Looking for a mentor in plastics manufacturing

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One of the most difficult things about starting something completely new is when you don’t have a coach or mentor. While Google and YouTube has been decent in giving me an understanding of the recycled plastics manufacturing process, it hasn’t been so useful in answering my specific questions – like around pricing.

As much as I’ve asked around for the last few months, I still haven’t found a mentor or coach locally with plastics manufacturing experience. This is partially to do because I live in Canberra, Australia which is the nation’s capital. Here, most people work for or with the local and federal government rather than in industries like manufacturing.

So, I’ve expanded my network to outside of Canberra – first to Brisbane. Next week, I’ll be meeting with the CEO of a social enterprise accelerator who has already invested in circular economy type businesses like mine.

I’m more interested in meeting the other companies than I am in the program itself. It would be amazing to find a peer group of complimentary businesses all trying to do great things for the environment. With that type of network, I know that learning curve will flatten sooner too.

Fingers crossed.

Trip to Brisbane

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I’m in Brisbane the next few days for a conference. Since I was already in town, I scheduled coffees with a couple of old contacts.

The first one was with someone who I think might be really useful on my future board of directors. She didn’t know that was partially why I wanted to meet with her until then. After all, I really don’t have much to offer her in exchange for her time and advice yet. Still, it was worth having that conversation early to give us both time to think about her potential contributions for the future.

The other person was an old contact from my last job. He’s a successful entrepreneur himself, and it was good to test my product ideas with him, as well as ask for advice about picking the right investors. It was ironic when he recommended my Manufacturer #1 to me without any promptings as he has done business with them before. Small world.

It doesn’t look like my schedule this trip will align with Manufacturer #1 to see their factory, but it was good that my friend also endorsed me to them – saying that I was serious and “not just kicking the tires on this idea.”

My friend also introduced me to someone who appears to be the founder of a social impact accelerator. I can’t tell if it’s only for Brisbane, but it does seem to be a fairly mature group. In any case, I’m always happy to gain more advice about attracting investors to my social enterprise. So, we’ll try to meet in the next few days.

What exactly is a social enterprise?

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According to Social Traders, an organisation in Australia that certifies these types of entities – social enterprises are:

“Businesses that trade to intentionally tackle social problems, improve communities, provide people access to employment and training, or help the environment.”

I think the OR in that definition is pretty important because I feel like the general population is confused.

When I started my company The Refoundry, I made it purpose driven specifically to help mother nature. However, when I tell people that it’s a social enterprise, many believe that means I should be also be creating jobs for disadvantaged workers, donating all profits to other causes and attending every environmental forum in town.

It’s like someone telling an organic farmer that they must give away their profits to farming charities in other countries.

The farmer’s mission is to farm organically, just like my company’s mission is to make products out of recycled plastic. That’s it. Anything else is bonus.

This one decision alone already disadvantages my business because it costs significantly more to manufacture products in Australia than in places like China – especially with recycled plastic rather than virgin materials. However, it means that the local plastics here have a place to go after their first useful life rather than into the tip or waterways. And this is exactly why I started the business.

Today, even I had to remind myself of my company’s mission as I spoke to a company that does outsourced work from the Philippines. While my manufacturing will be done in Australia as part of the social mission to use Australian recycled plastics, it doesn’t necessarily mean that my customer service team needs to reside here too.

After all, if the consumer won’t buy my products because they are way too expensive, then my business will fail,. Then, there goes all the good I could have done for the environment too.

Social Traders certification process

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Spoke to Social Traders to make sure my social enterprise met their criteria for certification later. They said yes – just need to get 2 clauses into my corporate constitution.