Next in our series of Social Enterprise Stories we feature Alan Tan. Alan is the Founder, Chairman, President and CEO of the Connecticut based TAN2000 International Holdings Corporation.



Why are you operating in Connecticut?

I grew up in Rocky Hill, Connecticut and decided to take this as an opportunity to help others who had to confront cultural, financial, and other obstacles to entrepreneurship. Our partners have connections to Connecticut, with most of us growing up here in Central Connecticut, primarily the Rocky Hill-Berlin-New Britain-West Hartford areas, and the rest of our partners having connections to Connecticut such as going to college in Connecticut, or sending their kid to college in Connecticut.

Why did you decide to start a Social Enterprise?

I have always believed strongly in helping others, and over the years, eventually built a like minded team. As such, a socially minded pre-accelerator program was only natural for us to create, since we had the necessary experience, and saw the need of many entrepreneurs, for that helping hand which would lead more businesses to succeed. Given our experience and our firm belief in helping others, it made sense for us to start the world’s first pre-accelerator program versus just simply, “launching… another series of startups, incubator or accelerator”.

What is the community you’re trying to have an impact in?

We are trying to expand entrepreneurship to the masses, particularly underprivileged entrepreneurs who face barriers to entrepreneurship such as cultural barriers, financial barriers, etc. We really believe that entrepreneurship is a right, not a privilege, and access to the knowledge and resources should be available to help bring entrepreneurship to all.

How do you/will you achieve that impact?

We hope to achieve this impact by building partnerships within the entrepreneurial ecosystem. Our flagship program, the RevUp program, reaches out to potential entrepreneurs early through our Outreach Ambassador program and through initiatives such as helping mentor at Startup Weekend events, operating programs to expand entrepreneurship to non-traditional avenues such as student organizations, conferences, and generally injecting innovative thought into activities that ordinarily wouldn’t get people to think about entrepreneurship. We help entrepreneurs who have a dream but don’t necessarily know how to make it happen. Simultaneously, we hope help entrepreneurs who’ve “done it before”, but need a guiding hand to help avoid mistakes that led to issues that the entrepreneur does not want to see again. We want to empower entrepreneurs to follow their dreams, have more options to achieve their lifetime goals, than “just finding a job after college”.

How do you balance purpose and profit?

We balance purpose and profit by utilizing a budgeting process that assures that our mission aligns with our entrepreneurs’ intentions. We ensure that our entrepreneurs are given the best services possible at a price point that is affordable by them based on their individual budget. This ensures that TANHC has enough to pay its personnel and maintain our one on one approach to mentorship while our entrepreneurs are paying the lowest cost possible to achieve their dreams.

What have been your biggest challenges thus far?

One of our largest challenges has been to gain acceptance within the entrepreneurial community, most notably, investors and community-based entrepreneurial initiatives. Somewhat surprisingly, we have experienced significantly more difficulty in Connecticut, when compared to other areas such as New York City, Philadelphia, and Boston.

What is the most rewarding thing to you about operating a social enterprise?

The most rewarding thing about operating our enterprise, is the fact that we know that with every client we work with, we are helping them achieve their dream and build their own home within the entrepreneurial ecosystem.

Why do you want to incorporate as a benefit corporation?

Our corporation is already structured in a manner where converting to a benefit corporation would be a natural move for us. Since our mission is to help our community access entrepreneurship, converting to a benefit corporation is only natural for our organization to do.