We on this planet and the planet itself are in crisis, we need to make changes and it's easy to feel worried about this. It's not entirely unjustified, but neither is it a reason to descend into a mental darkness and lose all hope. On the contrary!
The opportunities to reverse the trend are significant.
We have reached what is commonly called the fourth industrial revolution, we have developed intelligence that is greater than our own and investors have identified fossil fuels as "stranded assets."
Stranded assets are "assets that have suffered from unanticipated or premature write-downs, devaluations, or conversion to liabilities."
This means that capital no longer sees fossil fuels as profitable investments, they don't even see businesses that are dependent on or in any way built on fossil fuels as good investments.
And that's shaking up the world order we've had since the car became every person's reasonable property.
So, it's in the intersection between global problems and innovations that the great business opportunities lie in the future.
Previously, there has been a tendency to regard sustainability as an imposition on a fundamentally completely unsustainable business model. The environmental issue has been sighed and groaned over, eyes rolled, and endured in board meetings and conferences.
But that was then!
Now, the core of tomorrow's businesses is circular, innovative, and sustainable. For some, old companies, it's a long-term investment in the business, for new companies and startups, it's the very engine and it's a rocket engine, because now things are moving fast!
This change is, to speak in "Rockströmian" terms, a tipping point, but it's tipping in the right direction!
When we started Västerbottenssåpa, few, possibly no one, believed in the idea, especially not in the circular part.
- "Att du ävles och tjures ve edannä?!"
Translated into Swedish: that you can be bothered and that you "stubbornly" persist with that.
Then referring to purifying frying oil and saponifying it instead of buying virgin raw material.
That, it will never amount to anything, will never work, and so on, we heard daily.
Today we are far from finished, we have only just begun, but we have proven that a circular idea can be profitable and it can grow. At the time of writing, we have 31 employees at the factory in Vilhelmina. The 2024 financial statements will probably land at just over 59 million and the profit can be said to be good.Another Vilhelmina company that is moving forward thanks to a strong commitment to the environment, climate, and innovation is Ecoclime, google it!One of Sweden's largest municipalities by area, bordering Norway, with about 5000 inhabitants and a plant hardiness zone number 7, I would like to venture to say is per capita leading in Sweden when it comes to innovation-driven sustainability entrepreneurship.As we now transition from a linear economy to a circular economy, from disaster reports to optimism about the future, you should probably keep an eye on us or perhaps on the whole of Vilhelmina.