Baker Stove is a product by Top Third Ventures Ltd, a company registered in Kenya, run by a locally based team and a vast network of professionals around the world dedicated to empowering women in the developing world.
The majority of women in the developing world prepare food and purifiy water on a technology called a three-stone fire. It is basically three rocks that support a pot with a open fire in the middle. This cooking style is very inefficient and leads to many environmental and health problems.
A woman in Kenya cooking with a three-stone fire.
The Baker Stove replaces the traditional three-stone fire. Since the three-stone method has been in use for thousands of years, to be succesul the Baker Stove must allow the user to keep their cultural traditions and way of life intact. To achieve this, we conducted thousands of hours of fieldwork, research, and socioeconomic studies in Kenya alone to understand these women, their circumstances, local food, and how it is cooked.
But we will not not stop there. Accross the developing world there are inumerous cultural differences between countries and communities and Top Third Ventures will achieve a truly sustainable solution by modifying our Baker Stove designs for each.
The Claesson Koivisto Rune design team in Stockholm.
The Baker Stove Campaign seeks to raise funds to further its dream of providing women in developing countries with an energy efficient cookstove solution to the three-stone fire problem.
Your contribution to this campaign will catalyze our social impact venture, enabling the widespread production of Baker Stoves to improve the lives of millions of women, reduce deforestation, boost the local economies, and combat climate change.
Baker Stoves on the factory floor in Nairobi.
The Baker Stove
Indoor air pollution kill 4 million people every year. This is more than malaria and HIV/AIDS combined. The high thermal efficiency rating of the Baker Stove allows women to cook with only a third of the wood they used to use and in much less time. This saves lives because less wood means less smoke. The Baker Stove not only achieves impressive technical performance, it also has excellent usability and cultural adaptiveness.
Finally, Baker Stove is an aspirational product. The aesthetic aspect of the design was added by the world-renown Swedish architectural/industrial designer trio Claesson Koivisto Rune. Watch the video detailing the product design process here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQt5cu0c79w
Baker Stove is also 100% locally manufactured, contributing greatly to the local economy and manufacturing sector. To learn more about the production process, watch this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0no8yITISM
The Baker Stove technical specifications are shown below:
• Thermal Efficiency - 32 %
• Wood Savings - 69%
• Reduced Particulate Emissions - 38 %
• Reduced Carbon Monoxide Emissions - 56 %
• 7-year product guarantee
The first Baker Stove store opened on March 29th, 2013 in Kenya, specifically in Laikipia county, just outside Nyahururu. Currently, the store is selling Baker Stoves faster than our facilities in Nairobi can produce them. Here is a link to a video showing our sales and impact:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uG9X5Gbf8DU
What We Need & What You Get
The first 250 Baker Stoves are being produced as you read this, and are selling in our Baker Store everyday.
A customer leaving the Baker Store with her new efficient cookstove.
If interested investors see 1,000 products sold, they will join us to sell millions of Baker Stoves across the developing world.
This campaign is raising $30,000 to close the gap, i.e. produce and sell another 750 Baker Stoves. The money is 100% dedicated to covering production costs.
This is a fixed funding campaign; if we do not raise $30,000, the money is returned to the funders. If you help the campaign exceed its funding goal, you will ensure more women receive the Baker Stove faster.
Your contribution will not only help put a Baker Stove in the hands of an amazing woman in Kenya, it will catalyze a social impact business that will change the lives of millions of people. People who really deserve a change.
A Baker Stove Customer in Laikipia, Kenya