Fledge is a global network of conscious company accelerators and investment funds, helping entrepreneurs create impactful companies and co-ops at scale through intense, short programs filled with education, guidance, and a massive amount of mentorship.
Each city runs (up to) one session per year. Each city’s program is a bit different from the others’, but all are focused on mission-driven for-profit companies, and all invest in their fledglings.
Th educational curriculum is based on The Next Step books and online classes, taught to fill in any gaps in the key skills entrepreneurs need to know to succeed: strategy, financials, marketing, sales, funding, etc.
All our cities share a global network of hundreds of mentors, who share their experiences, advice, and connections in 1-on-1 meetings with participants.
Every day, week after week, we push the participants forward, iterating business strategy, financial models, marketing and sales plans, funding options, and investor and sales pitches, plus we put a special focus on storytelling. The result is intense and creates lasting value for years after the companies return home.
We have been refining this service since 2012 and, to date, have helped hundreds of companies from dozens of countries. We’re eager for more. Our goal is to help foster a wave of companies that make a measurable impact in the world, collectively improving the lives of everyone on the planet.
We invest $15,000 (Peru), €15,000 (Europe), or $20,000 (U.S.) into each company we invite to participate, using revenue-based equity, which aligns our interests with the founders, avoids any pressure to “sell out”, and lets us invest in just about any market segment and most any country in the world. Plus, we make introductions to impact investors and make follow-on investments from our family of seed funds.
Fledge is exceedingly happy to announce today that it has received certification as a B Corporation. What exactly is a B Corporation? These are companies which realize that capitalism can be a force of good in the world. Companies that can be a benefit to the world. The “B” in B Corporation stands for “benefit”. These are companies which believe that shareholder values...
What can be done to improve the world in a single weekend? A whole lot more than you probably think. The world is full of big, important problems. Issues of sustainability, pollution, community, unemployment, etc. The 50 attendees of #SocEnt Weekend: Next 50 spent last weakened with the goal of solving some of these problems, while learning about social enterprise and having fun doing it...
Seven inspiring companies with the potential impact to improve the lives of billions… to save millions of lives… to make it easy to share and reuse the planet’s limited resources… to make it easy for us to share our time with those in need… to recreate the world where we know our neighbors… and to work with those neighbors to create the world we want to live in...
Bloom is an event focused on innovation in sustainability: environmental, social, and economic. Eight speakers will share their stories; what’s new and what’s making an impact. We want our attendees to leave the event with their minds expanded and hearts inspired by learning about what people are building for a more sustainable world. We’ve got a killer lineup of speakers...
Ready to try your hand at being a social entrepreneur? Have an idea that you would like to turn into a company, but are not sure where to start, or what to do next? Or are you eager to join the movement of socially-minded companies, with no idea of your own, but talents to share with others? #SocEnt Weekend is a 50-hour, one-weekend, hands-on workshop, where you can learn how to be a social...
This month begins a tsunami of social entrepreneurship: #SocEnt Weekend, Fledge “Demo Day“, and Social Innovation Fast Pitch (SIFP).
The mobility of Americans over the past six decades has led to huge cultural changes, with the norm now for Americans to move every five or so years, and with those moves, to have friends scattered across multiple states. The rise of email, instant messaging, and most recently, social networking, it is become commonplace for Americans to connect to those friends online. Meanwhile… as we spend...
Americans gave nearly $300 billion to charities last year (2011). That is almost $1,000 per person, and surveys show almost 90% of that giving was by individuals, with those individuals consisting of 67% of the total U.S. population. Meanwhile… in the same year, 64 million Americans volunteered their time, just shy of 25% of the total population. Why do more Americans give away their money vs...
I want to live in a town with a thriving downtown core, with good restaurants, a great bakery, nice shops, and a comforting grocery store. I want to live in a community which supports these business owners. A community where I don’t have to get in a car, drive a half hour, sit in traffic, and shop in a 100,000 square foot store to buy things made halfway around the world. The problem is… it’s...
Living in our comfortable homes in America, boiling a pot of water is as easy as turning a dial on the stove. We forget that for billions of people around the world, heating water involves making a fire. Where is the fire, there is smoke, and where there is smoke, there are shortened lives and early deaths. The team at BURN Design Labs on Vashon Island outside of Seattle knows all about fire, and...