Beekeeping for the Corporate World, Inspired by nature
Inspired by rooftop urban beekeeping initiatives in some of the world’s most iconic buildings including New York’s Waldorf Astoria Hotel, the Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris and London’s Tate Modern, Bees On The Roof offers Dublin’s first official Corporate beekeeping program that provides valuable Profiling and Corporate Social Responsibility opportunities for organisations, including educational and wellness benefits to staff.
Emma Finn, the founder of Bees on the Roof has been a beekeeper for over 10 years and has recently widened her focus from honey bees pollinators to the environment and then to biodiversity. Emma’s biggest inspiration comes from a deep love for nature and the serenity of working with bees, where working on “bee time” reinforces the need for being present in an often busy, deadline driven world.
“I was looking at the bigger picture of how we could make the landscape better and more diverse for all pollinators, including in cities. I decided to target the corporates with the bees on the roof idea and then to get them involved in greening the city. We can make the air better, be a greener place and a nicer place to grow up in or spend time in.”
Through research, Emma began to build the foundations of her business, she contacted several companies that had won green awards and spoke to facility & planning employees, who advised Emma of any issues that may arise and thought about how Emma could address them.
Challenges
Setting up a business is not without its challenges, something which Emma is no stranger to “I had a lot of issues to overcome - my biggest one was getting insurance. It was very difficult, costly and slow. They did not want to quote me and it was a battle to get it done.” Emma remembers She also found that it was much slower to get the corporates engaged. As Bees On The Roof is weather dependent, Emma needs good weather to work. Due to bad weather, she could only begin working in May. Luckily, the weather has remained good since then ,giving Emma a chance to work continuously.
Making the decision to become self employed
Emma had been self employed before and had also worked in the corporate world so she was familiar with both sides. By December of 2020, Emma decided to leave her corporate position, with the aim to start working on the business full time. “The pandemic was a great help in the fact that I was totally focused and was able to do loads of classes online in many different areas.” I then got my first lot of bees into my first corporate in the IFSC area.
Opportunities
There has been great interest in Bees on the Roof. Emma has since quoted for her service to a lot of other businesses in the city and some Industrial Estates as well. She has also been approached about setting up in Limerick as well as doing a project for 20 new sites. At the moment, Emma feels that she needs to grow her business more before taking on such big projects but is extremely excited about the opportunities available and how Bees on the Roof can become a Nationwide enterprise. “I have also signed on with another business where I can provide a series of talks on bees and biodiversity in Ireland. They will also help me to sell the Bees on the Roof. Just last week, I had an enquiry from a green roof company if we could have talks- all different avenues I hadn't planned on.” Emma was also featured in the Independent on New Year's Day and then interviewed on Mooney goes Wild in February. All of these opportunities have increased Emma’s profile and with that opens the floor to more opportunities for Bees on the Roof The future looks bright for Bees on The Roof.
Education
Emma, a natural educator has been approached to speak on bees and educate adults and children about biodiversity and the importance of bees in our environment. She has hosted educational workshops and beehive demonstrations in schools and has featured on RTE Junior Radio to share fun facts about bees and their role in nature
LEO Supports
Emma applied for business advice mentoring and was matched with Joe Fernandez, who Emma says was excellent. “Joe encouraged me to see the progress strategically and catalogue the details so I could roll out the project nationally.” Michael Gough assisted Emma in all things finance - something which she was keen to get support in.
Emma also joined the Women in Business Network, a network for female identifying entrepreneurs. The Network is run by Pauline Logan. Emma attended most of the talks that were available. She also joined an accountability group that Pauline set up. The group met up every month or so to discuss how each business was progressing.
Emma felt that Social Media wasn’t her strongest area and attended some of LEO Dublin City’s training courses, Instagram for Business & Twitter for Business. Emma states; “I did plenty of those classes (several times) until I became more confident in my ability. It also built my network and joined others in the green space. Now, I’m able to hold all my meetings online and have a lot of the work done before I go out to do site visits. This saves a lot of time - also, the meetings might have up to 6 people attending from different departments. Much easier for all to do online.”
2021 and Beyond
Emma plans to continue to grow Bees on the Roof and aims to continue attracting new clients to spread the word on the importance of bees. She intends to install beehives on the roof of numerous corporate buildings around Dublin and beyond. Emma is working to help to develop green projects for the city and hopes that Bees On the Roof will become a nationwide initiative within Ireland.
Contact
- Beesontheroof
- https://www.facebook.com/Bees-on-the-Roof-109114404152511
- www.twitter.com/bees_ie
- 086 1003784
- beesontheroof@gmail.com
