The VisionSpring
Model: Creating Markets And Players Instead Of Empty CSR
Laura Zax, 10/05/2012
A talk with Dr. Jordan
Kassalow about the field of social enterprise—how far it has come, where it’s
gone astray, and where it’s headed.
Earlier this month,
the Schwab Foundation announced its 2012 “class” of outstanding social
entrepreneurs. Among them was Dr. Jordan
Kassalow, the founder of an organization called VisionSpring that
works to ensure that everyone in the developing world has access to
eyeglasses. Part of the VisionSpring strategy is to equip local
people – identified as Vision Entrepreneurs – with the tools they need
to create businesses that generate jobs while addressing an important
health need.
It’s perhaps no
surprise that Kassalow’s organization was the breeding ground for another
disrupter in the world of optics, Neil Blumenthal.
Blumenthal, who started his career with VisionSpring, is the co-founder of Warby Parker. You may have heard of
the company. After all, it’s the talk of both the fashion and business
worlds: a company proving that hip eyewear can be affordable and can change the
world for the better. For every pair of glasses sold, Warby Parker funds the
production of a pair of eyeglasses for VisionSpring, which VisionSpring in turn
sells either directly to Base of the Pyramid (BoP) consumers or to vision
entrepreneurs.
How is what you’re doing with Warby Parker different from traditional Corporate
Social Responsibility (CSR)?
- One thing that’s kind of unique is that the founder of Warby Parker worked at VisionSpring for 5 years. During this time he really saw firsthand the power of using markets to effect change. So, Neil’s desire to create a company that is a force for good is rooted in his personal experience and deeply authentic. Also Warby is taking the one-for-one model further than others, in that most one-for-ones are using donations to get glasses and shoes out there, whereas Warby Parker has bought into the VisionSpring model: this is about creating markets and helping local markets to function.
What’s wrong with the donation model—“you buy one, we give one”—of social
enterprise?
- The donation model is the tried and true model people understand. But it has clear limitations. Let’s use eyeglasses as an example: glasses that are donated often don’t match the needs of the consumer and so the uptake and usage is less than optimal.
Earlier in my career,
when I worked with donation-based organizations, I literally had people who
were blind hand back glasses to us because they felt those particular glasses
made them look ridiculous; there was ridicule culturally. If you’re just giving
something away, you don’t have the market as a mechanism to determine whether
or not the consumer really wants your product, whereas when you ask the
consumer to pay, you know clearly where that person places value.
Also, if you don’t
develop the capacity of local communities to devise their own ongoing
enterprises that provide glasses or shoes or other needed products, then as
soon as the company that is donating these products goes away, the
products go away as well. By
creating a company that’s more locally owned and market driven, you
increase the chance of having the solution embedded sustainably in the
community.
A very trendy friend of mine recently looked at herself in the mirror and
found she was wearing a pair of TOMS and a pair of Warby Parker
glasses. Social change is getting trendier – is there anything to worry
about there?
- The [social enterprise] space is going to get more crowded, and there’s going to be a battle for the consumer in every category. If you’re getting a whole bunch of noise and a whole bunch of players, some are just going to be doing it to capture the consumer, who might not have a good enough sense of smell in terms of sniffing out authenticity versus marketing exploitation. Then it could end up being a trend for trends’ sake.
B Corporations, companies certified to meet rigorous social
responsibility standards, could play a role here.
- Absolutely. It’s like a LEED stamp of approval for buildings. People will see that B mark and will understand what that represents.
Will B corporations make non-profits go “out of business,” so to speak?
- No, I don’t think so. There are so many problems that don’t really have a market-based solution. What will be harder is for organizations that have for-profit potential or market potential to live in the no man’s land of non-profit social enterprise for ten or twenty years. Product-based social enterprises will have a harder time attracting long term philanthropic capital unless they are on a strong pathway to cost coverage.
- No, I don’t think so. There are so many problems that don’t really have a market-based solution. What will be harder is for organizations that have for-profit potential or market potential to live in the no man’s land of non-profit social enterprise for ten or twenty years. Product-based social enterprises will have a harder time attracting long term philanthropic capital unless they are on a strong pathway to cost coverage.
What does social enterprise look like in ten years?
- Extremely bright, but there will be more scrutiny. Bright because social entrepreneurship is burgeoning and attracting some of the brightest young people to the field. The next ten years are critical however because it will be a time when more mature social enterprises with revenue models like VisionSpring will have to prove that social enterprises are scalable and able to wean themselves off philanthropic capital. Unless social enterprises develop balance sheets that are robust enough to attract Impact Investments or true commercial capital, they will always remain small.
