Solar Oven Manufacturer, Solavore, LLC Receives National Certification as a Women's Business Enterprise by the Women's Business Enterprise National Council

ST. PAUL, MN--(Marketwired - Jul 25, 2016) - Solavore, LLC, a women-owned social enterprise committed to the manufacture and global distribution of 100% fuel-free clean cooking technology, announced today that it received national certification as a Women's Business Enterprise by the Women's Business Development Center - Minnesota (WBDC-MN), a regional certifying partner of the Women's Business Enterprise National Council (WBENC).

WBENC's national standard of certification is a meticulous process including an in-depth review of the business and site inspection. The certification process is designed to confirm the business is at least 51% owned, operated and controlled by a woman or women.

"We are thrilled to receive this certification from WBENC," said Anne Patterson, CEO of Solavore. "We expect our solar ovens to help their (mostly female) owners in the developing world improve their health by reducing wood-fire cooking, save time spent gathering firewood, and generate income by providing goods to sell in the marketplace. Local assembly of ovens creates jobs as does the sales, distribution, and support of new ovens. WBENC certification shares the fact that we are women helping women."

Founded by former tech industry senior executive, Anne Patterson, Solavore™ is the manufacturer of the Sport solar oven, a 100% renewable energy solar oven. A solar oven can be used in your back yard, on a boat or a camping trip to cook a broad range of delicious food including meat, poultry, vegetables, fish, slow cooked meals and baked goods, without using cooking fuel of any kind other than sunlight. It is also a big time saver because you can literally "set it and forget it" and in a few hours the food will be perfectly cooked when you return.

Every Solavore solar oven purchased helps to fund a Solavore Sport somewhere in the world where an open fire is still the main kitchen appliance. The benefits that Solavore Works, Solavore's corporate social responsibility program, brings to communities in the developing world include:

• Respiratory health: freedom from common diseases such as pneumonia, which kills more women and children each year than malaria or AIDS
• The removal of one of the main causes of deforestation in the developing world
• Savings in energy expenditures, which can range up to 25-50% of a family's budget
• Water pasteurization and food dehydration
• The ability for girls to attend school rather than spend their days collecting firewood with their mothers
• Increased income generation, enabling a woman to sell the food that she bakes or dehydrates in her solar oven

Designed by engineers from 3M, the Solavore Sport is a virtually indestructible, retained-heat box-type solar oven made of rugged, durable, lightweight injection-molded nylon resin. Surround insulation and two-pot capacity enable unattended, family-size year-round cooking. The included water pasteurization indicator adds clean water to the Sport's versatility, along with slow-cooking, baking, and dehydrating. The Sport solar oven is an industry leader in price, performance, family-size capacity and rugged durability.

By including women-owned businesses among their suppliers, corporations and government agencies demonstrate their commitment to fostering diversity and the continued development of their supplier/vendor diversity programs.

About Solavore:

Solavore is a women-owned social enterprise whose mission is to promote clean-cooking technology around the world. Solavore pledges to use its profits to remain independent and self-sustaining while providing clean cooking alternatives to the world's 3 billion people who are still cooking over open fires. Over 20,000 Solavore Sport ovens have been deployed in 60 countries. Solavore is an active member of the Global Alliance for Clean Cook Stoves and Solar Cookers International. For further information please visit www.solavore.com. Follow Solavore on Facebook at www.facebook.com/solavore, on Instagram and on Twitter @Solavore.

About WBENC

The Women's Business Enterprise National Council is the nation's largest third party certifier of businesses owned and operated by women in the United States. WBENC is a resource for the more than 700 US companies and government agencies that rely on WBENC's certification as an integral part of their supplier diversity programs.