Entreprenören Björn Söderberg: ”Vi har aldrig tjänat så mycket pengar på någoting”

På söndagkvällen träffade Lina och jag Tirtha Rasaili som driver Child Watabarans center i Nepal och den svenska entreprenören Björn Söderberg som driver företag i Nepal.

Björn och Tirtha grundade Child Watabaran ihop, med stöd från det svenska konsultföretaget Xdin, för åtta år sedan.

Björn driver idag tre företag, varav ett är en avknoppning från Child Watabaran. Företagen gör allt från outsourcing av IT-tjänster till julkort av återvunnet papper. Just nu är han i Sverige och föreläser, han blev utsedd till årets talare förra året.

Vi satt alla fyra runt köksbordet och spånade kring olika projekt om hur man kan få till en hållbar utveckling. För min del tycker jag det är otroligt stimulerande att sitta med tre så drivna och kreativa personer som Björn, Tirtha, och Lina och diskutera, vrida på argument, utveckla idéer och ständigt försöka komma på sätt att göra saker bättre.

De kan utan tvekan mer om Nepal, så på det området lär vi oss mycket av dem. Men när det gäller t.ex. sociala medier kan vi ge dem många bra tips. Det känns skönt med ett prestigelöst utbyte av idéer och kreativa infall.

Lina passade på att intervjua både Björn och Tirta och i det här inlägget kommer intervjun med Björn, Tirtha får ni vänta på.

När vi sätter på kameran går Björn in i sitt talar-mode och det är lätt att förstå varför han blev utsedd till årets talare.

Björn berättar bland annat om den åtgärd han utfört som gett bäst pay back under sina åtta år som entreprenör i Nepal. 600kr kostade det och 75% av alla missförstånd försvann.

Björn ger även sin syn på socialt entreprenörskap, Nepal och han ger sitt bästa tips till den som funderar på att starta ett socialt ansvarstagande företag. Dessutom bjöd han på tortillas, men det är inte med i filmen.

Igår stod Lina på en mässa här i Göteborg och hon gjorde stor succé med våra manschettknappar av återvunna kretskort. Jag gillar dem, men jag är positivt överraskad av kundernas mottagande. Fast det är klart, det är en tacksam julklapp.

Jag har blivit fotograferad av en fotograf från tidningen Ingenjören. 1,5h tog det att få till en bra bild, tydligen är jag inte så fotogenisk... Jag och den gravida fotografen klättrade upp på taket här där jag bor för att ta bilder på mig med skjortor fladdrande i vinden. Tur att hon inte ramlade ner... Du får dock vänta till i februari med att läsa artikeln och se bilderna.

Sebastian Stjern
THE FAIR TAILOR
- Dress responsibly
Skräddarsydda skjortor, rättvist producerade, via internet

Konsten att hantera motgångar

Det blir aldrig som man tänkt sig.
Det tror jag är en bra beskrivning av livet i allmänhet och livet som entreprenör i synnerhet. Det som avgör hur bra man lyckas, både i livet och som entreprenör, tror jag till stor del handlar om hur man hanterar de gånger när de inte blir som förväntat.

Jag trivs otroligt bra med det jag arbetar med nu, men ibland kommer ögonblick när jag bara vill gå hem och aldrig komma tillbaka.
Vid såna tillfällen är jag glad över att både jag och Lina har förmågan att först bryta ihop en stund, men sen kan ta oss samman och börja fundera på hur vi ska vända det här till något bra. Hon kanske blir arg på mig för att jag berättar det här. En gång blev Lina så arg på en leverantör att hon gick hemma och skällde ut dem högt för sig själv i en halvtimme. Sen kunde hon åka in till kontoret och ha ett lugnt möte med dem. Ofta är det bra att få ur sig saker, men det gäller att göra det på ett kreativt sätt. Och det tycker jag hon gjorde där.

Vi får ofta frågan om hur det fungerar att driva företag ihop med personen man är gift med. Jag vet inte hur det är för andra, men för oss fungerar det fantastiskt. Summan av våra samlade ansträngningar är större än delarna var för sig. Men vi har bestämt att vi inte får prata om budgetar och ekonomi efter att vi gått och lagt oss.

I Nepal har vi nu äntligen fått fram de ekologiska tygerna. Det har tagit lång tid, men med tanke på att leverantören i Indien var tvungen att färga den ekologiska bomullen med växtfärger och sen låta det torka utomhus innan det kunde skickas till Nepal får vi vara nöjda. Nu har vi 500m ekologiska tyger som väntar på att bli skjortor.

Idag har vi släppt en light-version av vår site. Vi har fått så mycket frågor om man t.ex. kan köpa presentkort innan jul så vi har beslutat att lägga upp en sida där man kan se alla produkter förutom skjortorna. Det ska bli spännande att se hur det utvecklar sig.

Vår facebookgrupp fortsätter att överraska oss. I snitt ökar den med över 20% i storlek varje dag. Helt otroligt! Den responsen är utan tvekan något som gör det här jobbet så fantastiskt.

På söndag ska jag träffa både Tirtha, som är VD för Child Watabaran och Björn Söderberg, den svenska entreprenören i Nepal som blev årets talare förra året. Förhoppningsvis ska jag få till en intervju med dem som jag kan lägga upp på YouTube.

Sebastian Stjern
THE FAIR TAILOR
- Dress responsibly
Skräddarsydda skjortor, rättvist producerade, via internet

An amazing new program that can change mobile health care as we know it

Today I spent a few hours with Björn Söderberg, the guy who is to blame for The Fair Tailor deciding to put the production of our Fair Trade fine dress shirts in Nepal in the first place.

First Björn showed me an amazing new project that his company WebSearch is working on together with Tirtha at Watabaran. It is system to handle medical journals via cell phones. Child Watabaran has a mobile health service, where they drive around to find street children who are injured or sick and give them medical treatment. One problem they have noticed is that it is very difficult to keep track on the kids, if the medical team changes it is no way to know if someone for example is allergic to antibiotics of if she/he has HIV. With the system developed by WebSearch they can use their cell phones to take a picture of the patient and to keep an journal with a medical history. The next time one of the kids is sick or injured they are able to find him/her in the database and can know their medical history.

I am not sure that I'm able to really describe in words how amazing I think this project is. It has such a huge potential world wide.

Here is by the way a video of Björn talking about WebSearch in general.

Sebastian Stjern

THE FAIR TAILOR
-Dress Responsibly

Tailor made Fair Trade and ecological fine dress shirts via Internet

A meeting with Björn Söderberg

After yesterdays tour of the fabric markets to look for fabrics for our fair trade tailor made shirts this has been a much calmer day. Saturday is the day of in Nepal so I thought it would be more quiet today. Little did I know that the neighbours have an orchestra and the orchestra had practice time a 6am today. I am glad that I can sleep fairly well despite of the noice.

Me using public transportation on the way to the fabric dealers

If the video doesn't work, use this link.

Today I have met with Björn Söderberg, a Swedish entrepreneur that is the reason that we have decided to put our production in Nepal. We had originally thought of having the production in Cambodja, but we started talking and here I am, 8 months later, in Kathmandu, Nepal.

We talked for hours about what can be done here in Nepal and why some things can not be done. It was interesting to get his insight to the situation in Nepal. He also had some really exciting projects planned for the future, but I can reveal here what he has planned. Today we discussed entrepreneurship, our business and Nepal. On Friday we are going out to see the Watabaran paper production facilities.

I have uploaded nine videos on YouTube now, you can find them if you search for The Fair Tailor.

Sebastian Stjern

THE FAIR TAILOR
-Dress Responsibly

Tailor made Fair Trade and ecological fine dress shirts via Internet

Hanging out in Abu Dhabi

I'm on my way to Kathmandu and right now I'm changing flights in Abu Dhabi. It's going to be fun to get back to Nepal again. It is the end of the monsoon season right now, so I suppose it will be a little rainy...

We are planing to conduct several interviews for our open position as quality inspector and I am also planning to meet with Björn Söderberg.

I'm a little tired right now, but this time I managed to get a few hours sleep on the flight from Frankfurt.

I just realised that they have a free wifi connection here - much better than the public computers.

I hope to be able to update the blog in Swedish - http://blogg.va.se/entreprenor as well before I leave here.

Sebastian Stjern

THE FAIR TAILOR
-Dress Responsibly

Tailor made Fair Trade and ecological fine dress shirts via Internet

Fair Trade

After having spent the weekend at the parents in law in Värmland I am now ready to take on a new week with The Fair Tailor.

Last week I attended a coaching session with an accountant and he made a quick overlook of our budget and found some things that we should have wrote differently. There is no doubt that we need help from someone who knows more about business economics than we do. The coaching session was arranged by Göteborgs Nyföretagarcentrum and if you live in this region and are planning to start a business, I can really recommend going there.

When I was in Nepal in April I med with a group of Swedish students who were there to study Fair Trade. We met in Patan, just south of Kathmandu, to share our experiences of Nepal. Now they are back and one of them was interview by a local paper, NWT. You can read the whole article here link

By chance I came across an only newspaper article in Dagens Industri about Björn Söderberg who has helped us to get in touch with people in Nepal. The article is nothing extraordinary, it tells the story Björn has told tons of newspapers and magazines, but what struck me was the comments to the article. Many of them were really mean and ill-natured and I suppose it is easy to come across some people like that with an article in a business newspaper. In my blog at Veckans Affärer I have already came across comments about our Fair Trade focus. I know a lot of people don't understand the point of Fair Trade, I suppose I will have to get used to facing them more often... You can read the article about Björn and the comments here: link

Sebastian Stjern
THE FAIR TAILOR
-Dress Responsibly

The last day of business in Kathmandu

Yesterday morning I met with Kumbeshwar Technical School (KTS) in Patan. It is an organization that works with the lowest of the lowest casts, people who are considered untouchable.
When they started the organization in 1983 they found that 90% of the members of the lowest casts did not even have names. No one could read. Some orphanages would not even accept orphans from the lowest casts.
The situation is still terrible for most of them, specially on the country side. But organizations like KTS are making a real difference.
The organization has 479 people in its programs and I was very impressed with what they showed me. Since 1994 the organization has been self reliant, so they don't need any external money other than what they make by selling crafts they have produced.
I visited their school and it really made my heart melt to see the children. They were all so cute and so happy to be in school, without KTS they would probably have to turn to the streets...

Yesterday I was contacted by a Swedish man called Claes who works an organization called Namaste Nepal. They have a training program to teach women tailoring and he has a program with 70 women in the south of the country.
He knows both Tirtha and Björn well, so we will be in contact again when I get to Sweden. Maybe we can work together.
Björn is by the way quite ill, Tirtha told me last night that he has some sort of typhoid and that he is in the hospital.

Last night I was invited to Tirhta and Poonam for dinner. It was really nice to see their home and learn more about the way of the country.
I'm looking forward to get The Fair Tailor up and running so that we can start working together for real.

By the way, a taxi driver told me that the road between Pokhara and Kathmandu would not open until 6pm yesterday. That means that maybe the biggest road in the country stayed closed for more than 30h. It seems I was lucky to get through to Kathmandu.

I have a long trip ahead of me, I suppose that it is about 40 hours until I will be back in my own bed...

Organic cotton

Today has been a good day, I started of by meeting some interesting people together with Tirtha.
First we went to the Garment Producers Association. They gave us contact information to a lot of fabric producers and fabric importers. Tirtha will try and get in contact with most of them over the next couple days.
One of the persons the Garment Producers Association told us about sounded so interesting that we decided to go straight to his production facility. He is maybe the only importer of organic cotton to Nepal and he uses it to make fabrics. That means that it is possible to get a hold of organic cotton fabrics in Nepal. Now we just need to make sure the quality is good enough. I'm not sure that we can get the best quality fabric if we want to use ecological cotton, but we are thinking of having organic fabric as one of the options. It was good to at least see that organic fabrics are available, and maybe possible to produce in better quality.

After the meetings with Tirtha I met with WebSearch Pro, an website producer runt by Bjorn Soderberg. Websearch is one of the companies we are discussing with to make our website. It was interesting to see their facilities.

Tomorrow I'm meeting with the Consul General of Sweden to get their point of view on the political situation here in Nepal and maybe some tips on what to think of when doing business here.

A slow day in Kathmandu

Today has been a rather slow day here in Kathmandu. The pollutions combined with a cold I've caught makes me feel a bit ill.

I spoke to Tirtha earlier and he is working on setting up meetings with fabric supplier. It seems difficult to find organically grown cotton fabrics here in Nepal, but he's working on it.

I have set up a meeting for tomorrow with Fair Trade Group Nepal to learn more about how Fair Trade is done here. On Tuesday I'm meeting with WebSearch, the internet company Bjorn Soderberg has started here in Nepal.

Fair Trade students

Tonight I met with a group of Swedish Fair Trade students who are in Nepal to see how fair trade and fair production works in real life.
We talked for four hours and they gave me a lot of good information, including the name of some people I should meet when I'm here in Nepal. They had actually met with Watabaran here in Nepal and with Bjorn Soderbergs mother back in Sweden.

One thing we discussed was Ekobanken, a social banking bank. We will definitely try to meet with them when I get back to Sweden.
Ekobanken helped to finance a company called DEM collective, a Swedish fare trade company. What DEM has done is really impressive and we hope to learn a lot by studying what they have done.

Tomorrow I'm changing hostels, I'm moving to an are north of the tourist area. Hopefully it will be a bit more quite there.
Right now there is a guy playing trombone just outside my hostel, it is 11pm and tomorrow is a work day here... I've been to almost 40 countries but I think this is the loudest one =)

Aid through trade

Today has been a very interesting day.
I woke up at 3:30 local time after having slept for 3h30 and I could not go back to sleep. But at least it gave me a chance to see the city wake up.

Before lunch I took a taxi to meet up with Tirtha.
He took me to the Watabaran production. It is a quite small facility where the workers produce clothes and bags.
We discussed how Watabaran works and how we could work together. After a couple of hours there we went to the boys home. The Swedish company Xdin sponsors the boys home, where both the boys and the girls go to school. Every month Xdin sends money. By western standards it is not a huge amount, but it is enough to provide 16 boys who used to live on the street with housing, food, school, clothes, yes basically everything. It is hard do understand why not other companies does the same.
Tirtha told me about the history of Watabaran and how they have experimented to come up with the concept that they currently have. Tirtha told me about when he came across a boy who lived on the streets who had a bleeding wound on his hand. The boy tried to stop the blood flow by putting soil in the wound. That made Tirtha and Bjorn start an ambulance service where medical doctors seek up street children to provide them with health care.

After the visit at the boys home we went to the girls home. Everybody was really friendly and I talked a little to the girls. Some of them were making paper airplanes of their old homework assignments and I showed them my special paper airplane design and they were very impressed =)

It was good to see how the children live and how Watabaran makes life easier for them.

Our initial idea was to train our personnel ourselves but that does not seem possible. It takes years to make learn to make a shirt so we are thinking of a different method. Side by side of the general production we think about having children from the school studying how the professional tailors make shirts, thus learning the work faster and better so that they later can join the general production.
But there are still tons of details to sort out.

Tomorrow I'm meeting with a group of Swedish student who are here to study Fair Trade, it is going to be interesting to get their opinion on The Fair Tailor project.

By the way, "Aid through trade" is a slogan Watabaran uses. I like it.

Time to say goodbye

When Lina played the piano she was often asked to play Time to say goodbye at weddings. That felt a bit, eh, strange.
But now it’s time for me to say goodbye to her. This is going to be the longest we have ever been apart.

Anyway, I’m packing and it seems like I will make it. I think that the only thing that’s might keep me from catching the flight is if my friend Anders doesn’t stop sending me chat messages on Gmail…

I’m starting to get excited. I have looked forward to the trip for some time now, but it is not until now I feel like I’m really going. I will leave from here in about two hours and I will get to Kathmandu about 20 hours later.
Tirtha, a Nepalese friend of Björn Söderberg is coming to pick me up at the airport, that feels really good.

Different weather sites show quite different forecasts for the weather in Kathmandu, the temperature ranges from 19 C to 35 C and from clear skies to heave rain.
Well, by this time tomorrow I will know.

Who are you?

Yesterday we discussed our business idea with Elin and Mikael (see yesterdays post) and I must say that they were really good at playing the devil’s advocate. They really put us to the test, they questioned our decisions and forced us to motivate why we had made the choices we had made. Once we had finished crying ;) we had valuable new input. We talked a lot about whom we will be as a company and who we are going to sell our products to. So if you are considering to buy our products; who are you?

Today we are meeting with Björn Söderberg, a Swedish entrepreneur who has started several CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) companies in Nepal.

By the way, did you remember to turn off your lights during Earth Hour yesterday?

The BANK!

Today we met with Swedbank Avenyn, hopefully they will be our bank throughout this project.
We met two advisors and discussed the project for about an hour, and it was a really good meeting. We have done our homework so we fell we can answer most questions we get, and they seemed interested in the project and asked good questions. Of course, since they are a bank they will need some sort of security...

Before the meeting with the bank I had a meeting with my manager at Etteplan, the company I’m leaving to start The Fair Tailor. I hadn’t presented the idea for him before, but he seemed to really like it. He promised to by a couple of shirts when we are up and running =)

I got an email from Iqube today, it is a company incubator and we are hoping to get them interested in our company. They are looking for 30 entrepreneurs in Gothenburg and they want to meet us next week, on Monday afternoon.
So the plan for the next couple of days is: Saturday - Travel to Stockholm. Sunday – Meeting with Björn Söderberg in Stockholm and travel back to Gothenburg. Monday – Meeting with Iqube. Tuesday – Decision from ALMI and travel to Nepal.