Vitanovae is the first shared living brand that is registered as a social enterprise (or what is known as a ‘société à mission’) in France. What does that mean exactly and what are the criteria for becoming a ‘société à mission’, especially in regards to a shared living brand?
Since 2019, a new French regulation called Elan Law (loi Elan) offers the possibility of creating a ‘société à mission’. These structures not only aim to maximise profits as profit-oriented companies do (which usually have strict economic motives); they also may pursue environmental and social goals, without neglecting profits, as non-profit organisations (such as charities) do. However, they need profits to serve their social agenda, ultimately to provide more benefits to the environment and society.
We were co-founders of a non profit called Co-Liv which aims to gather and promote the best practices regarding shared living. This organisation inspired Vitanovae to create a vision of housing that cannot be disconnected from having social impact on society.
Our mission is written in our status as follows: “Bringing the keys to a shared habitat to as many people as possible, while being open to its neighbourhood and eco-responsible. ”
Consequently, we defined 18 indicators which are used to define and evaluate all of our projects. An independent organism audits us every 18 months in order to certify our ‘société à mission’ status.
How is impact and sustainability integrated into Vitanovae’s business strategy and branding? Could you tell us a bit more about how you measure and report on your impact and how this keeps you accountable to your different stakeholders?
Impact and sustainability is our backbone! Whatever the department – finance, design, human resources, community management, etc. – we use our impact indicators to check if we are aligned with our mission.
This alignment is completely compliant with our business goals which means acceptability of our projects from cities, affordability for our clients, energy and cost savings regarding the operational cost of our residences and more.
We brand ourselves very far away from many developers who are considering the coliving wave as a new way to maximise profit by reducing the living space per resident (which is actually quite an old way of doing things in real estate).
Could you also share about the equity crowdfunding campaign you are doing with LITA. co? How do you think these kinds of alternative investments impact your brand positioning and value proposition? What is the end goal with an initiative like this?
As we are fully engaged in both scalable and sustainable impact and profit, impact investing is our natural soul! That is why we selected LITA.co for our first investment campaign (1 million euros). Impact investing is really an exciting and rapidly growing direction powered by investors we really like to deal with. Like us, they are determined to generate social and environmental impact as well as financial returns. This is taking place all over the world, and across all asset classes.
In terms of branding, using a crowdfunding platform is clearly a way to federate our community and communicate our value proposition. To be selected by a platform like LITA.co is also a first stage of recognition in the impact investing industry. Our goal is to to develop our company thanks to impact investors.
How do Vitanovae’s brand and business strategies foster long term impact within coliving and other specialist residential real estate markets? What are some learnings you’d like to share with our wider audience that you’ve come across since Vitanovae’s creation that contribute to this impact?
We envision and encourage a real estate market which considers both its social responsibility and mid- and long-term results. For example, promoting and being able to provide affordable housing ensures long- term security in regards to occupancy, and ultimately financial value.
Providing the best technologies for energy savings in our residences allows us to save annual cost, keeping our offer affordable, and will make the difference of value when, in a context of climate change, we will sell some of our assets. Who will buy in 10 years a building that is already poorly designed regarding isolation and energy consumption?
As said before, we do not neglect profit; we protect it by offering what society needs!
Finally, why is branding and marketing important for a shared living and placemaking business like yours? How can we create impactful and timeless coliving brands?
Last year, we saw the Irish Minister for Housing, Darragh O’Brien, issue a de facto ban on new coliving developments, considering this industry as a new form of ‘sleeping merchants’.
Our mission of offering quality, sustainable and affordable shared living is protecting us (and the market) from this confusion. We also consider sharing and training our practices with all the players who envision shared living as a societal business (e.g. ‘société à mission’). Our ultimate goal is to help the market transition into developing more sustainable and impact-driven shared living businesses and brands that have long-term value for all stakeholders involved.
