The Social Dilemma of Moving to a Mass Market

Abstract: Social startup wanting to broaden their impact on society needs to move towards a mass market, something that may require an adaptation of its identity. By adapting the identity it can be seen as untrustworthy and unreliable. The choice is to either limit the good it can do for the world, or sacrifice the foundation of what the startup is. The purpose of the study is to create an understanding of how the identity of social startups can be managed in the move towards a mass market. it was addressed by conducting a discourse analysis on three case studies. The findings points at moving towards a mass market as more complex for social startups because of their social orientation. It is proposed that social startups may want to remain in the niche and await for changes in society that will lower the barriers, rather than adapting to the mass market.