Winners

Jump to a category:

Social Enterprise Award
Social Entrepreneur Award
Young Social Entrepreneur Award
Overseas Impact Award
Social Enterprise Champion (Organisation)
Social Enterprise Champion (Individual)

Social Enterprise Award

Shepshed Carers

Sarah Sanders and Pauline Graves founded Shepshed Carers in Loughborough in 1994 as a workers’ co-operative, convinced they could provide better care than they had witnessed. Their mission was to provide high quality care for the elderly and others with high-dependency needs in their own homes. Since then it has grown from strength to strength, with 80 workers/members, 250 users, and a turnover above £550,000. Users cite the services as high quality and reliable, and their families receive exceptional levels of support and peace of mind. Co-op members receive excellent pay and conditions as well as ongoing training to develop their skills and abilities. Local authorities, whose contracts account for 80% of Shepshed’s work, benefit from proven standards of care, and the local community continues to benefit from the creation of 80 well-paid, secure jobs.

Shepshed’s mission has not been confined to the local community. Their reputation has led a number of organisations from across the country to approach Shepshed Carers with the aim of improving their own caring practices. There are now 49 care co-operatives in the UK, and Shepshed remains one of the most important and influential.

Highly commended in this category:

Bryson House, http://www.brysonhouse.co.uk/
Suma, http://www.suma.coop/

Social Entrepreneur Award

Nick Baxter

http://www.cornerstone.org.uk/

Nick Baxter and Cornerstone Community Care have had an excellent year. Scotland’s pioneering provider of care to people with learning disabilities and special needs grew by over 30 per cent, to reach over 900 adults and children.

Since founding Cornerstone in 1980, Nick Baxter has transformed the way care is provided and helped to change the public’s attitude to learning difficulties - immeasurably improving thousands of lives. Cornerstone popularised the idea of helping people to become independent, by supporting them in their home and helping them to find work, rather than languishing in a hospital.

"Cornerstone was founded 25 years ago to provide ground-breaking new services for people with learning disabilities - and we are fast becoming the leading provider of services for people with learning disabilities in Scotland. This nomination recognises the hard work by the entire team at Cornerstone. We opened the first service in 1982 and since then Cornerstone has gone from strength to strength," says Nick Baxter.

Cornerstone’s Deputy Chairman, Tony Dyer says: "Nick is involved at all levels of the organisation from chairing strategic planning meetings to going 'back to the floor' annually, to keep abreast of issues that may be occurring in the services."

Nick Baxter has led the Aberdeen-based organisation to cover 140 locations and turnover £19.5 million in 2003/4.

Highly commended in this category:

Sophi Tranchell, http://www.divinechocolate.com/

Young Social Entrepreneur Award

Jason Pegler

http://www.chipmunkapublishing.com/

At the age of 17 Jason Pegler, now CEO of Chipmunkapublishing was diagnosed with manic depression and spent six weeks in a hospital for mental health. The experience had a profound impact on him, and since then he has dedicated himself to helping others in a similar position and to changing public perceptions about mental illness. In 2001 he received a grant from MIND to print 300 copies of his autobiography A Can of Madness, using the proceeds to start Chipmunkapublishing with co-founder Andrew Latchford. Their aim is to raise mental health on the political agenda, remove the stigma attached and make it "part of the social norm". Their publications are written by people with mental health issues, and his own autobiography is a remarkable account of living with manic depression. The book was an instant success, striking a chord with millions affected by mental health around the world, and is now used by healthcare professionals to help understand the issues involved. A film version is in the pipeline.

At 29, Jason is not just a successful author, publisher and activist but is widely recognised as a social entrepreneur, consultant and an inspirational public speaker. In October 2004 he set up the Chipmunka Foundation, which aims to become the world’s largest mental health charity. He recently appeared on BBC One discussing patients’ rights, and has lobbied for funding at 10 Downing Street. No doubt he will continue to give a voice to those who have too often not been heard.

Overseas Impact Award

Bishopston Trading Company

http://www.bishopstontrading.co.uk

Bishopston Trading Company was founded in 1985 to provide fair employment in the South Indian village of KV Kuppam, which has had a friendship link with Bishopston in Bristol since 1978. Since then the enterprise has become a thriving workers’ co-operative, with five shops in England and a team of 168 tailors and 300 handloom weavers in India producing a range of clothes in organic cotton. The profits generated are used to benefit the people of KV Kuppam through the South Indian Rural Development Trust. For the last three years this has gone into building accommodation for the tailors.

The villagers insisted they wanted fair work rather than charity, and the company has always upheld that ethos. Men and women are paid equally, child labour is not used, and employees enjoy a range of benefits such as medical care, maternity allowance, a crèche and after-school activities. The tailors are paid above average wages, but more importantly are provided with full and secure employment all year round. With a paid staff of 32, directors elected annually by members of the co-operative, and an annual turnover of almost £1m, Bishopston Trading has become a shining example of the ways that Fairtrade can be central to a sustainable, successful business, without external funding and without volunteers.

Social Enterprise Champion (Organisation) Award

Traidcraft

http://www.traidcraft.co.uk/

Traidcraft is the UK’s leading fair trade organisation, fighting poverty in the developing world through trade since 1979. Founded on Christian principles, the organisation’s core mission is to enable poor, unorganised producers to trade on an equal basis in developed markets, and to develop their business practices to a sustainable level. To that end, Traidcraft seeks to influence lawmakers and public opinion to support fairer trade practices.

Traidcraft’s unique structure, combining a plc with charitable and educational arms, furnishes the organisation with the professionalism and credibility needed to fulfil its advocacy aims. With access to the charitable, business and public sectors, Traidcraft is a leading promoter of corporate social responsibility and a pioneer of social accounting. Traidcraft embodies the ideal that a business should work in the interests of all its stakeholders, and be accountable for its impact on the poor.

Traidcraft has played a vital role in demonstrating that fair trade is a viable business model. Turnover is expected to exceed £15 million this year, providing producers with vital income in over 30 countries, and a modest dividend to investors. Innovations such as helping to establish Cafédirect and the Fairtrade mark have been instrumental in making the issue the mainstream force for change that it has become in recent years. Traidcraft is a true champion that has inspired many other organisations.

Social Enterprise Champion (Individual) Award

Richard Adams

http://www.communityviewfinders.com/

Richard Adams has dedicated his working life to alleviating poverty in the developing world. In 1974 he began importing handicrafts from farming communities in Bangladesh. This initiative grew to become Tearcraft, the craft marketing arm of the major UK relief and development charity Tearfund.

In 1979 Richard also established Traidcraft, which became a plc in 1984, offering the first 'alternative' and socially-oriented public share issue in the UK. Traidcraft expanded to produce a wide range of goods, including the first fairly traded tea in 1980. Traidcraft works with small to medium-sized enterprises throughout the developing world, providing thousands of jobs and often working in collaboration with the Department for International Development. Their current sales exceed £12m per year.

Richard set up the Fairtrade Foundation in 1989, providing a fair trade 'seal of approval' for products from the developing world and helping to put fair trade on the corporate agenda. In 1994 he founded Out of this World, Britain’s first chain of Fairtrade grocery stores.

Richard is also a highly successful author. After writing Who Profits? in 1989, exploring alternative methods of trade, Adams went on to set up the business research charity New Consumer and co-authored many seminal titles.

Richard Adams has established and developed more than a dozen successful charitable, community-owned, or co-operative enterprises. Each organisation aims to encourage constructive social values and empower people so that they can provide for themselves.

He was awarded the OBE in 2001 in recognition of these achievements.