"Every business could be a social enterprise if they wanted it badly enough." – Lauren Edwards

Lauren Edwards has spent her career helping businesses stop treating "doing good" as an afterthought, and start building it into the core of how they operate.

As Executive Director of SeaChange and owner of NextStep Business Consulting, Lauren works with entrepreneurs, nonprofits, and corporations to prove that profit and purpose don’t have to be in tension.

In this conversation, we dig into what social enterprise actually means (and why the label matters less than the intention), why nonprofits and for-profits are both constrained by broken systems, and how trust (and the lack of it) shapes everything from wage gaps to public policy.

We also cover:

• What defines a social enterprise (and what doesn’t)

• How profit and impact collide, and how to navigate those moments honestly

• Practical models for values-led businesses (B Corps, benefit corporations, worker ownership, revenue sharing, and more)

• Why "shop social" can matter as much as shop local

• What it looks like to show up ethically when no one is watching

This episode was a beautiful reminder to us that how we structure our business is one of the loudest ways we can show up in the world.

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Flying the Coop is brought to you by Strange Birds, a messaging co-op that gives a flying duck. From websites to onboarding flows, launches to long-term strategy: if you want your brand, offers, and experience to tell the same story, we can help.

Find us at ⁠http://strangebirds.land

Chapters

• (00:00:00) - Flying The Coop: Lauren Edwards
• (00:01:03) - What's a Social Enterprise?
• (00:03:25) - Double-Bottom Line
• (00:05:26) - Social Entrepreneurs: Profit and Purpose
• (00:08:13) - The Case for Social Enterprise
• (00:11:47) - The Fight for Higher Taxes
• (00:17:35) - Shop Social: How to Support Social Enterprise Companies
• (00:20:18) - The Importance of Choosing Your Own Money
• (00:23:08) - The role of individuals in fighting climate change
• (00:26:31) - Give More to Nonprofits: We Need a Business Model
• (00:30:30) - Five Ways to Do Good While Starting a Business
• (00:36:44) - Local Businesses to Support
• (00:37:19) - The role of trust in our society
• (00:42:15) - The Value of Communication
• (00:44:43) - SeaChange: Celebrating Social Enterprise's 10th Anniversary
• (00:46:25) - Flipping The Coop