How to Start a Regenerative Business
Can’t find a job you like or want to be your own boss? One of the reasons we started this website is to help people who want to start a regenerative business. We make it easier for people to find you but will also continue to expand our support in a number of other ways.
Here’s an exercise one can do to determine what type of business to start:
Read “What is Regeneration?” [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1DYcnd5iWUYiE4Wltesl2eZsGD1dqGR_0xUSczLNkeFo/edit] and then think about what type of services and goods we will need to transition to a more regenerative version.
Entire sectors will be transformed over time, such as food growing and energy production. How many products or services will be needed in the food growing section alone? Here is a partial list:
• Garden or farm design or consulting
• Soil and water testing
• Composting
• Vermicomposting
• Biochar production
• Edible and useful plant nurseries
• Small and medium regenerative farms and ranches
• Local food distributors and marketers
• Regenerative farmers
• Regenerative ranchers
• Renewable energy production (methane, etc)
• Food processing and preserving
• “Green” transport
Etc.
Other sectors that will need new types of jobs with a more regenerative approach are:
• Water conservation and storage
• Ecological restoration
• Assisted migration of species
• Green building and architecture
• Regenerative urban planning
• Renewable energy (many forms)
• Appropriate technology (low tech, low energy solutions)
• “Waste” to resource
• Education
• Health
• Regenerative finance
• Community building
• Land access
• Governance
Let’s dive into one sector and see what kind of jobs can be created in it.
Turn waste into wealth
A huge source of potential wealth in the US is the waste stream. We throw away 40% of the food we grow. Our landfills are filling up with plastic. There are hundreds of items thrown away that could create a viable income stream if captured and used.
One acquaintance has created a relationship with county contractors who clear seaweed off the popular beaches. This seaweed is tremendously fertile, packed with trace minerals that plants need. He makes fertilizer out of it and sells it to people to feed their gardens. It would have otherwise gone into the landfill.
Another example is an entrepreneur who saw opportunity in the waste stream from hospitals. In the US, bandages expire and have to be thrown out. Yes, bandages! The waste stream coming from our healthcare system is enormous. This person saw wealth, where others saw a problem. Other countries can use these medical supplies, and they can be life saving. He can sell these at a much reduced “used” price even though the goods are brand new, thus making them much more affordable. He’s keeping a tremendous amount of perfectly good supplies out of the landfill and filling a need for them elsewhere affordably.
Below is a very partial list of waste items that end up in landfills but yet are valuable and could create a viable living for the right entrepreneurial spirit.
• Bandages
• Seaweed
• Invasive species (kudzu, water hyacinth and many more have multiple economic uses)
• Horse manure
• Restaurant waste (compost, biogas)
• Used coffee grounds and ash (great fertilizer)
• Construction waste
• Used carpet
• Junk (some “junk” artists make a great living creating art from waste)
• Food waste that can be grown (pineapple tops, green onions, much more)
• Plastic bags (crocheting designer purses)
• Upcycled used clothing
• Broken tile, dishes, etc (mosaic)
• Urbanite (walls, stairs)
• Pallets (furniture)
What ideas or resources do you have that could create regenerative jobs in Florida? What services are missing, in your viewpoint?
How to start a successful regenerative business
Being successful with a regenerative business includes a lot of elements that any business needs to be successful. There are plenty of articles written about that already, so we’ll include only some brief major points. These are important because often, people starting regenerative businesses may have high ideals and may think about business as being an aspect of a holistic lifestyle. These are all desirable – but there are a few points that will increase your chances of economic success in our current system.
- Keep it simple. Start simple, small and slow, and build on successes. Many people are successful at a small business with minimal overhead that pays a few of the bills or buys some extras. It’s harder to create a business that will support a family or employees – if that is your goal, it’s important to follow the next steps.
- Do your homework. The SBA business plan template [https://fitsmallbusiness.com/sba-business-plan-template/] will walk you through how to do that. It’s a tried and proven model. A more regenerative model is the Holistic Management decision making process. This is a rich, life affirming approach to creating your business model.
Is your business idea viable? Take your time doing some number crunching and examining what people out there are already doing. You may have a great idea, but can you make money at it? Enough to survive and pay bills? A business plan is a daunting thing to do but it will help you focus your plan of action, it could save you lots of time and money when done well, and it will show potential supporters that you’re serious and capable of doing the administrative thinking needed to run a business. - Find a mentor. You’re not always going to get the advice you need from just any successful business owner because we all have our own styles of doing business. Try to find someone who is successfully running their own business that has a similar attitude and outlook as you do regarding business. Also, organizations like Million Cups and SCORE offer free support for new businesses. Sometimes it can be helpful to get a completely different viewpoint than yours. We’ve been told by traditional business owners more than once that our ideas would never work though – and so have many others who are now successful. So the mentorship you choose is important. Consultants are also very helpful at this stage and can be worth every penny in saved time, money, energy and grief – there are a number of Holistic Management consultants and other consultants listed in our database. We will hold regular mentoring and regenerative business support sessions online in the coming months, so be sure to sign up for our newsletter.
- Create a strong feedback loop. What is working, what isn’t? Sometimes market research can tell you that too but nothing replaces ground truthing.
- Don’t be shy about asking customers or potential customers what they really want. Ultimately, we all need to provide something others will pay for to be successful.
- Network. This is a strength of regenerative business models; we tend to network much more creatively than is generally done.
- Apply permaculture and regenerative business principles. Stay tuned as we’ll offer webinars, podcasts and articles on this topic and other hints on making regenerative businesses successful.
This model, from ThinkPlace Design is one of a number of different regenerative business models that can be useful for thinking through how to maximize the regenerative components of it.
- Define the Intent: This involves forming a coalition and mapping out the argument why changes need to occur, and what a regenerative future means to the collective group. Explore the initial mindset conditions that need to be invested to enable a journey to become regenerative. (note that Holistic Management decision making process can be an invaluable tool for any management decisions)
- Map the eco-system: This involves a discussion on the scope of the task. and whether you use a scope 1,2 or 3 framework, or another systems model. The important outcome is to identify who is important to engage and collaborate with throughout the process. The mapping is an iterative process and can expect to model this continuously through the process.
- Assess the ecosystem for regenerative health: This assessment explores the system in action and seeks to understand the flows of energy, resources, people, and knowledge. Explore the extent of circular flows, and closed loops; energy flows and carbonisation, fair, equitable labour flows, learning and adapting; value creation; flow of finances etc.
- Design and transition: On the basis of the assessment, co-design the vision for the change that is desired, mapping a theory of change, with strategies that create regenerative actions from regenerative flows, beneficial relationships, balancing system efficiency and redundancy, intervening at differentiated scales, and so on. The design is translated to programs and pilots, which take adaptive and learning approaches, seeking out those projects that can scale. The transition involves changes that include new behaviours, and new practices, both within and across the eco-system. This will require rapid feedback loops and tools to enable and support changes.
- Map eco-system for scale: Mapping out new networks for scaling regenerative projects is a critically important stage, and happens in parallel to stage 4. This stage invites new partnerships and collaborations that create new value.
- Monitor and measure: This is the data story we tell to show our progress and our learnings. This is not just a compliance activity, it is a powerful and important basis to show the return on regenerative investment. The measurement informs storytelling which encourages others to enrol and take up regenerative practices.
Regenerative business design model, developed by ThinkPlace Institute for Regenerative Design
Summary
Part of our purpose is to help people transition to regenerative work. We will continue to offer resources like this and more, to assist you in your efforts to do this. What resources would be of most use to you? Your feedback is valuable to us! (link to contact form)
More resources
Make your existing job a climate job.
Have a job but want to make it more climate focused? Per Drawdown CEO “Every job is a climate job” at this point. This article and the Drawdown Organization can help make that a reality.
How to fund your regenerative start up
(coming soon)