Value creation in business-nonprofit collaboration : a case study of a danish apparel company

Abstract

Companies are under increasing pressure to ensure a high degree of social responsibility in their operations, throughout the value chain and around the globe. At the same time, the importance and influence of nonprofit organisations have been increasing drastically in the world economy, pressuring companies and governments to be consciously aware and participate in social issues. Simultaneously with the rise of corporate social responsibility (CSR), and while companies start to realise the importance of strategic benefits that may arise from implementing CSR practices, the emergence of business-nonprofit collaborations has become more prominent within the business world. By choosing a global industry that is strongly influenced by business-nonprofit collaborations, this study examines the value that is created in partnerships within the apparel industry, hereby presented through a case study of the Danish apparel manufacturer IC Group and their nonprofit collaborators. The central justification for engaging in cross-sector partnering becomes evident when the businessnonprofit collaboration starts to generate co-creation of value, which is observed between IC Group and their nonprofit collaborators. While the thesis establishes that elements of all the stages of Carroll’s Pyramid of Corporate Social Responsibility are observable, the Collaboration Value Creation Framework further concludes that there is high potential for cocreation of value. Notably, IC Group’s role as a part of an information network exceeds the notion of one-to-one relationship that Austin and Seitanidi (2012) depict; the company cocreates value in multi-stakeholder, multi-sector collaborations facilitated by nonprofit organisations. This creates favourable conditions for synergistic effects emerging from the collaborators exchanging resources and capabilities. However, within the highly scrutinised apparel industry, there is potential for capturing more value and generating more welfare from establishing better partnership processes.