Growing Social Enterprise Startups to watch out for in 2021!

The drive to create a business which has a purpose and adds value to the society is something that many entrepreneurs put in the center of their business.

Each year hundreds of social enterprises are created worldwide varying in purpose with the desire to make this world a better place.

Singapore has been known as a hub for startups, bringing to life companies like Lazada and Grab. However, this tiny island-city has also been home for many local social enterprises. Focusing on Singapore let's look at what local entrepreneurs from 3 different industries have been working on recently.

Retail & Fashion - The Kint Story

Launched in 2019 Founders Yushu Huang and Elisa Goh, decided to take on the mission to reduce the enormous waste of leather & textiles in Singapore. Their mission: carefully curate, wash and model worn clothes and sell them on their online thrift store The Kint Story.

The leading idea is to cultivate a sustainability mindset by bringing back circular fashion back into fashion. Following a bigger goal, the duo is working on reselling items to only from Singapore but also from other Southeast Asian countries. The website also allows users to sell their own clothing, opening up the movement to anyone interested to contribute to a bigger good.

The duo also has been using their platform to inform its customers about wider topics like body positivity and sustainability.

Make sure to follow them on their Instagram to stay updated.

Tech - Mercurics

Founded in 2018 by Kai Reuber, Mercurics has developed a platform - Selfi.ai - as a tool to help assess employees and candidates by analysing personality traits to understand time-effectively the candidate match for a specific role and the company. Mercuris aims to use this tool to provide a service which can help improve the well-being and mental health of employers and employees by eliminating unnecessary biases and workplace discrimiantion. The company offers multiple solutions such as self discovery and people analytics for companies. The platform Selfi uses a psychometric assessments which is guided and developed through research and powered by Mercurics' AI engine.

Users can get opportunities in domains such as job culture fit & matching, team guidance & cohesion, self improvement & self help. We help companies and individuals unlock the power of personality data to achieve business goals and self-actualization.

The tool aims further to also help people connect on deeper levels to increase productivity at workplace.

If you are curios about Mercurics, check out their website to find out more.

Flower Shop - Hello Flowers!

Hello Flowers! is a social enterprise floral studio which has made its mission not only to create beautiful flowers bouquets, but also to use their passion for a bigger good - empowering local women by teaching the art of flower assembling. The flower shop allows women "from all walks of life, with a special focus on women who are unable to work or hold full-time jobs due to various barriers such as health conditions, caregiving duties, lack of education and/or skills" and up-skills them through their program Kins - by Hello Flowers!

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The mission:

As part of our cause, we aim to empower local women from challenging backgrounds in a holistic manner. Through our programme, we work with social service agencies in our community to equip these ladies with crafting and simple entrepreneurial skills. What distinguishes us from other training programmes is the understanding of their household circumstances, which allows us to tailor our interactions with them. With these new skills, we envision that they can earn extra income through the sale of their craft, which can then be used to supplement their daily expenses and support their dreams.

Furthermore, they hold workshops and are open to partnerships and volunteer opportunities.

In case you are intrested to find out more about the cause or would like to voluteer, dont hesitate to drop them a note at hello@helloflowers.sg.

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