Social enterprises are on the agenda in Denmark – not only in Kolding, but also at the national level. Since spring 2013, a national committee for social enterprises has been working to develop a set of recommendations for how the Danish Government and other stakeholders can contribute to promote social enterprises in Denmark.  These were published in September 2013.

The overall vision is that social enterprises should address several major societal challenges.

As part of the committee’s work there is established a Danish definition on social enterprises: “Social enterprises are private and do business with the purpose that their work and earnings promote specific social purposes.”

Recommendations

The Committee is of the opinion that it takes a long and challenging process to achieve the vision, and that there is a need to make it easier and more attractive to establish, operate and develop social economy enterprises. It is therefore proposed that the government establish a national strategy, based on the recommendations.

In total, the committee has provided five general recommendations on how Denmark gets more and stronger social enterprises:

1)      New legislation and administrative practices: clear legal framework and a minimum of administrative burden is crucial. The social enterprises must keep focus on their business and not spend unnecessary resources on administration. Therefore, the Committee recommends introducing a special registration model to define, legitimise and regulate the sector and help create a common identity for social enterprises in Denmark. Furthermore, the interaction between the public and social economy sector must be strengthened.

2)      Raising awareness: To spread the knowledge of the social economy sector is essential in order to build trust in social enterprises and ensure that they are recognised. It is important to strengthen the interaction with potential customers, investors and partners. The Committee therefore recommends that the broad public sector are better informed about what social enterprise is and build up more knowledge about the sector.

3)      Strengthened entrepreneurship and empowerment: The presence of appropriate business and social competencies is essential in order to establish and develop social enterprises. The committee therefore recommend a focus on inspiring the development of new social enterprises and business models as well as supporting the development of competence in existing social enterprises.

4)      Better funding opportunities: Social enterprises are like any other companies relying on capital and funding when they have to establish themselves and scale their business. The Committee recommends the development of a social investment market, where new and existing players make risk capital available. This should include the establishment of a social economic fund and alternative capital options.

5)      Increased focus on social considerations into partnerships and procurement: Increased cooperation with stakeholders in the private and public sectors is essential for the social economy enterprises chances to achieve better marketing opportunities and a greater customer base. The committee therefore recommends an effort to increase focus on social considerations into partnerships and trade between social enterprises economic, public and private clients.

 

Social economic entrepreneurship camp in Kolding, Denmark

As part of the SEEING project, the municipality of Kolding organised a Social Economic Entrepreneurship Camp on the 24th of September, where 46 people from across the country met  in Kolding in order to develop social economic business ideas. The participants were a mix of students, business men, employees from local authorities, politicians and people from the volunteer sector.

It was a not an easy task; it appeared it is easy enough to generate ideas for social innovation, but to create a concrete business model is more complicated.

 

The participants at this four-hour workshop received a 3-minute crash course inAlexander Osterwalders “Business Model Canvas”, which is a strategic management tool that can be used to create a structured overview on how to “make a business”, including a description of values, infrastructure, costumers etc.  The workshop resulted in 15 concrete business models for social innovation.

 

Figure 1: Alexander Osterwalders Business Model CanvasFigur 1

Here are a few examples of some of the business models:

  •  “Bee in town” – a project which aims to produce honey on the roof of big companies and institutions and employ people who have difficulties in entering the labor market
  • “Pie without light” – Blind people invite seeing people to experience what it is like to be blind. A team of blind waiters serve dinner and lead? dialog in a darkened room. Potential to   sell it for businesses as an office party even!
  • A company that produces fashion design and employs refugees and immigrant women
  • A company that solves everyday tasks, small practical tasks for elderly people: e.g. picking apples, patching?repairing? cycles, canning???cleaning?, gardening, clearing snow.

 

Some business models are more adequate than others, but the method ensured that the participants thought deeply about the business ideas. In addition to the 15 ideas, the most popular business model which is about an apple factory, will be turned into a good practice example, which it is hoped will inspire nascent social entrepreneurs to turn their ideas into practice. The good practice example will be available from the SEEING website in a few months time.