DIY for Vulnerable Women Empowerment through Enterprise.

Coastal women development and social enterprise model through implementing DIY themes in an organized way.

Problem Identification:

• The coastal poor communities of Bangladesh are hardcore poor and they are male headed family. They usually go for earning while women have to manage household activities that’s why female members have to fully depend on the income of their male counterpart which is not sufficient enough to meet basic needs. Moreover, if anything bad happens to the male counterpart then an in humanitarian situation comes to that family. Then the female members have no options to choose for earning and feed their children except begging or day laboring or house servant where they face daily humiliation in spite of their potentiality to earn by their own skills and creativity.
• As a non-income generating member of a family and community, women in the coastal poor community have no decision making power. Even they sometimes are not allowed to participate in the decision making meeting. Economic contribution in family makes them as an implementing members of imposing decisions.
• The prominent behavior of the male counterpart make the female members losing self-confidence and self-respect. 

Proposed Solution:

The proposed theme is DIY for vulnerable women development. DIY (Do It Yourself) is now the trending terms and a new kind of marketing strategy across the internet especially in Social Medias, where individual or a groups show their skills, potentiality and creativity of doing any specific activities or anything. The coastal women sometimes make necessary handicrafts, showpieces, kitchen tools, etc., for their own usage by using unique indigenous knowledge without knowing the business value. Through this solution we want to unlock their huge potentiality where they will learn from different DIY related YouTube videos on specific trades or products by our mentors and horn their skills of what they are doing by themselves. There will be ten different DIY trade groups consisting of 10 women per group. Each group will produce specific crafts/ products/ showpiece/ pickles which have business value. We will provide them raw materials and pay wages after successfully deliver a product. The end products will be stored and showcased in our sale center where we will sell those products to the pre linked shopping mall, potential buyer and markets. The earned profit will again be reinvested among groups and new groups. This will become a cyclic process and a sustainable social business design where coastal women will make significant contribution to their family income and have an organized platform to raise their voices. This is the first time where DIY ideas will be implemented through an organized way for the coastal women development and form an impactful social enterprise.

The proposed theme is very carefully designed for the coastal women development. Besides, it has a huge potentiality to grow as social enterprise because of the unique business idea and in build sustainable features of cyclic process. It has a great replicate potentiality to feature in the coastal communities around the world where many such impactful social enterprises can be developed aiming to prosper coastal communities.

The uniqueness of this solution is the strategy to solve the hardship of the coastal communities especially for vulnerable poor women. Making products by themselves which have business value by integrating the indigenous and modern knowledge and skills using latest tools and technology in an organized platform.

The theme was generated through the internet trending term DIY. The solution theme is the implementation of DIY in an organized way aiming to the development of coastal community especially the women. The different DIY trade groups will be trained using interactive YouTube video tutorials with the help of a mentor. By this way, the women will be skilled and learn the usage of modern tools and technology which will be used for producing specific trade products to add business value. For marketing of those products we will also take the advantage of social media, online markets and websites.

• Develop 300 Skilled DIY women from 3 coastal villages of Khulna district. They will be called as the ‘Coastal DIY Force-CDF’.
• Conduct extensive market research for profitable and saleable products to produce by the CDF.
• Make partnerships and linkages with 20 chain shops, shopping mall and potential markets.
• Attract the international customer by using online platform e.g; Amazon, Alibaba, etc.
• Make the solution as a sustainable social enterprise in the 3 villages.

• Develop more than 2000 skilled DIY women from more than 20 coastal villages of Khulna district.
• Make four local and a regional sales center for deliver the products to the partnered customers, shopping centers, etc.
• Build a DIY training center where the most skillful CDF members will give training to the new CDF members.
• Expand our solution to not only in the communities but also in different orphanage center and old age homes of the coastal areas.
•  Build international relations with the retail sellers, online sellers and different online platform to sell our products globally.

Extensive rapport building is already going on about our solution. After forming initial women DIY groups, our mentor will train them practically on specific products. The trained groups will be called as ‘CDF- Coastal DIY Force’ and provided with necessary raw materials for producing specific products. We will pay their wages with reasonably high price upon receiving the end products. In the meantime, we will be developing partnerships with customers, small business entrepreneurs, chain shops and others potential buyers as well as take the advantage of social medias by disseminating promotional videos for marketing our solutions and products.  

We are currently working with only 20 DIY female members who mainly produce small crafts and jewelry. Those 20 members had got training from us and now they work individually upon receiving orders and raw materials from us. We have a small scale Facebook page where we showcased our products for sell. We already build our trust over a small customer base who regularly buy our products. Those 20 DIY female members will be our mentors to train the CDF-Coastal DIY Force.

We will be working in three coastal villages on our proposed solution with 300 vulnerable coastal women in 12 months. Those vulnerable women will be trained and skilled on different DIY specific trades. Around 20 partnerships will be formed with business organizations, shopping malls and small scale entrepreneurs which will make around 2000 customer base followers of our products in 12 months. 

Within the next three years we will expand our working areas with engaging around 1200 coastal vulnerable women and build a large customer base of our products. We will make a sustainable social business ecology.

Our team consists of 6 members from diversified sectors. I have the experience to work with the livelihood of coastal community by which I develop my skills in community development and social business development. Three of our team members are female, who are online entrepreneur and doing DIY crafts. They are very good in business strategy development and working closely with the coastal female members. Other two members of our team are a kind of influential and impactful personality. Both of them were the national UN youth leader and they can create international linkages with organizations and individuals.

We have experimented our idea through self-financing and fund raising from friends and family members. We trained 20 poor girls and young women on small crafts and jewelry making as well as pay them daily wages through our raised funds. After receiving products from them, we primarily targeted the online community through Facebook page. We started making profits by selling our products to our neighbors and on Facebook page. Our profits make us capable to engage continuously with those 20 trained women in producing crafts and jewelry.  

Our solution's main theme is to empower coastal vulnerable women as a significant income contributors to her family. For this, we design this business strategy where we will be able to continuously engage with them and help them earn through our solutions for ensuring the sustainability of our theme.

By this, we will be acting as a linker between poor women and the potential customers. We will be providing ideas, skills and raw materials to the poor women to deliver us the desired products and sell those to our customers and make profits to reinvest again and continuously expand our working zones and engage more women.

Our long term goal is to make our product to reach to the global community and make positive impact on the lives of women from every coastal areas around the world. So, we found it as the best and most prestigious platform around the world to introduce our efforts to the global audiences.

Either selected or not, Solve can help us through their impactful suggestions to make our effort more feasible and sustainable. Besides, they can link us with other competition, interested donors, private organizations and non-profit leaders so that we can continue on our effort to make an impact.

- Our effort is now in a stage where we need a push forward funding for effective and smooth continuation. Solve can arrange or make effective linkages for that push forward funds.

- As we are going to make a huge social enterprise with the coastal communities, we are lacking or need improvement on some special skill sets, eg; leadership development, Social enterprise development, Entrepreneurship skills, Effective marketing strategy, Effective communication and linkage development. Solve can give us this great opportunity to become a skilled social entrepreneur which very effectively advance our work.