Spring 2020

‘They Care About This’

Listen

Prabaarja Bedi MBA’20 came to Babson knowing she wanted to pursue entrepreneurship. But she wasn’t sure what shape that would take until she spoke with Sinan Erzurumlu, associate professor of operations management.

Bedi’s family has a textile business in India, and she was speaking to Erzurumlu about his course lessons in sustainability and operational efficiency and how she might apply them.

That’s when he asked her: “Why don’t you think about ways that waste can be reduced?” And as Bedi thought about that question, and thought about the incredible amount of waste the textile industry creates, the proverbial light bulb blinked over her head.

The end result was UNfabricated, a socially and environmentally responsible brand that produces furnishings, apparel, and accessories from leftover materials from the Bedi family business.

“I realized there is a lot of waste that is generated, but it’s in usable form,” says Bedi, a member of Babson’s Women Innovating Now (WIN) Lab®, a business accelerator in Boston. “I saw it as an opportunity.”

In addition to reducing waste, the venture also seeks to empower impoverished women. All of the company’s products, which Bedi and her mother design, are made by 17 rural women working at an all-female production house that provides skills and fair wages.

Bedi—who was named to Poets & Quants’ 100 Best & Brightest MBAs of the Class of 2020 in early May—has long had an interest in helping women in need, but she admits she never thought of that as a business opportunity. “I thought it was social work,” she says.

With her business, Bedi joins a growing number of Babson graduate students who are thinking hard about how environmental and social concerns play out in their ventures and careers. “We hear from students,” Erzurumlu says. “They are asking questions. They care about this.”

How central are these issues to Bedi now? Just take a gander at her laptop, where she displays three stickers. Each corresponds to one of the Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations that are so pertinent to her business: no poverty, responsible consumption and production, and gender equality.


READ MORE: More Than Profits: The Importance of Integrated Sustainability »


Posted in Community

More from Babson Magazine »

Latest Stories

Side-by-side photos of the chair and the two students posing for a photo with the chair
From Text Prompt to Furniture: The Story Behind Babson’s AI Dam Chair With groundbreaking artificial intelligences advances, Vaness (Reece) Gardner ’26 and Cole Collins ’26 have created what is believed to be the first full-scale, AI-designed chair on a college campus.
By
Eric Beato
Editor / Writer
Eric Beato
Eric Beato is the Editor of Babson Thought & Action and Babson Magazine. A native of Chicago and a graduate of the University of Missouri School of Journalism, Eric has worked as an editor and writer at newspapers across the country, including the Chicago Sun-Times and Boston Herald. Eric joined Babson College in 2019 after working as the communications director for a private educational travel company and as the managing editor of six regional sports publications.
May 23, 2025

Posted in Community, Entrepreneurial Leadership, Outcomes

College president shakes hands with a student at the Commencement ceremony
Babson’s Graduates Remember the People Who Inspired Them In the final moments before Commencement, just before marching to the ceremony, Babson’s 2025 graduates reflected on their College journeys and the people who supported and inspired them.
By
John Crawford
Senior Journalist
John Crawford
A writer for Babson Thought & Action and the Babson Magazine, John Crawford has been telling the College’s entrepreneurial story for more than 15 years. Assignments for Babson have taken him from Rwanda to El Salvador, from the sweet-smelling factory of a Pennsylvania candy maker, to the stately Atlanta headquarters of an NFL owner, to the bustling office of a New York City fashion designer. Beyond his work for Babson, he has written articles and essays for The Philadelphia Inquirer, Notre Dame Magazine, The Good Men Project, and other publications. He can be found on Twitter, @crawfordwriter, where he tweets about climate change.
,
Hillary Chabot
Writer
Hillary Chabot
Hillary Chabot is a writer for Babson Thought & Action and Babson Magazine. An award-winning journalist, she is known for her insightful reporting and dedication to detailed storytelling. With a career spanning over two decades, she has covered a wide range of topics, from presidential campaigns and government policy to neighborhood issues and investigative series. As a reporter for The Boston Herald, Hillary earned a reputation for tenacity and integrity. Her work at Babson College fuels her passions—to learn something new every day and conduct thoughtful, empathic interviews. She’s thrilled to be at Babson College, where students, faculty, staff members and classes provide compelling copy daily.
May 22, 2025

Posted in Community

Teddy Sourlis holds a microphone while speaking at an event
LISTEN: Changing the Game: The Mind on Sports In Episode 6 of “From Problems to Possibilities,” two Babson College alumni and an expert in mental health philanthropy discuss how entrepreneurial leaders are making an impact at the intersection of sports and mental health.
By
May 21, 2025

Posted in Entrepreneurial Leadership, Insights