Crafty students make their mark
The winners of the University’s #makeyourmark challenge have been announced.
Edinburgh undergraduates took part in a 48-hour challenge to find business solutions to global social challenges.
Tackling loneliness
Crafty Care were named the winners after impressing the judges with their subscription-based box of crafts to tackle loneliness and isolation in old age.
Developed by Elinor Williams, Lindsay Gelb, Aayush Goyal and Ciella Ying, their DIY craft kits would be marketed through existing befriending services and retail chains.
Business leaders
Having worked on their ideas over an intense 48-hour period, teams pitched their ideas to a panel of judges.
These included Alice Thompson, Founder of Social Bite, Thomas Gillan, CFO of Social Investment Scotland, Chris Gillen, Founder of Heroes Vodka, and Polly Jones, Corporate Affairs Manager at Asda.
The top three teams won the opportunity to spend one-on-one networking time with leaders of global businesses and social enterprises.
Public toilets
Runners-up Two Loo, developed by Sara Ketovuori, Nurhidayah Musri and Zoe Williams, designed a business to address the lack of accessible public toilets in Edinburgh and Kenya.
They planned to take over disused facilities in the Scottish capital and refurbish them into accessible and safe toilets, decorated by locally-based artists.
A 40 pence usage fee would be used to fund 800 public toilets in Kenya, potentially providing up to 40,000 people with access to much needed sanitary facilities every day.
Mental health
In third place, HuMAN asked the question of how to encourage men to check-in on their mental health and bring awareness to their daily routine.
Designed by Kristin Boland, Zuzana Morvayova, Brook Stockbridge, Fangqian Ye and Joanna Spreadbury, the social enterprise would develop a line of products encouraging men to reflect while shaving and beard grooming.
The revenue from one out of every five products sold would be donated to charities working with men in need.
Business skills
It is the second time that the Business School has run #makeyoumark, in partnership with Social Investment Scotland.
The students participating in this year’s #makeyourmark challenge were so positive about the confidence and skills they gained. We were overwhelmed by the quality of the work they produced in such short space of time, with some genuine social innovation that truly impressed the judges.