Non-Profit Entrepreneurship

Last week I met with Kay Paine, a manager of the Boston-based non-profit InnerCity Entrepreneurs (an affiliate of Root Cause) to discuss some of the possible ways we can structure HeatSource Textiles as it grows beyond the prototype phase. At the moment, the clearest way I can describe these options would be:

1. As a non-profit that directly manages its own business ventures (design, manufacturing, sales and distribution of socially-beneficial products in developing countries).
   
2. As a non-profit that establishes new semi-autonomous for-profit enterprises with local partners who manage part or even the entirety of the business ventures.
3. Some variation I haven't thought of (admittedly a wide range of possibilities)

Given Kay's experience with InnerCity Entrepreneurs, which focuses on developing MBA-type certificate programs for small business owners in urban areas, I believe that she will be able to bring some real sophistication to this discussion as we move ahead. Kay succinctly described a few aspects of the strategy that ICE employs: avoid growing bureaucracies, create services that can be offered by other non-profits (and for-profits).

One fascinating story from her past was the process of incubating one of the first online anti-smoking support networks, QuitNet, into a financially-self sustaining non-profit that has substantially impacted the health of its target user group over the last 15 years. The crucial shift came when the managers of the program discovered an appreciable demand for "premium" services that could be sold to organizations interested in the health of its employees and members. This allowed free services to continue to improve through a sort of trickle down (for lack of a better term) of features from from the for-pay services.

I look forward to our next conversation so that I can share more of her interesting thoughts and experiences.