Social Bite founder for Entrepreneurship Week 2017
Published On Fri 27 Jan 2017 by Roddy Isles
A public lecture from one of the UK’s leading social entrepreneurs is among the highlights of the University of Dundee’s first Entrepreneurship Week, aimed at giving students, staff and graduates support to turn their ideas into successful businesses.
Josh Littlejohn MBE, founder of Social Bite and BrewGooder will give the inaugural Principal’s Lecture in Entrepreneurship, telling the story of how he founded his social enterprise projects and helped raise millions of pounds for charity. The public lecture takes place on Thursday 23rd February.
“I am delighted that we are welcoming Josh to the University as part of our programme for our first Entrepreneurship Week,” said Professor Sir Pete Downes, Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University.
“Building a socially just future for Dundee is a priority both for the city and the University. Josh’s inspiring story illustrates how enterprise can be focused to deliver a common good, and I am sure he will help us to inspire our city and our budding entrepreneurs.”
Josh is the co-founder of Scottish sandwich shop chain Social Bite, which shot to global fame with the help of visits from Hollywood A-listers George Clooney and Leonardo Dicaprio. 100 per cent of Social Bite's profits are donated to good causes and one in four of their staff are people from homeless backgrounds. Social Bite also feed the homeless with food that their customers pre-pay for.
Josh is also the founder of The Scottish Business Awards and last year, along with business partner Alan Mahon, launched a beer brand called BrewGooder, where all profits go towards providing clean water. The brewery plans to provide clean drinking water for one million people in five years.
Through his social enterprises Josh has raised over £4 million for charity and made a significant impact to the issue of homelessness in Scotland. He was awarded an MBE in the 2017 New Year Honours list for services to Entrepreneurship and Social Enterprise in Scotland.
“I am delighted to be part of the University’s inaugural Entrepreneurship Week,” said Josh.
“Universities are home to many of our brightest people, young and not so young, who have the ideas that can be transformational in so many ways across our society. It is great to see the University of Dundee working like this to encourage those ideas towards fruition and turn them in to successful ventures for business and social enterprise.”
The public lecture takes place at 6pm on Thursday 23rd February 2017 in the Dalhousie Building at the University. All are welcome to attend and admission is free.
The event forms part of the programme for Entrepreneurship Week, which also features the final of the University’s Venture 2017 competition, for which University Rector and worldwide adventurer Mark Beaumont is among the judges.
The £25,000 competition supports new business ideas among students, staff and recent alumni, who are competing for prize funds. Applications are open until midnight on Sunday 5th February. Further information is available here
Other events taking place over the course of the week including workshops focusing on some of Scotland’s main business support competitions such as Converge Challenge, Scottish EDGE and a social enterprise workshop delivered by Dundee Social Enterprise Network.
The week of events is being held to coincide with Dundee Business Week supporting businesses, enterprise and entrepreneurship across the city.
For media enquiries contact:
Roddy Isles
Head of Corporate Communications
University of Dundee
Nethergate, Dundee, DD1 4HN
Tel: +44 (0)1382 384910
Mobile: 07800 581902
Email: r.isles@dundee.ac.uk