In founding her company, Strappity-do-da, entrepreneur Shelli Styles was more interested in doing good than in making a huge profit for herself:
- Shelli started with a goal to help her husband’s impoverished relatives in South America
- Her challenge was to create a sustainable business in Santiago de Cali, one of the most troubled and impoverished regions in Columbia
- For her product, Shelli selected a handmade beaded bra strap made by local artisans in the community that could be sold in the States to those who admired the beauty of the product and were moved by Shelli’s cause.
- Back home, Shelli found her product gathered a group of volunteers so enthusiastic that they acted as a volunteer sales force even modeling for her website to help get the company off the ground.
- Contrary to typical business practice but common in the strategy of many bootstrappers, Shelli didn’t bother with a business plan to get her started focusing instead on selling her product and leaving planning for future expansion ‘til later.
- Her approach worked as the message behind her enterprise, lifting women out of poverty, took hold and customers were willing to spend on the quality of her product and the socially conscious goal it represented
- Socially conscious entrepreneurship is a growing market with more business founders and customers interested not only in the product but the values it represents.
Happy Holidays!
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