A three-tiered branding regime for the social enterprise movement will be announced on Social Enterprise Day
Graphic designed by Glock
'These identifiers will enable our movement to conquer the lack of awareness and understanding that has been such a barrier to us'
Steve Wyler, national director of the DTA and chair of the social enterprise identifier steering group
A three-tiered branding regime for the social enterprise movement will be announced on Social Enterprise Day, 19 November.
Steve Wyler is chair of the 14-member social enterprise identifier project steering group that was set up to find a way to brand the sector with professional marketing advice from the government's Central Office of Information (COI). Wyler, who is also National Director of the Development Trusts Association, told Social Enterprise that three different levels of identification were being developed.
Wyler said: 'These identifiers will enable our movement to conquer the lack of awareness and understanding that has been such a barrier to us.'
He added: 'We must act quickly and decisively to develop the identifiers and we must do it as a united movement.'
The branding project was deemed necessary after research last year by the government's COI found that only 20 per cent of those most likely to support social enterprise knew anything about it.
The project is still researching how the branding would take place but is likely to include some sort of visual logo that would help customers identify best-practice social enterprises and would build on the Social Enterprise Mark, devised by Rise in the south west, which is a halo with the words 'trading for people and planet'.
The second tier would be for businesses on a 'social enterprise journey' that have committed to the principles and values of social business and would have a similar but different visual branding device.
The third device could be used by 'every school or university running a social enterprise project, by every law firm, business adviser or bank providing specialised social enterprise services' and would be all about awareness raising. All three elements of branding would have 'strong visual continuity'.
Wyler admitted there were risks in the strategy, including the possibility of 'socialwashing' in the same way that 'greenwashing' has happened. But he said these risks were being mitigated by developing, alongside the campaign, 'a clear set of principles, values and criteria'.
You can read more in this month's issue of the magazine.
To comment on the proposals visit www.socialenterprise.org.uk
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Comments
I think a three tier system
I think a three tier system will confuse rather than clarify.
The proposed third tier is so wide as to be meaningless. The intention to raise awareness is laudable, but I think this approach is more likely to spread cynicism.
I can understand the thinking behind the second tier for emerging social enterprises, but unless this category is strictly time-limited it's not much of a recommendation.
The only sensible solution is to have one identifier mark. Either an enterprise meets the criteria or it doesn't - no ifs or buts.
David Parker Alpha Communication www.alpha.coop
How about publishing it?
"I would encourage people to read the full article in the magazine" - So should we divert another £54 from achieving our social aims to subscribing to another dead-tree magazine? (It doesn't look like online-only subscription is available.)
Wouldn't that just be giving more ammunition to the people who are trying to exclude worker cooperatives like ours from the social enterprise tent?
I think it would be much better for something as potentially important as this to be developed in the open, rather than locked away for subscribers of a particular magazine. Any identifier should be based on mutual verification, but so far the SEC appears hell-bent on repeating the mistakes of the SEM on a larger scale and on the national stage.
MJ Ray, a member of www.software.coop
I’m just back from annual
I’m just back from annual leave, or I would have posted something here a bit sooner to clarify that the three-tiered model described in the article above, and more expansively in the magazine itself, is currently still in the testing phase - nothing has been decided yet. The steering group (including representatives from RISE, SEC, and many others– see the magazine for the full list) will be reviewing specialist research as well as expertise and opinions from the movement to determine the best way forward. I would encourage people to read the full article in the magazine for a more detailed explanation of where we are now and how we believe things will proceed.
Ultimately, this process was undertaken to find out how we can increase awareness and understanding of social enterprise, and I believe that is not only necessary, but of some urgency. There will certainly be differences of opinion about how we get there, but it is our goal to present something to the wider movement that is valuable, effective and sustainable. Steve Wyler - chair of the Identifier Steering Group (Director of the DTA, vice-chair of the Social Enterprise Coalition).
Steve Wyler, Development Trusts Association
Brands and Marks
"Surely 'brands' attach to particular companies, goods or services" but then the first example "Co-op" is a family of companies, even in the tightest definition! So I think that shows there's no hard line on that.
Even so, one mistake was in calling it the Social Enterprise Mark when it can't be a trade mark because characteristics of goods or services are absolutely excluded from trademarks.
Training and support for all social enterprise workers may well be a better investment. Then social enteprises could market themselves with the fruits.
MJ Ray, a member of www.software.coop
"RISE did a great job of creating a model that worked"
"RISE did a great job of creating a model that worked" - not based in the South-West of England, then? My co-op is and we've taken an in-depth look at the SEM. Many parts of it seem arbitrary and little to do with social benefit. We've sent our comments to our regional and national representatives who are working with RISE to look at the problems, but I think this premature national rollout has broken it.
MJ Ray, a member of www.software.coop
Three Tier Brand
We all want to be better recognised, but the proposed three tier 'brand' risks adding more confusion than value.
Surely 'brands' attach to particular companies, goods or services (eg Co-op, Big Issue, cafedirect, geobar). What seems to be being described is a three tier certification system or Mark.
So apart from confusing 'brand' with 'mark', the scheme also faces the challenge of policing criteria. The Fair Trade Mark has been very successful, but is also costly to operate and not without its critics both from within and from without the Fair Trade movement. The more open and inclusive the criteria (especially if largely reliant on self assessment) the less 'bite' the mark will have.
It is laudable to want to promote the sector and encourage greater recognition. Will a scheme which seems muddled in its use of marketing terminology be the best way to do this?
A better investment might be marketing training and support for the leaders of the many excellent (but not yet recognised) social enterprises.
'By their fruits ye shall know them'
OFGS
If it's not policed properly and it's free to the brand/product/organisation it will have absolutely ZERO value and will be mis-used by people.
RISE did a great job of creating a model that worked, albeit than only a handful of companies made the grade. They should roll this out nationally rather re-investing a much poorer wheel.
Add to that that if you're an organic, fairtrade, ethical, recyclable, donating to charity 'brand' which carries the 'traffic light' food grading system, plus the new CO2 indicators, does this mean that you have any space left for your own brand communications?
I am so bored of companies trading off a platform (social, green, ethics, charitable, Fairtrade, environmental) which is based purely on spin and manipulating the system - much better for the government to spend money on getting Trading Standards, the Charities Commission or the OFT to slap a few heads together and make an example of 'green/eco/charityetc-washing' some of them.
As far as I'm aware (and from asking a few government people 'in the know') they can't even agree on what a definition of social enterprise is.
No wonder the founders of the SEC walked away.
Very poor Mr Whyler, very poor.
onedifference.org
Three-tier brand?
Surely any successful brand is a single identifier, mark or logo. If consumers are calling for the launch of a simple fair trade-style badge of recognition for SEs it's my view that any attempt at a three-tier fudge is likely to do injustice to the sector and diminish the achievements of our flagship social enterprises.
True, below the surface lies an exciting new generation of social entrepreneurs creating growth for the future. We can also observe the metamorphosis of many established third sector organisations moving towards a social enterprise model. Social enterprises however need to come of age, be proven and sustainable.
The private sector, shamed and weakened by the effects of greed by too many of those most powerful will seek, in the post-recession economy,to align itself much more closely to ethical business. However we should not be fooled into forming hasty alliances with the 'soley-for-profit' sector. I say, let EFQM, IIP, and other standards demonstrate commitments to corporate social responsibility well beyond the effects of 'social-washing'
In short, why not adopt the RISE SE Mark as the sole badge of social enterprise to provde visibility for those organisations ready to stand in the gaze of public scrutiny?
Bob Northey Director, Social Traders
Low marks for these marks!
I do so agree with the comments already posted on this, especially the Creative Co-op's point about NOT separating out social enterprise.
I was astonished by the COI study's approach to this, particularly it's focus on the need to distance social enterprise from charities to make it distinctive.
Why are they so determined to straight-jacket us?
Are we soon going to disown charities like The Eden Project, COPE and Jamie Oliver's Fifteen (all case studies on the Social Enterprise Coalition's website)?
Those who know me will have anticipated my usual complaint that social enterprise is and should be a verb not a noun. It's something we DO, not something we ARE.
In fact I believe most social enterprise in this country is done by charities, or the trading subsidiaries of charities, and many of the best examples of social enterprise, like Cafédirect, were conceived and nurtured by charities.
My guess is that the '3 Marks' approach is a committee's idea of how to deal with the fact that real 'social enterprise' eludes the kind of definitions the government et al would like to impose on it.
But what's really behind their wilful misunderstanding of this issue?
Could it be that what fits their bill is a few tame alternatives around the edges, mitigating the 'market failures' of conventional business, softening the landing for people let down by overstuffed bankers, palliative care for a broken NHS?
Could it be, even now, too controversial to suggest that economic activity can be organised perfectly well without business models based on greed, exploitation and tax avoidance?
Could it be that presenting social enterprise as a narrow little option alongside conventional business and conventional charity is just more, well, POLITIC, than telling the truth: that anybody using business methods to achieve social benefits is doing social enterprise, that it's everywhere, that it means nothing more nor less than doing business with a commitment to do good.
The really radical position here is not to say 'this is just one way of doing business' - it's to say 'this is the way EVERYONE should do business'.
www.geofcox.info
3 Tier Brand
Three tier branding is a new one for me.
I believe that only one brand can and should be created.
Take a look at what BMW do. There is one brand and one logo which is on all sizes of cars that BMW sells.
The differentiator is the number: 7 series, 5 Series, 3 series and 1.
Note only one brand and one logo which stands for and is BMW.
The cost of establishing just one brand in the minds of consumers and the public is enormous and requires lots of money on TV.
Looking forwards to understanding the strategy.
Mark Waterfield