In this episode of Executive with a Cause, host Tammy Ven Dange chats with James Petesic, Co-Founder of PV Industries.
How does a young company maintain vision whilst ensuring financial viability? And how can the lifecycle of solar panels be better managed and tracked? In this episode, we hear from Co-Founder James Petesic on how he maintained the foundational values of his social enterprise whilst growing solar panel recycling venture PV Industries.
Impact investment requires a different mindset to traditional Return on Investment focused funding relationships. On this, James explains how PV Industries have balanced attracting investors whilst serving the company’s values and sticking to a niche market. Furthermore, we hear how they have demonstrated ‘trusting the process’, and waiting for the right opportunity rather than premature growth.
We also learn about tracking the lifecycle of solar panels, and the opportunity to improve this process in Australia.
Finally, James explains their future plans and desire to increase their scale and revenue from material recycling, as well as improve the reputation of waste management.
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IT in Plain English
In this episode, Tammy is asked, ‘what is an iframe?’. You’re probably already familiar with iframes, or ‘inline frames’, presenting as interactive videos, websites or documents embedded within a webpage. But when should you use one versus an integration?
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Topics from this episode:
- 0.00 | Introduction
- 01.10 | PV Industries
- 06.21 | The recycling process
- 15.36 | Revenue model
- 22.56 | Staffing
- 25.00 | Aligning investors with the cause
- 34.00 | The waste industry
- 46.36 | IT in Plain English
Quotes from James Petesic in this episode:
“That’s what we started to do. And that’s solely what we do. So rather than branching out in broader ways, we just saw a niche-targeted problem. And I guess I had received some advice when I was younger, ‘if you do something, make sure that you’re the best at it and do it properly.”
“We generate revenue at the highest level from two avenues. One, when panels come in. So, we’ll charge what we call a ‘gate fee’. So, there’s a value that we charge per panel. Obviously, that helps, from a revenue perspective, money in, and then there’s money out from a labour and outgoings perspective to process that. And then the material that we produce is also sold on the back end. We can take the aluminium to scrap metal markets, and the copper cable also generates revenue for the business. So, when a panel comes in, we get revenue. And when pieces of that panel go out on the back end, that’s also revenue. So, it’s a two-pronged approach from a revenue perspective. So yeah, space is a big thing because like you said, panels are not small pieces of equipment. So, the more space that you have, the more panels that you can receive and process and get in and get out.”
“We only have our three Co-Founders. But like I said, over the course of the next few months, hopefully with some capital injection. We’ve definitely got plans to scale out and to hire not only warehouse staff but staff to help with the running of the business as well. So, it’s all part of the plan.”
“There are lessons that we’ve learned along the way. We sort of dabbled with investment earlier on, which I think was probably a little early for us. And not only that, aligning our values with the values of the other party was something that we learned the hard way. And like you said, the impact investment space is something which doesn’t typically align with the expectations of a normal investor.”
“That patience, I think, is super important. Your ability as a new business in an industry which is still developing is that understanding of ‘Rome wasn’t built in a day’. If I give you X amount of money today, in three months’ time, or in 12 months’ time, I expect that money back. Unfortunately, it isn’t really the world that we live in.”
“It’s something that we’re really obviously passionate about. And it may be to our detriment because we are limiting our avenues to generate revenue by not reselling panels. But at the end of the day, we want to make sure that we’re doing things properly. And more often than not, we win customers based on our honesty and integrity than just saying, ‘oh, you know, we’re recycling to a certain value, don’t worry about what happened and trust us’. We seen, coming from a non-waste or non-recycling background, we’ve seen some of the reputational issues that the industry has, and again, being a new player, not from the industry, we want to try and shake that. We don’t want to fall into that trap. So it may be, to our detriment, that we’ve hamstrung ourselves a little bit and haven’t generated the revenue that we otherwise could have to fuel the business. But at the end of the day, we’d like to think we’re doing things properly, and hopefully, it pays off in the long run.”
Links & Resources
Related Episodes
- Watch our interview with Cindy Reese Mitchell about social enterprises.
Credits
Thanks to our Producer, Nick Whatman, and the entire team at Lonsdale St. Studio. Thanks also to our Digital Content Creator, Laura Kleinrahm.
Tammy Ven Dange is a former charity CEO, Not for Profit Board Member and IT Executive. Today she helps NFPs with strategic IT and data decisions with her business, Roundbox Consulting.
