Can a social venture be financially self-sustaining?

Recently, a local radio program, The State of Things, discussed innovation on college campuses. Most of the hour-long show focused on efforts at N.C. State University, including the Garage, an on-campus business incubator for student entrepreneurs.

Carolina’s own Micah Gilmore, Clinical Assistant Professor of Social Innovation, was a guest on the program. He said that entrepreneurs are still learning how to apply skills learning in profit-making ventures into the nonprofit world.

Question to Micah Gilmore from host Frank Stasio: Can all socially responsible ideas be for-profit ventures? Is there a place in the world for nonprofit? How do you see things working with those two worlds – the nonprofit world and the smaller profit world?

Micah Gilmore: That’s exactly the question. For us, and the work I do at UNC, it’s really about helping students understand ways in which to generate revenue for their ventures. But more importantly, there are things that need doing in terms of the larger societal impact piece that are not profitable. It’s not profitable to provide education to low-income students, or to give medical care to folks that don’t have insurance. There’s no way to really make money doing that. So the question for social innovation is: How do we take what we’re learning in the entrepreneurship space and really translate that to the context that really can impact the larger societal problems? So, job creation is a piece of that, but it’s not the end-all be-all in terms of solutions for our society.

Looks like there is opportunity for innovation in social entrepreneurship.