About Me

After a year of brainstorming and jumping from idea to idea, we have finally fine-tuned our concept to launch our social enterprise - Ventures in Development. Our vision is to solve development challenges through innovative & sustainable business solutions. We do this by identifying, incubating, and implementing ideas that have the potential to become sustainable and socially responsible ventures. Our aim is to elevate the lives of the poor through the spirit of entrepreneurship. We are currently trying to incubate two ventures, Mei Xiang Cheese Factory and The Shokay Company. The concept is to capitalize on Western China's abundant resource - 13 million yaks.

1. Mei Xiang Cheese Factory

Mei Xiang Cheese Factory is a bottom up initiative of Tibetan farmers. It was first launched by Chinese Exploration and Research Society (CERS) in 2004. CERS invited Ranee May, a dairy expert from the University of Wisconsin to teach the Tibetans how to make Western style cheese. After two years of product development, the cheese is ready! Our goal is to bring the cheese to market and help Mei Xiang Cheese Factory become a viable social enterprise in rural China. We believe this can be a profitable venture and on top of that, increase the local community's income.

2. The Shokay Company

The Shokay Company is a for-profit social enterprise that will bring Shokay yarn and throws to the U.S knitters market. Shokay is Tibetan for "yak down", a high quality fiber similar in quality to cashmere. By moving towards purchasing raw fiber directly from isolated local communities in Western China, we provide them with a steady source of income. Our value proposition is providing exotic yet affordable luxuries with socially conscious origins.

The purpose of this blog is to share with you our start-up experience - our joys and our frustrations - as we navigate through the increasingly blurred terrain of non-profit, social enterprise, and for-profit institutions. We hope to to give you inspiration through our process and at the same time be inspired by your participation in our blog. This will also force ourselves to reflect upon and document our experiences more often. As Socrates once said, "An unexamined life is not worth living."