Haumana Bars: Navigating Social Entrepreneurship

Haumana Bars, founded in 2017 by Sidi Ba and Guillaume Bourque, was a Montreal-based, socially innovative company driven by a social mission. It specialized in producing ethically sourced energy bars containing a special superfood: the baobab fruit, ethically sourced from a women’s co-operative in Senegal. As the company engaged with suppliers and investors, it confronted diverging interests, such as the pressure to adopt individual packaging for its bars, which created tension with the company’s environmental concerns.

In March 2024, the company’s founders were presented with an opportunity to grow the company through national distribution, but to pursue the opportunity, the founders needed to consider the tensions between scaling operations, sustainability, and maintaining their social entrepreneurship.