Aim
The aim of the Acquiring Business for Good project, which will run from January 2009 for the next 3 and a half years, is to support more people who are currently excluded from the labour market into employment, by acquiring businesses and converting them to Social Firms. The project draws on lessons learned from a similar acquisition approach developed by Social Firms Australia which are detailed in a piece of research that Social Firms Scotland published in 2007 (click here to view)

Rationale
Traditional development routes for Social Firms, whether through start up, franchising or replication present certain risks and challenges. On the other hand, Social Firms Scotland is confident that Acquiring Business for Good will provide some opportunities for those who are keen to establish new Social Firms or extend their current business portfolio.

The sector is still relatively young and as such it has not yet achieved the critical mass needed to be able to meet the level of demand from severely disadvantaged people wanting to move into employment. Acquiring businesses and converting them to Social Firms offers one way of doing this. However there is currently no infrastructure in place for such a model to be used in Scotland which is reflected in the lack of case studies that Social Firms Scotland was able to find in their research.

We know that Social Firms work and can have a positive influence on people's lives through working in a supportive environment in a real business free from stigma.

In addition, due to the lack of critical mass, Social Firms have yet to evidence their social and economic impact on a significant scale. Social Firms Scotland believes that more Social Firms would mean that the sector would be better able to speak for itself as a result of its increased scale of impact. More Social Firms would also yield greater influence when lobbying on important issues related to Welfare Reform for example.

If the sector is going to achieve its full impact lessons being learned from around the world (1) would indicate that we need to develop new Social Firm business models that can scale to a size where they generate sufficient revenue to cover both business and incremental costs that are a function of their social mission.

For further information
Contact: Karen Anderson, Business Acquisition Coordinator
Tel: 07771818277 or by email

(1) Schorr, Jim (July 2006) Social Enterprise 2.0 Moving towards a sustainable model, Stanford Social Innovation Review