies in the city. A new fund is always welcome for the business sector, particularly at very good rates.
Geetha Rabindrakumar – Social Sector Lead, Big Society Capital:
New research, new ideas…
Geetha began by offering the audience a classic definition of social investment, and underscored research that indicates, whilst societal problems will magnify and public sector funding will continue to diminish, it is the social sector, with its thirst for new forms of finance that will drive the sector forward in the next few years.
Underscoring the role of Big Society Capital as a finance wholesaler, Geetha stressed the importance of intermediaries in process, and that BSC will be looking to exhaust its coffers on innovative projects, which give investors their money back, provide a return on that investment and achieve social impact and delivery.
A clear presentation of roles and responsibilities in the sector, now and in the future.
Sam delivered a pacy and detailed analysis of the work of The Key Fund for his audience. Outlining the Fund’s history, but also encouraging intermediaries with the news of the quality of relationships the Fund enjoys, it’s flexibility and pace in moving from application to decision. A refreshing approach in a finance oriented sector, we believe.
The Fund also illustrated how innovative and enterprising communities and individuals can be. Sam offered the audience examples of Fund development clients as diverse as a Therapeutic Comedy Training Academy, a Virtual Human Body for drug testing, community wind farms and and solar photo-voltaic energy installations on community buildings.
The Key Fund deserves it’s key player status as a driver of fiscal energy for projects across the North of England. Discover The Key Fund on–line here.
Peter Ware – Partner at Browne Jacobson LLP:
Peter gave the assembled audience a very informative over-view of Public Sector Mutual’s development. Organisations that move into the social business sector, ofen with existing customer bases and public sector ethics and philosophy.
Reminding us that the sector could see demand for social finance rise to £500 million by 2015, Peter, nonetheless, did not shy away from some of the issues to be wrangled with in creating Mutuals in a local authority setting.
Matt explained the heavyweight nature of The Big Lottery, and how it was looking to develop agile, relevant and timely funding solutions in the future, particularly to benefit the social finance sector.
Working across three strategic layers the Fund is looking at how demand, intermediaries and the supply side of funding can all be tempered and flexed to respond to the needs of risk capital with a social mission at its centre.
Richard gave us a ‘rally cry’ speech, moving across his own initiation into social business, after being a banker for twenty years and finding himself re-tailoring a hotel group in an area of social need.
Raising £3 million pounds, only a year ago, using the social business’s innovative model of housing development, coupled to partnerships in the social enterprise sector to provide training and skills support for ex-offenders.
So successful has Richard’s ministration been that profits are reported, funding need has been reined back, temporarily, and the business is set fair to exceed it’s targets of 15 property renovations undertaken per annum and with 150 clients supported through their training process into employment by the end of this five year bond period.
Midlands Together, using a revision of the ‘Together’ model developed in Bristol, describes its work as property development with a heart. Real asset development, care for people and delivery of profits. We were inspired.
We had our breakfast convocation at the Galleries of Justice in the Lace Market quarter of Nottingham. In the heart of the city’s creative area, this museum, educational service and charity offers a fascinating series of spaces for events.
We met in the courtroom. You can see from the narrative above, all our star witnesses for the defense of Social Finance were sparkling. The verdict? Guilty of enthusiasm and expectation for the future.
Vince Cable recently announced a variety of additional support mechanisms for small business – new funding for loans and additional mentoring and support services.
There is a new website – Business is Great Britain – which aims to provide information and resources to UK businesses to plan, export, lead and nurture their development.
The web pages also contain useful links to funding sources, business grants etc., to help that growth.
The new British Business Bank has allocated its first £45 million pound tranche of funds, the deployment of which should begin in early 2014. The money is being placed with finance intermediaries to explicitly be invested in the support of SME’s.
In the ministerial announcement was an indication that the funds may be invested in ‘…businesses that offer non-traditional channels of lending that may not be regulated by the Financial Services Authority or the Office of Fair Trading’. Is this an oblique reference to the Social Business market?
The Sector Mentoring Challenge Fund aims to encourage employers, trade bodies and others to work together and deliver tailored mentoring solutions that address real business needs in their sector.
This is a one off funding tranche, competitively aspiring to fund innovative mentoring and support for business sectors. The Fund is specifically looking for proposals that can become self funding examples of sector support.
Any help for the SME sector is useful in the current economic climate, although the acid test will be how conservative in approach these new intermediary funds turn out to be. More support, or more of the same, only time will tell?
Ethical business with a social dimension…
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You can always support the team at Social Saturday and add interest to your own energetic promotion by emailing news of your events or occasions to socialsaturday@socialenterprise.org.uk
