Interview with a social entrepreneur: Sarah Mills, Program Manager: Stella’s Circle
Sarah’s Description of Stella’s Circle: “Stella’s Circle is a large social services agency working in St. John’s to provide support to marginalized populations in the areas of Employment, Housing and Clinical services. Around 15 years ago staff began exploring the feasibility of incorporating social enterprises into our programming. The motivation for this was 2 pronged. 1) To develop additional revenue streams to assist with funding the larger organizations mandate of transforming lives through Real Homes, Real Help, and Real Work. 2) To create opportunities for participants of Employment Services to gain real world work experience and receive training in 3 sectors including food service, commercial cleaning and property maintenance / trades." There are many opportunities for learning throughout the process of developing and maintaining social enterprises. Stella’s Circle successfully opened the Hungry Heart Café in 2008 as an eat-in café providing breakfast, lunch and cat