Social Enterprise Fund
Social Enterprise Fund (SEF)
Loan
Alberta, Canada
Put simply, the Social Enterprise Fund (SEF) is a loan fund. We lend money to social enterprises in Alberta that want to make things better in the community and in the world.
The Social Enterprise Fund invests in social enterprises and social entrepreneurs, providing the patient and imaginative capital they need to successfully accomplish important public benefit missions.
Eligibility
Are you eligible?
If you have any doubts about whether SEF will consider your enterprise eligible for loans, please feel free to send us a letter outlining your mission, answering all the questions above, before you submit a full proposal. It may be a good idea to have a conversation with the fund’s executive director either in person or by phone. Be ready to talk about your idea, and how you see it working. We’ll want to know about the people involved, your target market and how you plan to reach it, and where you see your enterprise in three to five years.
Contact Details
Jane Bisbee (SEF’s Executive Director)
jane@socialenterprisefund.ca
780-756-0660
Contact Details
You have to start with a mission
The thing that sets social entrepreneurs apart is a public benefit mission at the core of the business. More than just a desire to contribute back to community (which is truly admirable, don’t get me wrong!), mission is central to everything a social enterprise does.
So the first hurdle for any organization making a proposal to the Social Enterprise Fund (SEF) is to clearly define and demonstrate your public benefit mission. Who are the primary beneficiaries of your enterprise? How is your mission part of everything you do in business? How will you measure if you are successful in delivering your mission, and how will you report those metrics back to SEF?