As part of the Impact Hub Switzerland Association announcement, Impact Hub Basel hosted a launch event on Wednesday 15 May 2019 – to the day, two years after the foundation of the Verein Hubbasel. Even though we are the youngest Impact Hub, IH Basel is so thankful for our supporters for helping us get to this point, standing proud with all the other Swiss Impact Hubs.

Our #StrongerTogether event started with the usual chatter and bustle, but suddenly the room became quiet – very uncommon for our events. Everyone was talking to their neighbor in hushed tones, the drinks table was almost empty, there was excitement in the air. Then Hanna, one of our co-founders, opened with an announcement – all the Impact Hubs in Switzerland have come together to form the Impact Hub Switzerland Association. Celebration ensued. At least that’s how I remember it; the wonderful wine from Delinat helped this introvert smile big and be social all night.

Prior to our members arriving, we invited current and potential partners to come to our future coworking space (still under construction, but no one had to wear hard hats, so…progress!). Connie, another co-founder, introduced Impact Hub Basel and our raison d’être, André and co-founders from the Impact Hubs in Bern, Geneva and Zurich presented the community growth, and we even got to hear from Thomas Weber, a council member of Canton Baselland. While members streamed in, we invited everyone to look around and explore our SDG project booths: Goal 3 (Good Health & Well-Being) with the Innovators for Children program and with our friend from Impact Hub Medellín and his program Gambetiando, Goal 4 (Quality Education) with our involvement in Swiss Digital Day 2018 and tunBasel 2019, Goal 8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth) with our pursuit of a coworking space in the spirit of the #FutureOfWork, Goal 12 (Responsible Consumption and Production) with the Swiss-wide Circular Economy program and Zero Waste Initiative and Goal 13 (Climate Action) with our quest to bring the Climathon to Basel.

Another great addition was Stefan Germann, CEO of Fondation Botnar, discussing the challenges of social entrepreneurship work. Making sure we follow-through on commitments, whether to our community or to society, is difficult to measure. As much as we would like, we can’t just pull out a ruler and see if we’ve improved the entrepreneurship landscape for our members. However, that said, we do have some numbers, and they’re pretty encouraging if I do say so myself…

We are humbled by the support we have received over the past weeks, months, and even years, from our members, and want to make sure we are doing the most to making your experiences the best they can be.

Integral to this are food and drinks, and we are thankful and proud to work with local partners. Our neighbor, Schmatz, provided the oh-so-tasty dishes; excellent bio wine (recommendations and glasses, too!) by Delinat; and the generous, awesome Bierlager supported us by giving us out of date beer that they can no longer sell–but is still perfectly drinkable! A big thanks to all of them for helping us pull off such fun festivities. We hope you got to enjoy some of our Impact Hub cookies, vegan couscous, flavored water, and all the other treats on offer. Check out some event pictures!

As we progress in developing our coworking space (this may involve some community bonding over paint cans), we definitely want to welcome all of you to engage with us some more. Join our next events, and let us know if you’re up for contributing to our new space. We’ll need all the hands we can get. And most importantly, we wish you all a great summer!

Caroline Steiblin

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