Essmart is a social enterprise distributing life-improving products ranging from solar lights to fuel-efficient cookstoves to reusable water filters to rechargeable batteries. They work with multiple designers and manufacturers to produce a catalogue of 160+ innovative products which tackle sustainable development challenges, such as income inequality, energy access or improved health. Essmart will equip local retail shops in peri-urban and rural locations with the stock and knowledge and resources to sell it so it can reach those who need it.

The twofold approach benefits local shop owners and consumers and profits can then be reinvested to continue to grow their reach and impact. The founders, Prashanth and Jackie discovered that these life-improving technologies were not being adopted by those who needed them. They were unfamiliar and people were used to products that easily broke. These insights led them to develop their operating model today.

Essmart products are designed to improve working and living conditions. Essmart’s vision is to become the go-to gateway for life-improving technologies to be distributed in emerging markets worldwide, thus improving many more lives along the way; ensure that customers’ voices are heard in the supply chain, influencing and directing design to suit rural families; and enable the technology-for-development ecosystem, creating solutions valued by those they are designed for.

For more information, please visit their website.