Madcap Café As A Social Enterprise

Reasons for the establishment of madcap café

Discuss about the Madcap Café As a Social Enterprise.

Sometimes profit organizations are well aligned but can they work to provide specific social objectives? The particular social goals should have a social intention that serves its primary purpose. Most of the profit companies are indulged in revenue-generating activities that they fail to engage in any social and ethical actions. While other companies do not make a lot of profits but serve the purpose of helping the society. These social enterprises are few to come about, but they are very essential in the community. The Australian Government has recognized the efforts of this companies. They, therefore, organize end year company award for the companies that engage in the most beneficial social activities (Zhu, Liu and Lai 2016).

An example of such an enterprise is the Ermha Inc. Ermha Company is a social enterprise that has won awards for its community-based delivery of health care to mentally disabled persons. The company received the Fast food industry award for social activity in 2010. The award is just one from a series of nominations that it has collected annually. The company is a sustainable one that has several cafes along the streets of Melbourne Metropolitan. The company cafes offer different support for mentally disabled persons. The company has 30 years of service delivery. The years of experience is proof that it is one of the most sustainable social companies in Australia. Omaha is a short form for Eastern Mental Health Association (Zhu, Liu and Lai 2016).

Madcap café is a social enterprise that was established by Ermha. The restaurant provides not the only job but also training for people with mental illnesses. The cafes majors on the disabled persons that are likely not to get formal employment. These same people who experience barriers to open job. The enterprise operates within selected homes across Victoria, New South Wales, and South Australia.

The company is on a mission to increase the number of opportunities across Victoria, for the mentally disabled persons. The enterprise has placed a lot of efforts in establishing cafes in master stores and relatively smaller stores. The relatively smaller stores are operated by two persons only. These stores have changed the lives of many people. The vision of the company is to ensure a world of equal opportunities to help them thrive in their favorable community. The enterprise serves a purpose of providing and advocating for innovative and responsive services of the highest quality for persons with mental disabilities.

The impact of the enterprise to the community

When people suffer or recover from mental illness, getting a job for them can be a tough task for them. They are not sure whether to tell the employer about their spiritual condition. They also do not know the reaction the employer will give to their health. The employer might have a problem in dealing with people suffering from various mental illnesses. Most of these people, therefore, end up not getting the job or worst enough, they sacrifice this crucial information so that they earn the position (Zhu, Liu and Lai 2016).

It is from these experience that the Madcap café was established. One of the co-founders of the Madcap café, Mike explains the knowledge of what led to the establishment of the enterprise. She told that her sister was recovering from a brain injury caused by an accident she was involved in. The damaged caused was irreversible. Meaning her brain had suffered mental damages that made her not be able to read and write. At that time Karen (the sister) had been married with two children. She had to find something to do to help her bring up her two children. The pain got even further when her husband abandoned her, forcing her into becoming a single mother. The reason behind her husband's divorce was due to an assault that Karen suffered (Wickert 2016).

The only solution for helping Karen was to find her a job. The job would help her cater for her children and also make her feel usual from the pain; she had suffered. At work, she would also interact with many other people who would make her forget the pains she had experienced (Ridley-Duff and Bull 2015).

In the way of finding a solution to this problem, it hit Mike of how many people could be suffering the same fate silently. At that time Mike owned Cheesy Café which was operating as a restaurant. The idea then hit Mike to start a nonprofit organization that would help people disadvantaged in the community and helps them gain their self-confidence and esteem.

It is from attending a seminar of nonprofit organizations that he sold the idea to Ermha Inc. The group was convinced in buying the idea. One of the managers, Peter Waters, approached Mike and showed his readiness to support the idea. When the idea reached the board of management of Ermha, they could not wait to buy it (Kavanagh et al. 2015).

They, therefore, agreed to use my cheesy café but they changed the name. They approved the acquisition of the company, but they changed the name to the mad restaurant. Mad café meant to make a difference catering and production. These are how the company came into being established as a social enterprise (Koslowski et al. 2016).

The company bought the Dandenong plaza where it currently has all the operation going on. The company was therefore established with the sole mandate of serving the community. Right from the dream to the actualization of the idea. This has helped in the growth of the enterprise as it doesn’t lose the purpose that it is supposed to serve. Guided by a trustworthy company that takes support for the disabled very seriously.  The enterprise has been able to cover outstanding milestones towards helping the mentally disabled (Croteau, Frechette and Grenier 2017).

Ermha did the funding of the café. The enterprise was also primarily funded by the government department of humanitarian service. The government was trying to help stimulate the economy through the creation of jobs. The café currently employs 30 staff. The store has been busy since it started and had rarely undergone any significant setbacks since opening except for few other challenges (Vogelsang et al. 2015).

The enterprise has helped the community in many ways beginning from its employment procedures to its daily business operations. The company has employed about 30 disabled persons. This, therefore, means that the company has had an impact on the country’s economy. The government recognizes that this is one of the stimulations of the economy, therefore employing staff will improve the economy. As a way of appreciation, the company has received a grant funding from the government to help in the expansion of the business (Lahana 2016). The development will, therefore, lead to more people getting employed. Therefore impacting on the economy.

Secondly is the impact that the company has had on individuals. The individuals who cannot get employed due to barriers are trained into various catering department. The enterprise, therefore, offers further studies for this individuals. This training helps these individuals since apart from operating in the mad café after graduation. Any other institution can employ them. Even when other institution employs the individual, the mad café enterprise follows up to know their progress. To facilitate this move, the enterprise has invested a partnership with the Gloria Jean Coffee Houses. This coffee house apart from training the individuals distribute the graduates to supermarkets and other cleaning jobs.

This kind of training helps the individual. Its help those to build confidence that might have been lost. They also feel essential to the society as they help in nation building.

Through the employment given to them, they can impact their lives. They can earn income that helps in maintaining their financial status. The family of the individuals is also able to feel the impact. The family feels the impact when they are now financially stable to afford various shopping activities. Some families are even able to provide holidays in other countries. These are proving of how the company has helped many individuals (Schwartz 2017).

A case study of Karen (one of the starters of the program) who is currently employed at Wallara Australia. This is an organization that cares for the mentally disabled. She works as a trainer in the institution. This is after she was trained at the Madcap program. She is a living example of what the enterprise has done in changing and improving her life. Many other people have also been helped the same way.

The profits accrued from the firm are not used for any other purpose that is beneficial to individuals or stakeholders like a profit company would do. The company, therefore, has developed a strategy where all the profits accrued by the company are taken back to the Ermha Company and used to support the training program of the mentally disabled. The company though takes caution not to make losses in the process of helping others.

The company’s goal is to have 30 to 40 cafes in most disadvantaged communities in Australia. This target population is the primary focus since most of these individuals are afraid to come to the limelight. This is due to fear of rejection from all the sectors of the society and even worst, from employees (Goodrich 2017).

About the declaration of the Social Entrepreneurship Forum of 2014. The company has strictly followed all the ethical procedures. The ethical methods allow for the enterprise to have moral values and principles that are socially based. The forum gives a few ethical considerations that are strict to be followed by this company, to achieve the community program that is supposed to.

The first crucial ethical value is that the enterprise should work for the common good of the society. Other public and profit-making companies do not work for the common good of the community but work to make an overall unlimited profit for the very few.  Mad Café Company engages in the common good of the society. It generates profits which are again used to train other mentally disabled individuals. These process of participating in profits for the benefits of the community is an ethical program that works for the interest of the common good and not the company only.

The second value is the enterprise should stand in total solidarity with a non- privileged group, the excluded and the future generations. The mad café enterprise works to support the mentally disabled individuals, by advocating for their rights to be employed like any other person (Hartman, DesJardins and MacDonald 2014). They even take a further lead by employing mentally handicapped individual and training them for further education and employment. This is another form of how the mad café enterprise performs its ethical value by standing in solidarity with mentally disabled, who are part of the non-privileged in the Australian society (Crane and Matten 2016).

Social Economy Company has to offer decent working conditions and positions. They should aim to pay a wage that is worth to earn a living. They should have a rather flat fee structure compared to private sector, who could choose to spend little wages to their employees (Dey and Steyaert 2016). The mad café enterprise engages their employees reasonably regarding waging. The enterprise pays enough wages that can make a family go for holiday vacations and go proper shopping. Apart from the wages the company also pays for furthering the studies of the employed individuals (Chell, Spence, Perrini and Harris 2016). The enterprise also follows to know how their previous employees and trainees are paid. That is if they are employed by profit entities like supermarkets and other cafes (Bryman 2015).

The second principle is how the company engages with other companies of the same social mind for the common good of the disadvantaged group. The mad café engages with other companies adequately. The company is funded by the Ermha group which is a humanitarian organization. The company also partners with the Greys café to offer training to the mentally disabled individuals (André and Pache 2016). Finally the company partners with other like-minded organizations that would wish to employ the individuals.  

The mad café company is, therefore, a perfect example of a nonprofit social enterprise. This proves how qualified it is to be awarded the governments annual award for the social enterprise of the year.

References

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