Press

GS Retail announced on the 4th that it is conducting online open lectures for the 'Social Impact Project,' a social venture startup support program being held this year to practice 'social distancing in daily life.' The 'Social Impact Project' is a corporate social responsibility initiative by GS Retail designed to provide education and startup opportunities to prospective entrepreneurs dreaming of starting a business in the social innovation manufacturing sector, early-stage startups that have already launched but need expert mentoring and business commercialization support, and young people who want to receive systematic business support. Starting for the first time in 2018, the 'Social Impact Project' is currently recruiting its third cohort this year. In collaboration with social enterprise 'Underdogs' and social finance institution 'Korea Social Investment,' it discovers and supports social ventures that solve social problems through manufacturing business models. In particular, this year, in compliance with 'social distancing in daily life' due to COVID-19, the 'startup special lecture' program, where participants listen to and communicate with founders who have succeeded in social innovation ventures, has been converted to an online format. While the previous offline lectures could only accommodate a small number of applicants due to space constraints, this year's online format has expanded capacity to 400 people. Additionally, by adopting an open lecture format, anyone can now participate through a URL link. The startup special lecture series consists of three sessions in total. The first lecture was held on the 29th of last month, with the second lecture scheduled for the 5th and the third for the 12th. The lecture on the 5th will feature Park Je-hwan, CEO of the lighting social venture 'Lumir,' who will speak on the theme of 'entrepreneurship that changes the world with warm technology.' The lecture on the 12th will feature Min Geum-chae, CEO of 'Earthlings Company,' famous for plant-based meat, discussing 'entrepreneurship to solve social problems.' Meanwhile, as non-face-to-face and contactless trends spread through social distancing and distancing in daily life, GS Retail is converting its conventional face-to-face corporate social responsibility initiatives into untact methods. It conducted recruitment for 'Real Love,' its signature university volunteer corps, through non-face-to-face UCC videos, and plans to conduct various performances and artwork exhibitions from the 'Meet 2020' artist support project in Mullae-dong, conducted jointly with the Seoul Culture Foundation, online.