OUR STORY

Since being founded in 2010, Villageboom has been working in rural areas of developing countries to implement market-oriented business models, create new jobs, and bring consumer goods to meet daily basic needs to some of the most remote villages of Africa and Asia.

Thomas Ricke founded Villageboom in 2010, but the idea had its beginnings much earlier. Already during his time as CFO for Procter & Gamble in Nigeria, Thomas Ricke was developing strategies to help the poorest people to participate in and benefit from the commitments of a global company. Contrary to all internal corporate concerns, he developed strategies to supply selected consumer goods that meet daily basic needs not just in Nigeria's urban centers, but also in its rural regions. And with success: for the first time ever, the people in the countryside had access to commercially produced soap and detergents and, because their sale was organized and carried out locally, new, long-term, well-paying jobs were created in areas without any available work.

In 2006, Thomas Ricke left Nigeria and turned his attention to developing new strategies for combating poverty in developing countries. In the following years, he provided both expertise and financial support to several social business initiatives throughout the world. In parallel, he was designing a business plan to improve the lives of the most disadvantaged rural communities in developing countries by implementing sustainable, market-oriented business models. In 2010, he founded Villageboom GmbH as a "social enterprise", a kind of company found in the English common law tradition which is not primarily driven by profit, but instead focuses on maximizing the social return. Unlike conventional non-profit organizations, social enterprises are market-oriented in their pursuit of earnings, but, unlike conventional enterprises, the profits are not distributed to shareholders, but are instead reinvested back into the company's social purpose.