Hub Coworking Hawaii

Hawaii's Best Coworking Space

Social Impact

Ulupono Initiative is a Mission-Aligned Impact Partner

Ulupono Initiative has been an Impact Partner for Impact Hub HNL for two years, and we’re grateful for our ongoing partnership that supports our work and bridges our two organizations.

Ulupono is an impact investment firm located in Hawaii that is building a more self-sufficient and sustainable island.

Ulupono offers for-profit investments, non-profit investments (grants), and social investments aimed at helping for-profit and non-profit sectors ‘harness [the] good and inspire catalytic change for Hawaii.’ Overall, the focus areas include food and agriculture, renewable energy, and waste reduction within businesses and organizations across the islands.

We had the opportunity to sit down with Murray Clay, President of Ulupono Initiative to talk about how our organizations align. Learn more about what Murray thinks about our entrepreneurial ecosystem, and why we need more of it.

Elemental Excelerator: Social & Environmental Impact Partner

Elemental Excelerator is a global climate-tech accelerator based in Hawaii that funds early- and mid-stage startups focused on impact across a wide variety of sectors to create measurable social and environmental impact. To date, they have supported 99 companies and 8 cohorts (#8 was just announced, and includes Member organization FarmLink Hawaii).

Each year their application process brings in some of the most innovative companies from around the world, and this year saw the most ever, at 800 startups. According to a recent article, 81% of those companies have technologies that lead directly to greenhouse gas reductions, and 67% indicated that their technologies have specific applications in low-income communities.

From its applicant pool, Elemental selects 15-20 companies annually to be part of their newest cohort. Companies chosen usually focus on solving systemic issues in agriculture, energy, water, mobility, and the circular economy.

Elemental has been an instrumental partner for Impact Hub, signing on as an official Impact Partner for both 2018 and 2019, and we are grateful for their support, guidance, and friendship over the years.

During our Wefunder campaign, the Elemental team talked about how the work they are doing aligns with work Impact Hub Honolulu is doing to build an interconnected Hawaii to support and grow entrepreneurs locally and beyond.

Making Impact Every Day: Our Commitment to Social Impact

Impact Hub locations around the world are focused on making an impact, and the Impact Hub network uses the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as a guiding framework for how we define impact. If you not familiar with the goals, check out our article here to learn why we think the SDGs are pretty awesome.

sustainable development goals

Our social impact focus areas here at Impact Hub HNL include sustainability and education, and we work hard to create events for the general public, opportunities for members, and recurring programming that allows our members and community to create impact and build awareness.

As a company focused on impact, we give back. Each of our large events has a direct financial benefit for organizations that we are committed to supporting:

  • Our Grand Opening, in January 2018, was a benefit for Aloha Harvest, and our most recent Bollywood Night was a benefit for Pu’uhonua O Waianae and the Aloha Lives Here campaign.
  • Each of our ImpactART Gallery openings supports a local organization of the artist’s choosing.
  • We teach others how to do well and do good. For our keiki marketplace, student entrepreneurs vote with their dollars to support a local non-profit. We also partner with organizations for coworking and event ImpactMaker scholarships for those doing good in the world.

We offer scholarships to increase access to innovation for everyone:

  • Last year we gave over $10,800 in ImpactMaker scholarships and we are projected to give at least $15,000 in 2019!
  • We started the ImpactSCHOLAR program in an effort to support local university and college students. We offer 5 unlimited memberships to every accredited college program in the state annually – that’s over $75,000/year in scholarships to grow entrepreneurship here in the islands. As we grow, we look forward to having students on neighboring islands and other communities join us in impact.

When our space made its Magnum P.I. debut before the holidays, we gave the proceeds back to our members and spent the rest on Holiday BBQ for Ka Po’e O Kaka’ako (KPOK, The People of Kaka’ako), the local houseless community in Kaka’ako. After the initial BBQ, we were so inspired by their community-building efforts, we started participating in weekly park clean-up efforts to beautify the area surrounding the Children’s Discovery Center and surrounding streets; many on our team volunteer regularly at the KPOK weekly neighborhood cleanups- and you can join too!

We are also home to a variety of sustainability-focused member organizations that make a huge difference in our local and global community, like Sustainable Coastlines Hawaii, Surfrider Foundation, Conservation International, Zero-Waste Oahu, Kanu Hawaii and more.

Providing inspiring spaces for collaboration between local social impact organizations is what we do at a basic level; making introductions, seeking out like-minded organizations and seeing what they do together lifts the whole community.

Here’s a highlight of some of the recent sustainability-focused programming and  events:

We also focus our efforts to support educators, students, and policymakers and empower the community with a range of business and personal educational opportunities.

Some of the education-focused events we host include:

  • A free, monthly Freelancer & Entrepreneur event to help support small businesses;
  • A free, bi-monthly Women’s Finance event, to educate and empower women to learn more about business & personal finance;
  • We are a community partner with Hawaii Women in Filmmaking and PBS Hawaii for the Indie Lens Pop-Up Film Series, which highlights important social justice issues across the US;
  • Our annual Keiki Marketplace, which supports over 25 student entrepreneurs to develop sustainable businesses with social impact in mind.
  • Education policy events: we provide space free of charge for educators, parents, students, and administrators to discuss education policy that improves public education. We have hosted Hope Street Group, Teach For America, Hawaii KidsCAN,  and a new group of inspiring educators who support each other in writing real stories about education in Hawaii, WRITE with #Educate808

In these ways and many others, we demonstrate our commitment to the Sustainable Development Goals, and as a company we hope to inspire other individuals and organizations to continue to do well, and do good in our community. This mission of helping businesses do well and do good, will continue to guide our programming and offerings, and we look forward to growing our impact together.

Stories from the Raise: A Crowdfunding Showcase

Raising funds for your project, business, or launch is an exciting way to gather community support and bring in funds needed for your work. Crowdfunding allows everyone to support projects they love – promoting good work and democratizing investment for the 99%.

A few weeks ago we hosted a Crowdfunding Showcase to share some of the stories from local companies and organizations that have raised funds (or are currently raising funds) for their projects. There were brief presentations from the participating organizations, a panel discussion, and a time for Q&A.

Here are some takeaways from the presenters and their projects:

It takes a village, says Jim Murphy of Honolulu Habitat for Humanity.

Habitat for Humanity is a nonprofit housing developer committed to improving communities by increasing homeownership opportunities. They work with families and communities to build and repair homes and provides a zero interest mortgage. In addition, they work with the communities they serve to provide volunteer opportunities supporting the mission’s work. Their goal is to build 40 single family homes in the next 5 years. They have tried crowdfunding unsuccessfully in the past, and are looking forward to more strategic campaigns in the future. Jim said some of his crowdfunding efforts were ‘cautionary tales.’

Keep momentum going through the whole campaign. Plan ahead.

Mia Moore, is a local student that was just accepted into the Interlochen Arts Academy starting Fall 2019. This prestigious school has high tuition costs, and she’s raising funds on Go Fund Me to cover her school fees. She is currently at ~$4300 of her $28,000 goal.

Crowdfunding builds community, not just funds.

James Koshiba is volunteer co-founder of Hui Aloha and the Aloha Lives Here Campaign, which has been created to give Puuhonua O Waianae a permanent home. The campaign combines crowdfunding, major donors, and in-kind contributions to enable POW to acquire land and add permanent structures to what is already a model village community. Funding will also allow the village to test innovative technologies in housing, water, waste management, and agriculture. It will also enable the village to continue their outreach to other houseless communities, and provide lessons in modern-day village-building across Hawaii and beyond.

Innovate, but you don’t always have to reinvent the wheel.

David Aquino, is Blue Planet Foundation’s Creative Director, and has helped to grow their unique energy efficiency loan program called WeEfficiency. The program raises funds from the community for non-profits or schools to cover energy efficiency upgrades. These upgrades can be costly at the offset, but energy savings can be huge. With the money they save, they can pay back their donors and do more good work for their communities.

Don’t be afraid to get started.

Sarah “Mili” Milianta-Laffin is a 7th grade teacher at the STEM Lab at Ilima Intermediate in Ewa Beach, Campbell/Kapolei Complex. Prior to teaching in Ewa Beach, she taught for 11 years in Houston, Texas. Sarah is a DonorsChoose Ambassador, personally earning over $15,000 in supplies for her students from DonorsChoose since 2007. She talked about how amazing the program is, and how it makes it easy for her to fund the things she needs to make her classroom a great place for her students and student groups.

Give back to your supporters.

We also heard from Nam Vu, co-founder of Impact Hub and ‘chief geeky officer.’ Nam talked about our experience with Wefunder, and why we chose this program for our investment campaign. Nam says that, “We chose Wefunder because it aligns with our community building focus and enables our community to invest in our success was well as benefit from our success.”

Thanks to all of those that presented at the event!

May is Mental Health Awareness Month: Let’s Talk More about Mental Health

May is Mental Health Awareness Month, and we want to be part of the movement to destigmatize mental health issues, and help be a part of the conversation to shed more light on this important topic.

Historically, mental health issues, including depression, anxiety, mood disorders (along with many others) were ignored, shamed, and not talked about. This needs to change for the health of our communities.

The Anxiety and Depression Association of America (ADAA) estimates that about 18% of the American population suffers with anxiety, depression, schizophrenia, and bipolar disorder, and only a small percentage of those are receiving treatment. The number of children dealing with anxiety is even higher, at 25%.

Last month we hosted ImpactART featuring the works of Boz Schurr. The work in this show was a departure from her previous work, which is characterized by bright colors and whimsical patterns. In our interview with Boz, she explained her new direction came from recent experiences with her own mental health challenges.

“In the summer of 2017 I was at an artist residency in Iceland and I experienced a severe depression and had frequent and severe anxiety attacks which I had not experienced since college. […] It was a completely surreal, almost out-of-body experience to be aware of what you’re going through and still be completely unable to change your feelings in the moment.” Boz explained that, “[The] current work is addressing that experience – the ebb and flow of our mental stability and how it really affects everyone.”

During the opening of the show there were posters placed around the exhibit that posed important questions focused on mental health. These give us some great ideas and insight for how to be more aware of mental health issues in our community, and how to be a better ally and friend to those that might be (invisibly) suffering.

Each Friday we host an open house to showcase Boz’s work. Anyone is welcome to drop by on Fridays between 9am and 5pm. Check in with our host and enjoy the art – hopefully it will spur further conversation with your friends, family, and coworkers about this important subject.

What are the Sustainable Development Goals (and why are they Important)?

Impact Hub HNL is committed to building a more sustainable working environment – not only is this the best thing to do for our community and our planet, it also is aligned with the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). These goals are a framework for building a better world, and Impact Hub global is committed to working towards these goals.

Building a better and more equitable future for all is the goal of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, and the SDGs are the guiding framework for this plan. The SDGs map out the various ways that we can achieve a more sustainable world, including gender equity, improved health and education, elimination of poverty, better cities, and so much more.

Read more about the history and future of the SDGs here, or watch the video below.

Impact Hub global uses the global SDGs, “as a lens through which to view our impact in the world.” So how do Impact Hubs around the world work toward the SDGs:

  • 51 Impact Hubs take part in waste recycling
  • 46 use recycled or sustainable office stationery
  • 45 use energy efficient or energy saving practices
  • 35 use reclaimed or reused office furniture
  • 34 use reusable or compostable catering supplies
  • 20 use green or renewable energy sources

Here at Impact Hub HNL, we have our own sustainability policies in place:

  • We choose only organic coffee and tea for our member beverages, meaning better working conditions and less pesticides in the environment (and in your body)
  • We support local companies to make our beer, ‘booch and nitro, meaning less transport costs and fuels
  • We now have paper recycling in addition to our Hi-5 item recycling. Unfortunately, recycling in Hawaii (and everywhere) is going through a major shift because of China’s recent decision to no longer accept recyclables from the US; we’ll continue to do as much as we can to reduce.
  • For our events programming, we don’t allow single-use plastic (bottles, cutlery, or containers) for our events programming, and generally we are working towards being a zero-waste facility.
  • Our facility uses super energy-efficient LED lighting
  • Much of our furniture is upcycled, recycled or secondhand. DYK the long tables in the front are former bowling lanes handmade by our very own George? Or that our wooden phone booths were custom-made from recycled materials by ARCH Hawaii.

We also work with local organizations and partners for events focused on the SDGs. Most recently, we hosted the ABCs of the SDGs event to highlight local groups that are implementing the SDGs locally. Groups like Zero Waste Oahu, Surfrider Foundation, Aloha+ Challenge, Hawaii FoodBank, WorkNow, and many more were present to share their work, and how the community can get involved.

Finally, we are committed to helping companies doing well to do good, and helping those companies doing good, to do well. We see Impact Hub HNL as a unique space when we facilitate these connections with our members, partners, and the broader community.

sustainable development goals